One of the beauties of language is that it allows a person to speak to another person and have that other person see the same thing.

For example, person A says “X,” and person B sees the same thing person A does.

Another one of the beauties of language is actually the opposite, that it allows people to think they are seeing the same thing when in fact they are not. So person A says “X,” and person B sees “X,” but in a different way. Later on, when they realize they have different ideas of what “X” looks like, person A gets to say “I said X,” and person B gets to say “but I thought you meant something else.” Language was used as a tool to kick the disagreement down the road.

An example of this is the use of the word “organic” to describe food. As many of you know, my parents used to run an organic farm, so I have an up close and personal understanding of what the word “organic” means in terms of food production.

From the industry’s perspective, the word “organic” means the growing process meets a second set of standards, and if you can label an item “organic,” consumers will pay a higher unit price for that item.

However, from the consumer’s perspective, the word “organic” means “healthier,” as in, “this organic apple is healthier for my kid than a regular one.”

The industry, and the consumer, have different ideas of what “organic” means, but don’t have to acknowledge yet that their ideas about what “organic” means are different.

You might ask what this means for your presentation, and here it is:

When you, as the speaker, are using a term in front of your audience, you need to be aware that they are not taking away from the presentation the same ideas you think you are describing. If you want them to be on the same page as you, you need to spend a bit more time than you think is necessary talking about things you think are obvious.