Don't settle for someone else's jargon

The term “curb cuts” taught me a lesson.

I was a young reporter covering the building boom in several suburbs, which sometimes entailed hours of sitting in planning commission meetings. Glamorous, for sure. One commission used “curb cuts” as if it were as common a term as sidewalks or streets. (Spoiler alert: Developers pour, or at least used to pour, continuous concrete curbs in a development, then remove the sections in front of homes or businesses.)

I didn’t think much about it at first. I even used the term in a few stories.

Once I stopped repeating planning commission-speak and thinking about words the average reader would understand, I stopped using “curb cuts” in favor of a better description:

Driveways.

The lesson for me was that clarity is vital to communication. As a reporter, I knew to strive for accuracy and fairness. But if my words were confusing or obscure, those efforts might go unnoticed.

We all have our “curb cut” moments. To limit them, communicators must ask whether their messages are clear or filled with jargon. Think about it: What do terms like actionable, synergy, optimize and utilize mean to the people with whom you are trying to communicate? Just because you’ve heard them a thousand times doesn’t mean you should fall in line.

Be a driveway, not a “curb cut.”