DRANG'S LAW

Drang's Law:

The more a person talks of the importance of 'good communications', the less likely they are to practice it.

Clarification: A "person" in this case may mean an actual human being, or a corporate entity, such as a business, a cultural, religious, or educational institution, a government agency, and so forth.

Observation: The "person" in question is probably aware that they (he, she, it) have a problem with communicating, but is probably clueless that they (etc.) are the problem, and that, in classical fashion, simply talking about it won't fix it.

Back in the depths of time, when I was a cub Drang, the Army ran me through a quick course on communications, aimed primarily at tactical, radio-telephone communications, which emphasized the Three C's: All Communications must be

• Clear
• Complete, and
  
• Concise
  

Clarity: Say what you need to say, with a minimum of jargon, slang, or technical or vague language that might be open to interpretation, or misunderstanding.
Completeness: Say it all, don't leave anything out, don't assume, don't take anything for granted, and don't leave anything open to interpretation.
Concision: (Yes, "concision" is a word. I looked it up.) Say what you need to say, within the parameters of Clarity and Completeness, with the minimum words necessary. If you can say it in 500 words, do so, don't try to cut it to 400 and don't waste 600.

I am reminded of Robert A. Heinlein's James Forrestal Lecture at the US Naval Academy (AKA Annapolis) in which he spoke of a course he had at that institution on "Order Giving": When it was your turn in the barrel, you were given a situation and the requirement to draft an order to deal with it, and had a certain (minimal) amount of time to do so. Your classmates spent the rest of the period tearing your order apart: Could it be misunderstood? Could it be clearer? Could it have been given in fewer words? And so forth. From his description it was hell, but he also stated explicitly that "it was a wonderful class."
(Note: Not surprisingly, this lecture does not seem to be available on the net. I suppose it is also possible that I am mis-remembering the source of this anecdote of his, but I don't think so. If I find a source I'll post it. Maybe my Google-fu is weak tonight.)

The fact that I spent the first half of this evening's shift at work cursing my colleagues for losing a request for a day off that I was sure a normally absolutely rock-solid, reliable, employee must have submitted, and the rest of it cursing management for not telling me that the same employee was starting training for another assignment today, has nothing to do with this little rant...