#457  from Innovative Leader Volume 9, Number 3          March 2000             

Techies Need to be Better Communicators
by Karl Walinskas

Mr. Walinskas is a professional engineer, speaker and freelance writer in Dallas, Pennsylvania, who owns and operates a communications development company, The Speaking Connection (www.SpeakingConnection.com). 

Oh no! Here he comes again. Pen protector in the pocket of a rumpled white shirt, blue solid shade tie in tow, with coke-bottle thick glasses and socks that don’t match. That’s right, it’s one of the company engineers. What’s even worse is that you know he wants to talk to you; that is, try to talk to you. For all you know this goof could be a genius, but once you pull him out of the lab, he’s a flounder flopping on the dock when it’s 90 degrees outside, too far from the edge to get lucky. Come to think of it, the same can be said for some of the accountants at your office. Different look--same results when they try to make a point.

I can see it now, stacks of hate mail from all the Scott Adams-reading, slide-rule toting engineers and their alter egos, those bustling but beloved bean counters. Come now, these stereotypes don’t apply to all of you, but they do ring true with quite a few. That goes for more than engineers and accountants, but also computer scientists and any other person whose college curriculum mandated more than two math and science courses. I’m an engineer, so I have some experience. Here are five reasons why white-collar techies struggle to communicate with others:

• Logic - Techies are trained to think of everything in logical, sequential parts. A leads to B leads to C, etc. This is essential and effective in solving problems, and that’s their business. Problem: human beings are emotional creatures. Most people without the techie training make decisions based on emotion, then justify them later with available facts. This leads to an immediate disconnect when the techie tries to get a point across to a nether being.

• Arrogance - Hey, it’s not easy getting a techie degree from school. When I went to college, the engineers used to look down their noses at the people in marketing or, laugh out loud, business. Admit it! If you were a sociology major, don’t cross my path! Consequently, when techies enter the world of work, there may be a bit of a chip on their shoulder that needs knocking off. They may communicate with others in a condescending fashion. If I can understand this, everybody should be able to. If not, that’s their problem.

• Boredom - We all know that we’d rather watch a technical presentation on the germination of sapling spoors than Seinfeld, right? NOT! Technical material is dry. It puts most people to sleep. Funny thing is, it doesn’t matter how important it is to their lives. Worse, the numbers geeks don’t enhance their chances of communicating this stuff. Ever sit in the audience of a techie-presentation. They throw charts and slides up with unreadable data in fonts that are unreadable beyond the third row. They speak in a monotone, droning on about the excitement that is obvious from the data.

• Overwhelm - Techies know their stuff. That’s what they get paid for. We don’t. We haven’t been trained in the subject matter. Engineers are famous for using a sledgehammer to drive a tack into the wall. They start to make a point and suddenly, "WHOOSH!", right over the listener’s head. We can’t handle the data dump.

• Reality - Techies may know how the world works on paper, but often get confused on how the business works in real-life. People are the movers of industry, and those people have feelings and ideas that need to be cared for. You accountants listen up. As soon as you tick off your listener, the wall goes up. Everything you say after that is just white noise.

These five reasons form an acrostic for LABOR, which is what you feel like you’re going through when communicating with propeller heads and pie-in-the-skyentists. Why is this a problem in business? I mean, really, why can’t we just banish these people to their cubicles and have them write a report once a month on what they’re doing? Well, in the high-tech age that we live and work in, these people have a lot of the answers to business and societal problems. Company initiatives like concurrent engineering and open-book management rely on the techies being understood by everyone else.

Here are some hints from a recovering engineer.

• Does logic work when convincing your kids? How about the dog? Remember that people are emotional creatures. Want to persuade us? Paint a word picture. Tell a story. Use clever analogies and anecdotes. Make your message real to human beings and there is a much better chance it will get through.

• Remember, it has also taken other people plenty of commitment and effort to get where they are. The world needs psychologists, social workers and administrative assistants just as much as it needs the techno-brained people like you. Everyone has a role. Treat others with respect for their backgrounds and points of view.

• I know it’s hard to make technical stuff fun, but you’ve got to try. Make it exciting. Become enthusiastic! Yell and scream and widen your eyes. Don’t tell us what you’re doing, but how that’s going to change our lives and the world, whether you’re working on our taxes or a cure for cancer. If you have to present to co-workers and if you’re boring (be honest!), take a public speaking course. It will be the best investment in your career you’ll ever make.

• How do you eat an elephant? One bite at a time. How do you perform brain surgery? One step at a time. Is this getting through? Introduce ideas with an eyedropper, not Niagara Falls. Make sure we get each step, then go on to the next concept.

• Get out of the cubicle once in awhile and watch how the office works. Take note of what people are talking about and how things get done. Guess what? If you’re the idea guy or gal, these beings moving around in front of you are what is going to implement it. Listen to what they want and help them get it. You’ll be amazed at how much smarter they seem to get.

So stop using so much LABOR when you deal with the non-techies at work. They’re not stupid, they’re just different. You can have the largest IQ on the planet, but if you can’t express yourself and your ideas in today’s information age, you’re limiting your chances for success.