People at my consulting firm have a very peculiar way of communicating.  It sometimes amuses me to imagine the home life of my colleagues…

[cue music and fuzzy fade-out, to signal that narrator is dreaming]

Wife: “Hey honey, what do you want to do today?”

Husband: “Well, what does success look like for you?”

Wife: “I just want to relax and have fun with you.”

Husband: “We should go to the park.  My hypothesis is that it’s a nice day outside, which I’ll prove by checking the Internet.  We should pack 3 things: a waterbottle, peanuts and the newspaper.  Can you be ready to go in 30 minutes?”

Wife: “Ok, Tiger.”

[later]

Wife: “Tell me again how much you love me.”

Husband: “I love you more than life itself.  There are a million reasons why I love you, but they can be bucketed into 3 groups: looks, smarts, and humor.  First, looks: you’re the most beautiful creature in the universe.  Second, smarts: you’re the only person I’ve ever met who’s smarter than me.  Third, humor: you can always make me laugh.”

Wife:  “Wow.  I don’t know what to say.”

Husband: “Next steps: let’s take off our clothes and make love.”

[later]

Wife: “That was incredible.”

Husband: “Agree.  I have some feedback, if you want it.”

Wife: [unintelligible]

I’m pretty sure I could spot a colleague or former colleague from a mile away, simply by listening to them speak or reading something they wrote.  Not that I begrudge the communications style…far from it.  As with everything at my firm, there is a logical reason for it: it’s simply more efficient to lead with the answer and then clearly lay out the three supporting reasons.  But because it’s so effective, we get addicted to it and it’s hard to go from work-speak to home-speak.

At work, people are clear about what they want and they can quickly communicate their reasons in a way that’s easy to understand and memorable.   It feels great to just dominate my workstream and communicate my progress succinctly.

At home, everything is much fuzzier.  Tasks are not nearly as exciting or productive.  For instance, we go grocery shopping and I’m expected to just follow Greta around with the shopping cart, occasionally giving my opinion about 2 brands or package sizes.  No apparent logic, just a seemingly endless set of t0-do’s.

I would be much more effective if Greta presented the grocery “task” as a workstream for me to handle.  I would attack the problem logically (perhaps an Excel model to minimize visits/week) and get buy-in from key constituents (this is what success looks like, is that ok with you?).  I would present my hypotheses to Greta, and we’d problem-solve together to achieve success.

I’m sure other work cultures are just as strong….anyone have any good stories?