[August 4, 2016] Someone once said, as best as I can remember, that being overly facetious is the deed of amateurs and a flaw of leaders.1 A few years ago my commander, a senior U.S. Army General, told us that our unit had won the military’s highest award for maintenance of heavy equipment. His comments set into motion a number of events to celebrate this much coveted award and congratulations to our maintenance teams.
I later learned that he meant it as humor and not to motivate us to achieve higher levels of equipment maintenance. Once we discovered his intent, the results were ugly; people were disappointed, we had to reverse a number of maintenance initiatives, and it wasn’t even funny. Of course he profusely apologized and later he even promised us never to say such things again.
People take the words of leaders seriously and often literally. That is why it is best that leaders should never be facetious in their communications; else the risk to misinterpretation is too high. I also learned this basic rule of leaders the hard way.
While I was attending graduate school I was also teaching a basic course in Trigonometry to incoming Freshmen. On the first day I told the class to expect pop quizzes daily to test their knowledge and provide extra motivation to study. The mathematics department chairman later had a “chat” with me about scaring new students.
Communication is very difficult because leaders will almost certainly be misinterpreted, people will be confused about your intent or desire, and some will twist those words into something unrecognizable. To use facetious talk, often a base and crass form of humor, is to invite problems. Try using facetiousness and witness the unintended consequences come running.
The lesson here is simple for leaders; speak plainly and unequivocally. Don’t use any language that could be misconstrued. U.S. presidential candidate Donald Trump used facetious talk to a woman with a crying baby at one of his rallies earlier this week. It backfired and some see him as anti-baby (yikes!) and everyone forgot his intended message as they focused on his baby comments.2 Learn from those mistakes.
[Don’t forget to “Like” the Leader Maker at our Facebook Page.]
————————
- Similar to the quote by Saadi (a Persian Poet), “To be over much facetious is the accomplishment of courtiers and blemish of the wise.”
- http://www.msn.com/en-us/news/politics/trump-blasts-rigged-system-and-crying-baby/ar-BBv9Fcn?ocid=ansmsnnews11