Re:The Danger of Financial Jargon
by lostcolony on Monday July 28, 2014 @08:41PM
(#8100104)
This is kind of the key to communication; knowing your audience, and tailoring your communication to them.
Too often we attempt to explain jargon once, which the audience still doesn't follow, and then we blithely continue using it.
Or worse, acronyms; we think it's sufficient to expand them once and we're done (rather than explain it, and then use something the reader will actually remember in every case).
It's a skill to recognize what level of understanding your audience has, and to be able to explain yourself to their level. We forget either that our audience isn't (whatever), or we forget that the point isn't to turn our audience into (whatever), in fact, that our audience may care nothing about (whatever) -except for the particular bit we're trying to communicate-; we need to use our position as (whatever) to explain a concept in a way that is understandable from the audience's perspective as it is. That's why analogy is often used, for better or ill.
Too often we attempt to explain jargon once, which the audience still doesn't follow, and then we blithely continue using it.
Or worse, acronyms; we think it's sufficient to expand them once and we're done (rather than explain it, and then use something the reader will actually remember in every case).
It's a skill to recognize what level of understanding your audience has, and to be able to explain yourself to their level. We forget either that our audience isn't (whatever), or we forget that the point isn't to turn our audience into (whatever), in fact, that our audience may care nothing about (whatever) -except for the particular bit we're trying to communicate-; we need to use our position as (whatever) to explain a concept in a way that is understandable from the audience's perspective as it is. That's why analogy is often used, for better or ill.