Misunderstood? It’s Always Your Fault!

If the person reading your briefing note doesn’t understand the issues, blame yourself. Although it’s easier to say it’s the reader’s fault, my friend Kirsten Farris reminded me: as the writer, you are responsible for the response you get. That’s one of the presuppositions of Neuro-Linguistic Programming (NLP): “the meaning of your communication is the response (feedback) you get”.

So, for example, if you write a briefing note or a blog post, and the reader has to ask all sorts of questions, you are responsible for having missed something.

And, according to marketing guru Seth Godin, if you are a student in my class and you don’t learn what I’m teaching, I’ve let you down. So once again, if you don’t get what I mean by all this, it’s my fault!