Corporate Poets?

The language that organisations use betrays its meaning as often as it expresses it.

I am hard pressed to think of a sector that does not need to constantly improve the way it talks to people. Take healthcare for example.

Many years ago I needed some dental treatment that required a visit to the hospital. As is so often the case, the signage and wayfinding in the building were less than helpful. So I did what men love to do, I asked for help. Following the instructions of my rescuer I stood before a large door which carried the sign “Maxillo Facial Surgery Unit”. Forty years old and I wanted to run away. What is it that is betrayed by this sort of language? The sign was technically correct, in fact it is hard to fault its technicality. But it betrayed callous institutionalism, and it told me that these people were unconcerned about anything except the technical effect of what they do.

Actions also speak, and as eloquently. My friend had sat with his father as he died. When he finally got ready to leave, he was handed his father’s belongings in a black plastic bin liner. The detritus of a life, valueless. This was precisely the same statement and the same betrayal of values as in the sign.

At one time, until the eminent paediatrician Hugh Jolley campaigned to have it changed, the parents of a still-born baby were required to sign a form of consent entitled ‘Certificate of Disposal’. Not a life, not a loss, not mourning, just disposal, just stuff.

A corporate poet would ensure that such institutional callousness is never committed unconsciously. The emotional intelligence of the poet will hear the communication of the organisation in context, empathetically, and then will be able to provide language that will be effective in the moment. And only a corporate poet will be able to do this beautifully.