Editor’s note: Besides following tech developments, our author is a musical composer (Juilliard-trained). He has provided a musical composition for you to listen to while reading this column. This piece is called “Changing keys and tonal centers.”
We live in a time when communications options are exploding, and we use them to develop relationships, both personal and professional. We communicate using emails, texts, phone calls, teleconferencing. We even use different modes of technology when making live, in-person presentations.
But we often use them wrong. Have you ever sent a one-sentence email and received a full-page response? Or you may have responded to a communication with either much more or less than was requested. Or received information that was so embedded in technology that you either couldn’t understand the message or lost sight of it completely.
It can take time to determine what an appropriate communication might be. And this is time we often do not have. Even if we have time, we may not know how to communicate effectively.
The plethora of electronic options, as well as the number of file-type alternatives, can be mind-boggling. We have movies, slides, animations, stills, illustrations, photographs, and audio files. These can be delivered on mobile devices, laptops, desktops, and wall monitors with or without external sound reinforcement. But, the use of them can backfire if your presentation is not calibrated to develop rapport with your audience.
Just because you can make a movie with your phone does not mean you should. It might even be counterproductive. Slides and still images might work just fine. Often a single ordinary phone call can replace a half dozen texts. Or a one or two-sentence text can replace a long email.
When we use technology to communicate, understanding the communication needs and capabilities of those we address is critical. We not only have many technical options, but we also live in a very educationally diverse neighborhood, so there is plenty of room for accidental mismatches.
With all the communications options available, it’s important to remember the cardinal rule of communication: It is the communicator’s responsibility to make sure the message gets through. Match your use of tech to the audience you are trying to have a relationship with. The point is to build a relationship. This is why I call it relationship tech.
Last weekend I attended a live presentation at the Tanglewood Learning Institute about the impact of Artificial Intelligence on music. David Pogue, the presenter, did an excellent job of matching his words, his tech, and, yes, even his music to the audience in Ozawa Hall.
In the first half of his hour-long presentation, David moved the several hundred-person crowd from being somewhat concerned about the impact of AI to being very concerned. He then brought us back to partially concerned. He accomplished this unusually and perfectly matched to his audience by showing a slide of how they felt and how they would feel.
David was hilarious, charming, and informative. He demonstrated many ways that AI could do all sorts of reasonably high-quality artistic things, which brought everyone down. Then, he showed examples of medical and other breakthroughs that could tremendously benefit people. He ended by saying that, as we are only a bit over a year into using large language models, it is too early to tell how good or bad they will be for humanity.
The vocabulary and images he chose were perfect for his audience. This is a man who hosts television shows, writes books and columns, and gives many talks per year. He never used too many words or too complicated slides and ended up at the grand piano playing and singing a ditty he had written about wanting an iPhone, based on the melody of the Frank Sinatra hit “My Way.”
This was a truly excellent presentation. At the end, the program director of the Tanglewood Learning Institute announced that there will be more programs available soon for year-round residents of the Berkshires. Let’s hope that future speakers use technology as effectively as David Pogue.
