Acronyms and words

 

This past week I was at a conference and during a lunch break we had a very interesting conversation with regard to acronyms and words in general. We were talking about how one word or acronym can have several meanings. This conversation also leads into how IT people seem to have their own language and a lot of other people have no idea what they are saying.

It was a lot of fun just sitting and listening to some of the conversation because even IT people have a hard time understanding other IT individuals because of the words that they use. We were talking about how you explain something to senior management in terms that they understand and move it away from the technical terms. This conversation was a lot of fun, as I am one of those that doesn’t understand the technical terms very often and need it in simpler terms. It was nice to have this conversation with a bunch of technical people because they agreed with me. Technical people must understand that they have their own language and not everyone will understand what they are saying.

The conversation also went into the messages that IT individuals write for the end-users and how confusing they can be. Most end-users don’t understand the technical terms, but some IT individuals write their messages as if everyone should understand what they are saying and if they don’t that end-user must be stupid. Yes, I have heard someone in IT say that if an end-user doesn’t understand the message, they are just stupid and don’t understand anything. I read a message from this IT person, and even I had a hard time figuring out what they were saying, and I understood the product they were talking about.

I know that this doesn’t just apply to the IT field because most other fields have their own language and terms and if you are not part of that field, it’s hard to follow a discussion. So, when you are talking to someone that is not in your specific expertise remember to try and remove some of the terms that are unique and put in some different words, and it might help everyone.