[Foundation-l] Communicating effectively: Wikimedia needs clear language now

[Erik Moeller]

On Sun, Feb 19, 2012 at 3:16 AM, Tom Morris <tom at tommorris.org> wrote:

> Mostly though, thanks to the Internet and multinational corporations,
> godawful business jargon crosses all national borders. Words and
> phrases like 'onboarding', 'stakeholders', 'mission statements',
> 'platforms', 'proactive', 'sectors' and pretty much anything
> 'strategic', for instance.

Terms like "strategy", "mission statement" and "stakeholder" have
concrete organizational meaning. Yes, they are also often used as part
of marketing copy or organizational copy in ways that are unhelpful,
because people who aren't good writers feel the need to plug holes by
picking from the shared vocabulary of organization-speak. That doesn't
make them meaningless, anymore than the fact that every idiot has an
opinion on quantum physics makes quantum physics meaningless.

Where I agree with you: It's the job of any writer to make their
message accessible and understandable, where possible by using plain
language. It's probably good to maintain a healthy degree of prejudice
against "organizational jargon", just because it is so prevalent and
often used poorly.

However, organizational development and management are serious human
endeavors that merit open-mindedness and willingness to discover and
learn on the reader's part just as much as they merit clarity and
brevity on the writer's or speaker's part. Being simplistic about the
"corporate world" is no more charming or noble than is ignorance about
any other field.

-- 
Erik Möller
VP of Engineering and Product Development, Wikimedia Foundation

Support Free Knowledge: https://wikimediafoundation.org/wiki/Donate