Part the Sixth, of Twelve.

Last week, I was sent two decks by two different agencies. One was twelve pages long. The other was fifty-five pages long.

In each case I would have been better off with a single sentence type-written on a page, preferably in Courier, with no codicils or subordinate clauses, or even commas.

Recently I did fourteen days of day-rate for a giant agency recently subsumed by an even gianter agency. Part One of their brief was forty-one pages. Part Two was eighty-one pages.

Semiotically, this is the world today.

We have so much to tell people to do, we have no time to listen, or think, or even discuss.

If a brief is a set of instructions, 

simply,

a set of instructions shouldn't be more than a few dozen words.  Maybe, at most, six or twelve steps.

I'm not one-hundred percent sure why briefs can't be as simple as recipes. Even a recipe by an old-school chef/writer like Craig Claiborne. When cooking was an all-day affair, not a sixty-minute sprint.

Whenever I meet with a client, especially a new client, I am wary when they schedule a thirty-minute meeting.

Very often a thirty-minute meeting means they expect nothing but them giving you orders. Thirty-minutes is not really enough time to question something you don't understand, share a joke, much less have a discussion. Semiotically, a thirty-minute meeting says, "You must do this. End of meeting." It's basically, I'll talk, I'll order, you'll do.

Also, it's ostrich-y. A thirty-minute brief ignores the fact that most often people are two minutes late and have to leave three minutes early. Thirty minute meetings rarely have more than twenty-five minutes of meaning. There is usually at least five minutes of fonfer.

Another example of this sort of talking-not-listening semiotic malfeasance is the "no reply" email or text message. Basically, those mean: do this and shut up. Take it or leave it. But no push-back or questions are permitted.

In so many cases, in work, in life and in our world, listening has been removed from the human equation. As Fran Lebowitz once is said to have said, "the opposite of talking isn't listening. The opposite of talking is waiting."

What's more, the famous I'm not really listening dodge, aka "I'll get back to you," is more and more widespread. No one ever gets back to you ever. If they do, they didn't understand the question you asked (because they weren't listening) and more than likely their answer raises more questions which you can't get answered.

Humanments are things people should do to act like decent humans. That is, accord people with honor, respect, equality. Listening--like a close read in literature--accords people that respect.

Instead we live in a TL,DR world.

That's both Too Long, Didn't Read

and Tain't Listening, Disrespect Rules.

If you care about your fellow humans listen. Think. Listen. Think. Listen. Speak. Listen.

Can you imagine if this were posted within an agency. Or if a deck started with this as a slide?