“Simplicity is the ultimate sophistication”
– Leonardo da Vinci

We all know that life and business can be very, very complicated and fast-paced. We’re in the process of creating a series of videos at Pendant, profiling each of our team members. In the very first one, one of our expert panel-builders was asked what talent he would like to possess if he could, and his response was telling. “The ability to stop time.”

It’s coming at us fast, faster all the time. We’re all looking for the tools, the tips, the hacks, and the apps that will make things easier and help us be more productive.

Simplicity works. We all know that it works. But sometimes it seems like we’re hoping someone else will make things simpler, or that there are magic tools or tricks that will make things simpler.

Pendant has executed a lot of very successful projects, but every once in a while a project doesn’t go as smoothly as planned. The less than smooth projects have one thing in common – the communication between the players in the project wasn’t very effective.

Communication – it’s something that humans have striven to do since the dawn of time. Infants communicate from the moment they are born. We know how to do it. It’s in our DNA. So why is it so difficult sometimes?

It’s like anything else.  Knowing what needs to be done and how to do it doesn’t always mean that it gets done.

It takes discipline and commitment to the ideal of communicating effectively to make things simple. It doesn’t matter what tools or tips or apps or hacks you have found.  It will still come back to the idea that all the players must commit to effective communication. Think about it – look at the amazing projects that our ancestors completed, centuries before we had the sophisticated tools available to us today.

Sometimes that means taking a little more time up front.

• Are the drawings and specifications you give to your systems integrator as clear as they could be?
• How clear are you on what you really want in your project?
• Is the plan prepared by the systems integrator as clear as it could be?
• Is there a process in place that’s designed to make sure the right people are talking about the right things when they should be? And does everybody commit to participating in that process?
• As unanticipated problems arise during the project, do the members of the project team agree on who is doing what by when to resolve the problems?

Sometimes it’s amazing how much difficulty we will put up with rather than fix the real problem, the lack of effective communication. The solution is simple.  Make sure you and your team commit to using effective communication and things get much more simple. Make the phone calls, take the extra time on the drawings and specs, show up for the meetings, use the tools, fix the problems, because if you don’t you’ll be making a lot more phone calls, taking way more time on the drawings and specs, attending a lot more meetings, searching for more or better tools to use, and fixing a lot more problems.

Find out how much of a difference effective communication can make for you in your projects by giving us a shot.

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