Written by work experience student, Evan
No matter who you are or what you do, we all make mistakes while speaking. With the way the world currently behaves, we must make an effort to minimise these mistakes and speak in the most professional, well-rounded way possible. But how can you tackle these challenges to ensure effective communication between your employees, your customers and all other stakeholders involved in the activity of your business?
Talking in front of audiences, assigning jobs to employees or responding to feedback can cause misinterpretation and create risk for your company. Risk that is easily avoidable when the right individuals are chosen to deliver the message.
There are over one million terms in the English language, many of which you have never heard of. Yet these are the key elements which determine the quality of your communications.
Have you ever needed to tell a client bad news but struggled to phrase it? You may have had to use euphemisms and dysphemisms – the building blocks to effective communication. Take ‘banana republic’ for example, a cheery and humorous saying used to describe something that isn’t cheery, like a corrupt government. This is a euphemism.
It also works the other way and can have the opposite effect. Making positive sentences sound negative, like saying ‘old codger’ instead of ‘happy birthday’ to the elderly in an insulting manner is a dysphemism – a simple change that completely alters the tone of the phrase. To a friend, this may be appropriate, but in a work setting you should assume otherwise. Take those extra precautions to ensure what you say is always of a professional standard.
Language and tone are central to communication, and with a PR agency helping you deliver the right message, you are already in a strong position.
One common mistake is the use of contronyms without context. A contronym is a word with two different meanings and can completely change the action as a result if not specified. ‘Consult’ is a word that crops up a lot in corporate situations, but you must be careful of its double meaning. It can be used to either take or give advice, and without context, it could confuse the person you’re talking to.
There is also a possibility that eggcorns and mondegreens are misused, two silly sounding words with detrimental impact on the way information is distributed and receive. Eggcorns are misheard or misunderstood words and phrases that are substituted with something similar-sounding, that still makes sense in context. In vocal communication and conversations, the impact is little. But through email and media, this can impact the contents of the message.
Mondegreens on the other hand focus on the misinterpretation of a phrase for a new one, without a plausible meaning. These are easier to spot compared to eggcorns, but still affect the reputation your company upholds. You must be careful when using words with multiple meanings to ensure that business instructions and operations are clear.
Presenting to stakeholders is a particular area of business communication imposing risk. Consumers, shareholders and suppliers can all notice when you are using pleonasms – using more words than necessary, better known as ‘waffle’. This is often a sign of nerves and imprecision. Instead, your focus should be on creating a short, punchy message and delivering it with confidence.
An example of a pleonasm in business context would be for two workers to say, “let’s collaborate together on this project”. Although the message is clear, the use of ‘together’ is redundant. In business where important decisions are made, it’s important to be direct to avoid the likely use of a pleonasm.
Another way to deliver impact in fewer words is through a portmanteau, deriving from the French word ‘Porte-manteau’ for two-part piece luggage. This involves blending the sounds and combining the meanings of two different words, like smog and spork. It improves the brevity and memorability of the information passed throughout a business.
Finally, malaphors and malapropism refer to the misconfiguration and changing of words and phrases to create another with a different meaning. Again, without notice of these being used, it can harm your company. You must be aware of this risk and consider the impacts it would have. A famous example for a malapropism was by NFL coach Mike Smith, who said “be sure to put some of those neutrons on it” when he meant to say croutons. Whilst it was a funny mistake, ‘neutrons’ instead of ‘croutons’ drastically changed the meaning behind the original message.
A malaphor is where you unintentionally change common sayings and cross the two – ‘like a wolf in cheap clothing’ involves the joining together of phrases ‘wolf in sheep’s clothing’ and ‘cheap clothing’.
The language you use can feel like a huge mountain to tackle when trying to maintain effective communication throughout your business. With professional PR support on your side, you can feel confident that the choices you make are the right ones – it only takes one word or a slight tone change to completely transform a message.
