Stephen R. Covey Nails the Communication Problem

The sign below has been making the rounds on Twitter. It came to me via @Lmalopes & @GoncaloPCruz. Since I am not a devotee of the late Stephen R. Covey I did not know the source of the quote until I Googled it.

I recall my first experience with one of his books. I was at a board meeting of one of my professional societies. A particularly annoying fellow BoD member made a big deal about giving our Executive Director a gift, all nicely wrapped, in front of the entire BoD and staff in the boardroom. He said something like, "You'll find this especially helpful. Please accept it in the same spirit with which I give it." The gift? A copy of Covey's famous, The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People. The gifter then gave a brief lecture on how much it had helped him and it can also help you, blah, blah, blah. I think the gifter was not entirely candid as to why he gave the book to our ED. It seemed to many of us that he was telling the ED, 'You're a bozo; so read this book to improve yourself, if that's possible."

In any case, the gifter resigned from the BoD within the year.

I didn't think that boorishness was one of Covey's 7 habits. 

The sign reminds me of what others say about Americans. I can sure relate to it, and I am going to write this on my office whiteboard. I could stand to remember and heed it.

Maybe it's time to read some of Covey's work.

 Enjoy!

Speaking of which...

"The single biggest problem in communication is the illusion that it has taken place." - George Bernard Shaw

Happy birthday to Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. He would have been 88 today.

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[Boris Shmagin]

Searching Google on "Communication hydrology" I found:

"Science Communication and Education in Hydrology & Natural Hazards

Published on August 11, 2015
Iain Stewart
Professor of Geoscience Communication and Director of the Sustainable Earth Institute

The European Geosciences Union is preparing a joint special issue of Natural Hazards and Earth System Sciences (NHESS) and Hydrology and Earth System Sciences (HESS) on the theme of effective science communication and education. I'm one of the co-editors.