Mind your volume — voices carry.
Consider three scenarios:
- A colleague with a naturally loud, penetrating voice has an extended hallway conversation with someone that touches upon matters that might be better discussed in a conference room with the door closed.
- Two friends sharing lunch at a restaurant get down into the details of their business at a high enough volume that everyone at neighboring tables can hear them.
- Mr. Clueless blares away on his cell-phone headset on the train, in the airport terminal, waiting in line at the theater, or what have you. He does not filter his conversation to make it crowd-appropriate.
Now, given your own inclinations and the nature of what’s being discussed, your reaction might be “Shhh!” or it might be to perk up your ears. Just be sure YOU’re not the one broadcasting sensitive work information out to the world at large.
You never know who might be listening (competitors? suppliers? spouses? your boss’s boss’s boss?). You might give yourself or your company a bad name regardless of who’s listening.
Now you might be thinking, “Oh, I bet that’s happened to him recently.”
And you’d be right.
Feel free to share your own horror stories of overheard business conversations — anonymized, if need be — in the comments.
~
Footnote: If you’re like me, the phrase “voices carry” evokes the 1985 ‘Til Tuesday song of the same name . . . so here’s the YouTube link for that song. I watched that video when it debuted on Night Tracks. I am now awash in nostalgia for the 1980s and my carefree youth.
~
Photo by Mike Schmid, used under a CC-Share Alike license.
Category: The language of business, The working lifeIf you liked this post, please consider subscribing to the RSS feed so you can receive future articles delivered to your feed reader.
6 Comments so far
Leave A Comment
At a previous job, my cubicle had a masonry wall, 6-ft tall. On the other side was a corridor. People felt private. I would frequently stand up, wave and say “Hi!”
These days I commute twice a day by train. Oy, the phone calls! One day, I admit I did “perk up my ears” listening to a lawyer chatting about recently starting his own law group. But most of the time…
My sister has suggested I take notes. Then, as whichever of us leaves the train first, hand the talker the note saying “you may want this. It’s a transcript.”
Shhhhhhh.
Thanks for the chuckle, Vicki — I especially like the transcript idea.
Half the folks on a recent flight were bound for the same industry tradeshow. Any place you had employees of the same company sitting together, trade secrets were aired. It’s hard to exercise restraint in conversation on a long flight with co-workers. It’s sometimes better to sit separately for that reason.
The risk is most obvious on ‘nerd bird’ flights between high-tech centers, but it’s on other situations – like the one I was in – that folks are likely to let their guard down.
Interesting, Russ. I remember a flight from Dallas to Seattle a few years ago that had at least a couple-dozen historians on it, all of whom were traveling to the American Historical Association annual meeting. But in that setting, talking shop openly is *encouraged* — scholarly collaboration and all that.
UNlike the commercial world.
Can I add, not just volume – Also think place.
An pair of english speakers in Italy may assume that their conversation is private because of a language barrier. But maybe not.
Story one: A lady I know was walking and a couple of Greek tourist men were making comments on all the ladies on the street – they did not know her background was Greek so they thought they were safe – of course she told them!
Story 2: I worked with a woman who was adept at American Sign Language, again, two young men were signing comments to each other that were completely rude and inapropriate.
They assumed that no one in the area would understand ASL.
Again, they were wrong -
Thanks for that, Elliot. I recall a story I heard from an executive who was doing business in Eastern Europe — and who, unbeknownst to the folks on the other side of the table, was fluent in Russian. At one point, after he said his piece in English and the translator mistranslated it, he corrected the translator. The exec said that the tenor of the entire discussion changed after that!