PRACTICE OPTIMIZATION FOR PROFESSIONALS
  • Home
    • Video >
      • The Alignment Doctrine
    • Communication >
      • Elements >
        • The Golden Rule
        • The Five Essential Qualities
        • The Five Essential Questions
        • The Five Step Cycle
        • The Ten Commandments
        • The Ten Sources of Authority
      • Modules >
        • Modules A-M >
          • Avoiding amateurism
          • Change: Understanding It, Facing It, Profiting From It
          • Communication for Long Term Relationship
          • Communications Horror Stories
          • Communications that blow up in your face
          • Communicating toward success
          • Earning the Right to Be Heard
          • Gerunds, Mesolects and Other Arcane Terms of Art
          • Having a Toad Day
          • Healthy Fear
          • Hippos and Raccoons-- Deadly Underestimation
          • How I Moved From Doing What I Liked to Doing What I Loved
          • How to Be on the Same Wavelength as Your Audience
          • How to Pick Up a Porcupine-- Dealing With Difficult People
          • Key of Trust
          • Manipulation
          • Mastering the Technologies
          • Mining the Subconscious
        • Modules N-Z >
          • Quick and Dirty-- the 80/20 Rule
          • Sabotaging Your Message
          • Scar Tissue
          • Secrets of the Druids
          • Some Specific Approaches to Communications
          • Specific audiences
          • Symbolism-- the Heart of the Communicative Process
          • Talking to Yourself and Why You Should Do It
          • The Difference Between Leadership and Management
          • The Eyes Eat First
          • The Eyes Have It
          • The Lizard Within-- What Your Reptilian Brain Makes You Do
          • The Media of Communication
          • The Respect Deficit
          • The Secret of Authenticity
          • Thinking About the Kinds of English
          • Websites, Blogs and Newsletters
          • When you don't have time to plan
          • When You'd Rather Shoot Yourself
          • Who's your audience? Targeted communication.
      • About us >
        • Karen Bowley
  • Norman Bowley
  • FREE
  • Services
    • Keynote Speaking
    • Training
    • Coaching
    • Troubleshooting
    • Consulting
    • Writing >
      • Ghost Writing
      • Transitional Ghost Writing
  • Testimonials
  • Blog

Much Adieu About Nothing

14/2/2017

0 Comments

 
Picture
He was bright, witty and a great moderator. But he got off to a bad start. Having introduced the panel, he turned to the camera and smiled, “With no further adieu, let’s move on.”

I thought I was going to have a stroke.

He clearly did well in law school, but in high school he must have been late for the class where “Much Ado About Nothing” was being discussed. “Ado” means “a great fuss or uproar”.

And it must have been a snow day when “adieu” was being taught. “Adieu” means “to God” and is one of the French forms of “good-bye” (which in old English was “God bwye” -God be with ye-, thus pretty close to the French.)

The term “with no further adieu” should be reserved for lingering good-byes at the airport. Otherwise, it’s “with no further ado”.

I’ve also heard some professionals utter “It’s a mute point, don’t you think?” Better they’d stayed mute! “Mute” means “silent”, “moot” means “uncertain or debatable”. And the list goes on...

When George Dubya used to warn about “nucular war”, he simply confirmed our guess he was a simpleton. Stand-up comedians feast on such malapropisms: “Having just one wife is called monotony.” It would all be funny, except it isn’t.

You see, the problem with using the wrong word is that the listener’s brain tells him it’s silly. If you’re a stand-up comic, silly is good, but not when you’re trying to make a serious point. If you’re on stage trying to convey a serious corporate message, or drafting pleadings, or pitching a project proposal, the last thing you want is to have your audience laugh at you.

There is a very simple and inflexible rule: if you want your audience to take you seriously, you need to take your audience seriously. In professional communication you can’t afford goofy language.

Why is this? I think there are two reasons. First, the zit factor. Second, the “Squirrel!” syndrome.
​
Let’s say you’re having a critical conversation with a sales prospect. You’ve researched and prepared well. But, right on the end of your nose is a Rudolph-certified zit the size of a golf ball. You know that their attention is 90% on the zit and 10% on your conversation. It’s not fair, but life’s not fair. Blurting out the wrong word is exactly like that, except that you can control it.

Similarly, every listener suffers from “Squirrel!” syndrome. If you don’t know what I mean, ask a friend who owns a dog. It takes very little to distract the listener, and a malapropism is just the squirrel to do the trick.

When you’re out to persuade, you can’t allow your audience to lose focus. Don’t serve distraction up on a silver platter.

​Remember, when you finish your presentation, you want the audience to complement you. Or is that compliment? Dang, where’s my dictionary?

Image attribution:  By William Shakespeare, Valentine Simmes (printer), Andrew Wise (publisher), William Aspley (bookseller) - Folger Shakespeare Library Digital Image Collection http://luna.folger.edu/luna/servlet/s/hyyrn6, CC BY-SA 4.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=40929008

0 Comments



Leave a Reply.

    Author

    Norman Bowley teaches the Alignment Doctrine and the Client Code-- secrets to building the professional practice you and your clients deserve.

    Archives

    June 2020
    April 2020
    February 2019
    October 2018
    August 2018
    July 2018
    February 2018
    January 2018
    November 2017
    July 2017
    June 2017
    May 2017
    April 2017
    March 2017
    February 2017
    January 2017
    December 2016

    Categories

    All

    RSS Feed

Proudly powered by Weebly
  • Home
    • Video >
      • The Alignment Doctrine
    • Communication >
      • Elements >
        • The Golden Rule
        • The Five Essential Qualities
        • The Five Essential Questions
        • The Five Step Cycle
        • The Ten Commandments
        • The Ten Sources of Authority
      • Modules >
        • Modules A-M >
          • Avoiding amateurism
          • Change: Understanding It, Facing It, Profiting From It
          • Communication for Long Term Relationship
          • Communications Horror Stories
          • Communications that blow up in your face
          • Communicating toward success
          • Earning the Right to Be Heard
          • Gerunds, Mesolects and Other Arcane Terms of Art
          • Having a Toad Day
          • Healthy Fear
          • Hippos and Raccoons-- Deadly Underestimation
          • How I Moved From Doing What I Liked to Doing What I Loved
          • How to Be on the Same Wavelength as Your Audience
          • How to Pick Up a Porcupine-- Dealing With Difficult People
          • Key of Trust
          • Manipulation
          • Mastering the Technologies
          • Mining the Subconscious
        • Modules N-Z >
          • Quick and Dirty-- the 80/20 Rule
          • Sabotaging Your Message
          • Scar Tissue
          • Secrets of the Druids
          • Some Specific Approaches to Communications
          • Specific audiences
          • Symbolism-- the Heart of the Communicative Process
          • Talking to Yourself and Why You Should Do It
          • The Difference Between Leadership and Management
          • The Eyes Eat First
          • The Eyes Have It
          • The Lizard Within-- What Your Reptilian Brain Makes You Do
          • The Media of Communication
          • The Respect Deficit
          • The Secret of Authenticity
          • Thinking About the Kinds of English
          • Websites, Blogs and Newsletters
          • When you don't have time to plan
          • When You'd Rather Shoot Yourself
          • Who's your audience? Targeted communication.
      • About us >
        • Karen Bowley
  • Norman Bowley
  • FREE
  • Services
    • Keynote Speaking
    • Training
    • Coaching
    • Troubleshooting
    • Consulting
    • Writing >
      • Ghost Writing
      • Transitional Ghost Writing
  • Testimonials
  • Blog