Pick up the Phone / Get in your Car / Hop on a Plane

Mar 1 2007

One of my good friends is Chris Knudsen. Chris has become one of the better known bloggers in Utah. He teaches Entrepreneurship at Westminster College in Salt Lake City. He has earned a lot of entrepreneurship battle scars. Some of those scars were formed right along side of me because Chris helped me co-found my first company, GearTrade. He’s pretty dang smart too boot.

Anyway, Chris posted an entry on his blog a bit back about I own a business so I’m an entrepreneur…right?. I and many others made comments, and in the exchange between my comment to the post and Chris’s reply, he and I realized something: Written communication (email, blogs, comments, letters, message boards, instant messages, text messages, etc.) a lot of times is just plain less efficient at getting communication done. We weren’t on the same page with my understanding of the full meaning of his original thoughts, with his understanding of my desire to add to the conversation through my comments, or with his reply back to my comment. He followed up his post with another about “Listening” to what we read . We had a great PHONE conversation about this very thing the other day, and we talked about how ‘speaking’ and ‘listening’ with written communication is very challenging. So we decided to write a post together expounding what we talked about. Here is what Chris and I came up with:

When was the last time you misunderstood someone? When a conversation you had escalated for no reason? We you found yourself on the giving or receiving end of a good rant and personal attack? We would bet dollars to donuts that odds are it happened because of written communication.

People more and more seem to be shunning face to face communication. It seems so easy to fire off an email, to post some sort of aggressive comment, to jump on a message board as ‘anonymous’ and tell the world what you think. In many ways, you can be a coward and hide behind your keyboard. But you loose so much interaction that is true communication. Body language. Tone of voice. Subtle meanings. Quick back and forth dynamics as the conversation takes on it’s own direction and life.

We’re not saying written communication is completely bad. The time savings provided by it has changed the world. We both blog. We both comment on blogs. We post on message boards. We both send A LOT of emails. We’re just saying that written communication comes with its own set of challenges if you’re going to communicate efficiently. On the flip-side, because of its structure, written communication can serve as a way to focus and hone your thoughts so that when you do engage in face-to-face speaking you can present your thoughts more clearly.

Just remember: when you are going to discuss serious topics via written communication, ‘speak’ carefully and clearly as you write. ‘Listen’ to what the writer is saying. It’s a challenge. Everyone can do better at it. And finally, we really think that in a lot of ways, sometimes it just makes more sense to pick up the phone, get in your car, or hop on a airplane and get some serious communicating done face-to-face.

As a side note, it was fun to work with Chris on this, maybe we’ll do it again sometime. We might very well be able to change the world if we collaborate enough. ;)

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6 Comments; Filed under Communication, Other Bloggers
  • http://www.briantayloronline.info/ Brian Taylor

    Jeremy…

    Great post! I agree that face-to-face meetings are the best way to exchange ideas, gain clarity on points of agreement and disagreement, and demonstrate that you have a genuine interest in the person(s) involved in the conversation (I also agree that body language conveys much more than the spoken word).

    I spend the majority of the day on the phone with my clients and partners. This communication keeps the relationships intact and allows all parties to collaborate in real-time. It also gives me the chance to connect with my clients and partners in a more relaxed and social manner (it’s amazing how much business you can get done when you don’t talk about business).

    In regard to written communication, I find it works best for bullet points and/or quick updates (my wife loves to tease me about this – she says I couldn’t write a short e-mail if my life depended on it!). I can identify with sending/receiving A LOT of e-mail – I can clear out my inbox early in the morning and by noon it looks like an explosion in a print factory. I try to respond by voice to my e-mail before I send a reply – a ringing phone will be answered more quickly than a reply sitting in an inbox full of e-mail.

    Continued success,

    BT

  • http://www.briantayloronline.info Brian Taylor

    Jeremy…

    Great post! I agree that face-to-face meetings are the best way to exchange ideas, gain clarity on points of agreement and disagreement, and demonstrate that you have a genuine interest in the person(s) involved in the conversation (I also agree that body language conveys much more than the spoken word).

    I spend the majority of the day on the phone with my clients and partners. This communication keeps the relationships intact and allows all parties to collaborate in real-time. It also gives me the chance to connect with my clients and partners in a more relaxed and social manner (it’s amazing how much business you can get done when you don’t talk about business).

    In regard to written communication, I find it works best for bullet points and/or quick updates (my wife loves to tease me about this – she says I couldn’t write a short e-mail if my life depended on it!). I can identify with sending/receiving A LOT of e-mail – I can clear out my inbox early in the morning and by noon it looks like an explosion in a print factory. I try to respond by voice to my e-mail before I send a reply – a ringing phone will be answered more quickly than a reply sitting in an inbox full of e-mail.

    Continued success,

    BT

  • http://www.ugandamissions2006.blogspot.com/ Sandi

    Hi, Jeremy!

    While I certainly believe that face-to-face/verbal communication is very valuable and effective, I believe that written communication is also very valuable and effective. Sometimes I find that, being the at times emotional person that I am, when I am speaking to someone (either in person or via phone), I don’t always communicate my meaning as well as I’d like. When I can sit down and write out what I want to communicate, I have an opportunity to read, re-read, and revise until it says just what I want it to say. (That’s why it takes me sooooo long to write a post on my Missions Blog….)

    The other plus for written communication is that you have a written record of what was said, and if there was an emotional confrontation involved, the reader can go back and re-read at a later time when he or she has calmed down. Sometimes that’s when the person really “hears” what was said.

    I do have to agree, though, that there are some times, when it is much better to “pick up the phone, get in your car, or hop on a airplane and get some serious communicating done face-to-face.”

    Appreciate you!
    Sandi

  • http://www.ugandamissions2006.blogspot.com/ Sandi

    Hi, Jeremy!

    While I certainly believe that face-to-face/verbal communication is very valuable and effective, I believe that written communication is also very valuable and effective. Sometimes I find that, being the at times emotional person that I am, when I am speaking to someone (either in person or via phone), I don’t always communicate my meaning as well as I’d like. When I can sit down and write out what I want to communicate, I have an opportunity to read, re-read, and revise until it says just what I want it to say. (That’s why it takes me sooooo long to write a post on my Missions Blog….)

    The other plus for written communication is that you have a written record of what was said, and if there was an emotional confrontation involved, the reader can go back and re-read at a later time when he or she has calmed down. Sometimes that’s when the person really “hears” what was said.

    I do have to agree, though, that there are some times, when it is much better to “pick up the phone, get in your car, or hop on a airplane and get some serious communicating done face-to-face.”

    Appreciate you!
    Sandi

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