You Can Not *Not* Communicate

Image by hebedesign via Flickr

Of all the lessons learned, both in the classroom and the real world, the one that stands out as the most important is, “You can not not communicate.”  Everything you do or say, and often times more importantly what you don’t do or say, communicates something.

Over two decades later, communication professionals still look to the Exxon Valdez spill as a textbook example of how saying nothing communicates everything.  On April 21, 1989 the Exxon Valdez hit the shore off Alaska and dumped 250,000 barrels of oil into Prince William Sound. Certainly that is a crisis by any standards.  However, next to the pictures of baby water fowl covered in oil, what people remember most about Exxon is the deafening silence emerging from their corporate office in the days after crash. Exxon executives failed to issue a statement for almost a week, which they might have seen as effectively closing the communication lines to the media and the public. However, their silence communicated many things.

• It communicated a sense of indifference about the environment, the clean up efforts, and the community affected by the spill.
• To the media;  it communicated a refusal to cooperate on a story that portrayed the company in a negative light.
• To their stockholders; it communicated a lack of leadership during crisis as the media reported that Exxon’s chairman, Lawrence G. Rawl, did not visit the spill site until April 14, three weeks after the event.

But we don’t need to examine a national case study to see this principle at work. How we approach our spouse, our co-workers or our children often provides an equally powerful example.  When someone walks into your office and you continue to type and don’t look up from your computer screen, without saying a word, you are communicating that what you are doing is more important than they are.  Failure to respond to an e-mail in a timely manner communicates a message to the sender that they are not a high enough priority to merit your time.  Answering work phone calls during a family dinner time may tell your spouse or your children that work is a higher priority than your family.

And I’m sure you’ve had at least one of these conversations with your spouse or significant other.

“Are you mad at me?”

“No. Why would you think that? I didn’t say anything.”

“You didn’t have to say anything. You just seem mad.”

So what is the take away?  Is it to never answer the phone during diner, always stop typing when people walk in your office, and answer e-mails in a timely manner? Maybe. But you and I know that those life happens and there is a good chance both of us will do one of those things before the week is out. The more practical advice is to remember that you are always communicating something, so be intentional and communicate the message that you want your receiver to hear.  Remember that silence is often more powerful than words.

The comments are yours.  How have you seen attempts to not communicate communicate a bigger message in the end?

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