The Power of (Mis)communication

Communication is a basis for human survival. We don’t really understand the gravity of this simple statement until we see the effects of miscommunication or worse, no communication at all.

Recently, there have been scores of shootings in schools around the United States and even more threats of shootings. Some schools refrained from communicating those threats to parents when they deemed it unnecessary; their reasoning being that they didn’t want to worry parents without cause. When the information came forth, parents were livid. They are now debating if they can trust the management in these schools with the safety of their children. No communication, in this case, is a misfortune for the school.

In India, this past week, an elderly lady sparked a bomb scare at the Mumbai airport near the baggage claim area because she had mistakenly tagged her bag with “Bomb to Brisbane” instead of “Bombay to Brisbane”. The whole airport had to be cordoned off and passengers ushered away in order to assess the threat. Miscommunication, in this case, caused a lot of discomfort to airport officials and passengers alike.

In our everyday lives, everyone of us has suffered from miscommunication (or no communication) fin some form or the other. In other words, it is so ingrained in our everyday life that we don’t even notice it. Some relationships suffer from no communication at all, some suffer from too much of sharing/communicating and some just suffer from the childhood game of “Chinese Whispers”.

In the work place, its such a coveted asset, that it can be the deciding factor between you getting or not getting that job you, so desperately, are trying to get. I started my career in the United States in the AD Strategy and Communications team at Ford Motor Company. Though I never worked on the communications side of the team, I was communicating every day through the scores of emails that I would send. I had a habit of getting my emails checked by my manager before sending them out for fear that I would miscommunicate and considering my audience, that wasn’t a risk I was willing to take. In addition, I watched as my communications team mates worked on and refined scores of videos, articles and materials for meetings and sessions. My respect for their skills increased every day.

Many of us are driven by the fear of the perception of our communication skills. Speaking for myself, fear of perception makes me take the easy way out (or thats what I think)! I tend to not communicate at all and that is perceived as miscommunication on my part. In the rare case that I share, it opens an unknown Pandora’s box and then that is perceived as miscommunication. That perception, threatens relationships, both personal and professional. This whole mess is enough to make me swear off any form of communication altogether! But, here I am. This is called the need to communicate! A new day starts, bringing us a new opportunity to (mis)communicate!