Much Ado About Communication

Today, I had to review the communication module for a course I’ll be (sort of) TAing for this semester. This review made it apparent to me how poor communication feeds into many of my disatisfactions and disaffections. Not speaking clearly enough means that people often don’t hear what I say; the effect being that they carry on the conversation out of politeness. There’s no malice with that, but the trouble is they missed the point I tried to make and end up talking over it (maybe they hear me, and I’m just dumb :)).

Holding back on giving (negative) feedback means that the teams I work with deliver subpar output, much to my chagrin. This makes collaboration needlessly painful for me.

As such I’m resolving speak more clearly, make sure my voice is heard, my ideas clearly understood. I’m also rediscovering the joy and sense of clarity that comes from writings. I don’t know who first said ‘Writing is Thinking’, but they were spot on. I’ll be writing more, without LLMs for the most part. The output will be subpar, but this writer will be heard.

On a side note, I’ve been meaning to start a blog for more than 10 years, and the topic of this post is a joke that only the hands of fate could so masterfully play. This could only be funnier were it to be about procrastination.