You’re not a retard, so don’t write like one

In a recent post I mentioned a message that some retard at Microsoft had built into Microsoft Word. I didn’t intend that post as a specific criticism of Microsoft; many suppliers of PC software and online services seem to have retards writing their messages.

Here are a few examples:

Hmm, that’s not the right password. [Is that “Hmm” supposed to be the sound the software makes while it’s “thinking”?] 

Whoa there! There’s nothing here. Whatever you were looking for doesn’t currently exist at this address. Unless you were looking for this error page, in which case: Congrats! You totally found it.

Congrats on successfully changing your email address! We really like your new one. It’s totally awesome! [Am I supposed to believe that the software is so sophisticated that it possesses aesthetic sense but simultaneously is so callow that it uses the vocabulary of a skateboarder?] Now you can log in to Your Account Page using the new email address you provided to us! Cool, huh? [No, it’s not cool. It’s just a mundane function.]

Well, this is embarrassing.

He’s dead, Jim!

Whoa there!

Oops!

Awk!

Ack!

Analysis of the examples

This kind of diction is not clever; it’s frivolous and puerile. It’s not helpful to your readers; it’s distracting. And it’s not polite to your readers; it’s offensive, because it presumes the reader is an intimate friend and is as ditzy as the writer.

In contrast, here are a few messages that are clear, helpful, polite and dignified:

The information you entered does not match our records. Please check your information and try again.

Your account is loading. This may take a moment.

Please wait while you are logged in...

These messages sound like they were written by intelligent, well-balanced grown-ups. The writers have used no hype, interjections, exclamation points or Star Trek quotations. And they have used no false intimacy or false enthusiasm.

The Takeaway: If you are in charge of writing anything that will be read by customers, don’t write like a frat boy, dude, ingénue, bimbo, scatterbrain or flibbertigibbet. In other words, don’t offend the people who enable your employer to pay you.

See disclaimer.

Random thoughts (5)

Four decades ago, I was the manager of a corporate department that frequently needed temporary secretarial help. By far, the two best secretaries I ever hired were a young Mormon and a retired U.S. Marine. Since then, in the course of business, I’ve met other Mormons and Marines, all superior producers. I’m self-employed now, and that’s probably a good thing, because corporate types tell me that nowadays managers can be fired for noticing differences in productivity.

I used to patronize a certain long-established local printing company. One day in 2008 when I was picking up my letterhead and envelopes, the saleswoman announced, “We’re a green printer now.” This mature, practical, capable woman whom I had known for many years was disturbingly out of character; she was wearing a dreamy, cultish expression and her voice was ethereal and creepy. A few months later, the owner suddenly laid everyone off, closed the business and sold the presses. Coincidence? I don’t know; nobody from the company would talk publicly about anything.

Do you remember this? Customer service reps who asked you for your telephone number would read it back to you, to check whether they had typed it correctly. Well, you’ve probably noticed that a lot of reps don’t bother to do that any more. And the ones who do bother will read back only the last four digits. Sometimes, when I’m not in a hurry, I’ll experiment. I’ll say, “No, my number is not 2789. It’s 603-279-2789.” Usually, the rep will respond, “Right. 2789.” Or sometimes, “2789. Right.” I call these people “The Oblivitons” – short for “oblivious automatons.”

We writers are usually chagrined (I know I am) whenever we learn that we have committed a fallacy – that is to say, whenever we make a mistake that’s so common it actually has a name. The fact is, we don’t want to be common in any way. Like Luisa in The Fantasticks, we pray, “Please, God, please, don’t let me be normal!”

The Takeaway: Be here now.

See disclaimer.

People judge you by your diction

As you have noticed, many people in the professions talk and write like children. By doing so, they detract from their professional credibility, even when they apparently are trying to bolster it. Here’s a good example:

In an interview with Elle magazine, a professor of psychology argues that professional psychologists are better at giving advice than are the authors of self-help books. But she fails in her delivery, by using awkward, juvenile diction:

Professor Sonja Lyubomirsky, who studies happiness at the University of California, Riverside, says, “We [psychologists] just sort of ignore that whole [self-help] section of the bookstore... We set it as so different from what we do, like, ‘Well, we do science, and those people are just spouting off their ideas.’ ” (Highlighting added.)

I do not know Professor Lyubomirsky. I haven’t read her books or papers. I’ve never heard her give a speech. For all I know, she may be the most brilliant and knowledgeable professor of psychology in the world. But that quotation makes her sound like a teenager.

The Takeaway: If you want to be respected as a professional, always talk and write like a professional. People judge you by your diction – even people who insist they would never do such a thing.

See disclaimer.

Don't be trendy – be considerate

Don’t abuse the preposition around

A corporate writer recently wrote “The company wanted to improve its processes around managing change.” The preposition of, or the preposition for, would have been more precise than the preposition around.

A political writer wrote “centering assessment around common work.” It should have been “centering assessment on common work.”

Very likely, these writers abused around simply because they wanted to follow the cutesy trend of promiscuously abusing around. The writers indulged their desire to be cutesy at the expense of their readers, who must pause for a few moments and decode the sentences. In other words, the writers were being fatuous, lazy and inconsiderate.

Other cutesy, semi-literate fads include the abuse of comfortable, drive, excited, issue, passion, self-esteem and sustainability. Such abuse not only confuses your readers but also dulls your mind.

The Takeaway: Be considerate of your readers; don’t follow semi-literate fads. Following semi-literate fads may cause your semi-literate readers to admire you, but it will almost certainly cause your literate readers to disdain you.

See disclaimer.

Sending the wrong message

A few years ago, while driving around in Vermont, I saw an electrician’s shingle: “Sure-Fire Electric.” The electrician probably meant something like the dictionary definition of sure-fire (adj. Informal. Bound to be successful or perform as expected). However, he overlooked an important fact: one reason why the typical homeowner hires a professional electrician is that he is afraid that if he does his own wiring he may burn down his house. In an electrician’s company name, fire is probably the worst possible word besides electrocution.

More recently, I noticed a tax preparation service called “Taxing Matters.” The tax preparer behind this frivolous name is probably competent, but her business name doesn’t do her justice. A sober name could inspire more confidence.

And speaking of frivolous company names, in 2006 a woman in Texas actually named her PR firm “Blabbermouth” (n. Informal. One who talks indiscreetly).* When I saw that name, my first thought was to imagine how strange it would look at the bottom of a non-disclosure agreement. My second thought was to imagine a pharmaceutical company inadvertently disclosing a few thousand patients’ names via email and then asking its PR firm, Blabbermouth, to prepare a press release to explain the indiscretion.

The Takeaway: If you are considering a certain word or phrase as the name of your product, service or company, be sure to study all the denotations and connotations of the word or phrase. Put yourself in your prospective customer’s place and imagine all the ways in which he may react – both positively and negatively – to the proposed name. This is not to say that you should skip over an otherwise good name because it has one unfortunate connotation; it is only to say that you should make an informed decision.

See disclaimer.

*In 2009, the firm was renamed “Penman.”

Narcissism can ruin your copy

Here’s a great example of how narcissism can ruin your copy.

A blogger gets an opportunity to interview the renowned management consultant Dr. Tom Peters. What a wonderful start.

The blogger interviews Dr. Peters.

But when the blogger publishes the post, "When Soft is Hard: An Interview with Dr. Tom Peters (Part I)," she talks about herself at length. Below are the first 400 words, color-coded as follows:

green = words about life in general
blue = words about Tom Peters
red = words about the interviewer

Holding ourselves back.

We do this in conscious — and unconscious — ways every day.

When I met Dr. Tom Peters on his trip to Iowa, I was made aware of how I was holding back an important piece of myself.

Perhaps my light-bulb moment will shine some light for you.

Tom is the best-selling author of In Search of Excellence, The Little BIG Things and a dozen other books.

Primarily trained as a behavioralist, he studied under pioneers in our field, including Daryl and Sandra Bem, Albert Bandura, and Philip Zimbardo. These master puzzle solvers showed him that there is a science of human behavior. There are ways people and groups predictably interact and behave.

So Tom is a brilliant scientist who observes and studies human behavior.

And…he is unapologetically, unabashedly passionate about people.

Why was meeting him such an eye-opener for me?

Because when I went through a life threatening illness a few years ago, I came out of the experience softer.

I didn’t know what to do with parts of my identity.

The scientist felt too hard. And the lawyer felt downright harsh.

I felt called to my Best Life Design work and it was an important part of my healing.

Yet, at the time I went to hear Tom speak, I was feeling a growing dissatisfaction with how ‘soft’ this work was beginning to feel. Although I continued to consult with select private athletic and corporate clients, I had drastically cut back on my work as a performance psychologist using science to help individuals and teams optimize performance.

And in one moment (…when the student is ready, the teacher appears) it all came back together for me.

What did Tom say that opened my eyes, reminding me of what I’d forgotten?

1. What’s hard is soft…and what’s soft is hard.

We tend to think of people and life design as soft. We throw values and relationships into that mix, too. Then we have the magic category of hard things, like research, systems, and strategies.

This is why I’d been struggling bringing the science of success that I know so well to the mushy place I’d been sitting in since my recovery. I’d been delighting in the preciousness of living and helping others design their life in a way that supports the greatest use of their gifts. Meanwhile, my inner scientist was shaking her head, questioning why I would [400 words]

The word count:

Life in general: 13 words
Tom Peters: 127 words
Interviewer: 260 words
TOTAL: 400 words

The Takeaway: Narcissism can ruin your copy. Don’t let it. Unless you’re writing a memoir or a personal essay, strictly limit your presence in the text. Your readers want to read about your subject, not about you. If you keep popping up in the text, they may conclude that you’re a flibbertigibbet and decide to stop reading.

See disclaimer.

Shown: A section of Echo and Narcissus, by John William Waterhouse, 1903. In Greek mythology, Narcissus was a hunter who fell in love with his own reflection in a pool.

The Wall Street Journal goes cutesy

Not many years ago, it was a rare event to spot an example of cutesy diction in The Wall Street Journal. The paper was a bastion of maturity and seriousness.

But cutesy diction is becoming more frequent in The Wall Street Journal. The trend is deliberate, as indicated by the diction in a recent letter from the managing editor (boldface added):

Dear Reader,

The Wall Street Journal [sic – no italics] has a crucial role each weekday to inform readers about the world and the world of business, but our personality has always been a tad different on weekends. From this Saturday, that personality will be distinctly different, with a refurbished front page and two new sections that will provide you with an entire weekend’s worth of compelling and amusing reading.

A features section will offer a combination of great reportage, original writing and unpredictable wit, and include a book review lift-out that will carry comprehensive critiques of the books you should read and warn you about those tomes better left on the shelf.

...

An even better indicator of the paper’s eagerness to become cutesy is its cutesy, bromidic tagline, “live in the know” [sic – no caps or punctuation].

The Takeaway: Don’t let careless diction distract your readers. For example, don’t use cutesy language to describe your company or yourself, unless you’re in a cute business such as baby clothes. If you distract your readers with precious language, they may infer that you are not a serious grown-up.

See disclaimer.