Transforming Business Language
Recently, Judith and Jim, over at Bridging Heart & Marketing asked an important question on their blog. “do you like to be called ‘traffic’?” They where referring to how the internet marketing world refers to the flow of visitors to a website as ‘traffic’. They also initiated a contest for people to come up with another word. I talk about my entry for the contest on the Dharma Bums Internet Marketing Blog.
This question brings up a whole area of inquiry that I believe is very important for transforming the impact business has on the world. Take “traffic”, the effect of the word is to disconnect us from the humanness of those who we are reffering. While increasing traffic is a good thing in internet marketing terms, ‘traffic’ in other contexts brings up images of throngs of cars (machines) getting in each others way and our way as we try to get from one place to another. This brings on a connotation of competitiveness, not with other businesses but between those we are hoping to serve with our offerings. In short the word dehumanizes is replete with implication that we associate with stress.
A Global Alchemist knows that the language we use has great power in shaping the kind of reality we experience. Even if we are committed to a heart centered approach to business, to an approach that remains vividly aware of the humanity of our customers, using language that doesn’t reflect this will create obstacles. We must engage in mindfulness of the language we chose and find words that reflect the paradigm we wish to operate from. I applaud Judith and Jim for beginning the process and asking for the input of the community. While each individual can adopt for themselves, new choices in language, it is an act of systems alchemy to bring into common use a new language choice. This will help transform the whole arena.