Communication

Years ago, in what seems to be another lifetime...I had a boss (the owner, entrepreneur, founder and vision behind the enterprise) who came back from a conference with an urgency & unbridled enthusiasm to have the word "Communication" inserted on all our printed materials. Brochures, invoices, purchase orders, envelopes, business cards - everything.

Working for an entrepreneurial spirit comes with its own array benefits and challenges but this was a new one. Some of you may recall that the purchase of printed items was once a very big deal. Before the days of all electronic everything, boxes of custom printed items were the norm. Today, businesses print the letterhead, invoices or whatever inline with the content. The stalwart exception being business cards. Somehow they remain elusive enough to in-house printing that printers now lead with their ability to custom print business cards as the hook for their other services.

Back to my story though. Why did the owner want the word communication on all our printed materials? What was the import of this word? This skill? Why? He shared his conversion experience and insights. He reinforced his new found belief that all humanity, innovation and profit rest upon "communication". So, the print order was placed and we wondered. We talked about it and considered the request, the word, the concept and...we thought about it.

In the end I'm not sure we ever got what he wanted us to get. No one ever adopted his conversion experience. Yet I'm still wondering and over the last two decades I've always returned to the consideration of how communication - good, thoughtful, skilled, present minded, clear, illuminating communication can be the hinge for creativity, efficiency and gratitude.

I often wonder if his conversion was driven by his desire to be heard and understood while aspiring to clarity in his expression. Maybe. I know it has for me.