Coming To A Common Ground
There’s many things I do that get accolades from many people. Sometimes, when one has had a nice string of successes, one starts to think one can’t do any wrong, that their finger is on the pulse of the world.
And that’s when reality kicks in. A friend of my wife’s asked me to design some wedding invitations for her over the weekend. So, I sat down, though designing cards isn’t my strong suit, and put together something that I thought was pretty nice. I showed it to my wife, and said she thought it was perfect, and that was that.
That is, until the following afternoon, when her friend came over. I showed her the design and she said “I hate it.” Plain and simple. I was stunned; I don’t hear that often. I asked her what she hated and she said the front design; she thought it was hokey. She loved what I wrote inside, but absolutely hated the cover.
The next hour was frustrating, as she tried to explain what it was she wanted and I kept trying to, first make it for her, then find it for her. It’s really hard to communicate when neither party is familiar with the terms they’re really trying to use, and words like “dookickey” and “swirlies” just don’t translate well. We finally found a term we both liked, “pencil sketch”, and within minutes found something that she liked. I finished up the card, saved it, put it on a CD and off she went, happy as could be.
Sometimes that’s just how it works in the world, and in the world of leadership and management. There are many words in our lexicon, but sometimes there’s just no known word, at the time, for what one is trying to communicate and for what the other person is trying to understand. Sometimes, it just takes some time before two individuals can come to an understanding of what the other is trying to say, but once that takes place, then it’s usually smooth sailing from that point forward.
Every person deserves understanding. With patience and a little bit of determination, the results can be pleasing to everyone.
