Louis Vuitton and communication

I was facilitating a workshop with a group of Louis Vuitton managers and we were exploring together what works well and what does not in the company.

In an organisation that they were generally thrilled to be part of, top of the “what doesn’t work well here” list was communication. “Nobody tells you anything around here,” said one. “I always seem to be the last to know,” said another.

Then we did some sorting of the team into personality types and, surprise-surprise, none of them were “bards”. None saw themselves as strong communicators and none saw any of their colleagues as effective in that area.

Eureka! They all seemed to grasp at the same moment that the problem was not them, but us. And, actually, not us but ME.

So what to do about it? The first solution usually proposed in this situation is to develop a new internal newsletter. It’s never the answer.

A few of the Louis Vuitton people decided that they could and would change their behaviour. And others decided to start hiring people who were strong bards. 

Result!

The illusion of communication

“The main problem with communication,” wrote George Bernard Shaw, “is the assumption that it has happened.”

This may well be one of the eternal truths of mankind.

And it’s particularly a problem when we are innovating. The nature of innovation is that new ideas break existing “rules”, and an immediate and natural response is to invoke the rule and put up an objection.

So often this knee-jerk reaction springs from having misunderstood some aspect of the new idea.

The best way I know to deal with this syndrome is to use paraphrase.

To say to the person who has put forward the idea, “What I hear you saying is…”, is far more likely to result in real comprehension. Especially compared with the usual tactic.