Catherine Kokoszka was scheduled to begin a meeting at 10:00 am. Kokoszka, age 52, is the Paris director of judicial youth protection (in French, Protection judiciaire de la jeunesse, responsible for endangered minors, juvenile delinquents, and some troubled young adults); on October 1, she'll be awarded the Order of Merit.
Kokoszka didn't want to go through with the 10:00 am meeting last Tuesday. So she didn't. She instead jumped out the fourth-floor conference room window. (She survived the fall, and her life is not in danger today.)
We tend to ask too much of meetings but accomplish too little with them. Why not frame them by written documents: specific agendas and prompt summaries? Why not announce news in a memo, then hold the meeting to discuss implementation (but not to debate the news)?
Marketing guru Seth Godin offered some great ideas to get more out of meetings. My favorite: remove the chairs from the conference room.
Friends have been writing me about a recent op-ed piece in The New York Times on plain English.
The contribution, by the executive counsel for the Rhode Island state insurance authorities, bemoaned the lack of clarity in health insurance policies.
The problem is quintessentially American: in the United States, private insurers offer 200 million Americans with private health insurance a patchwork of policies, with variable benefits. The policy determines whether or not it covers an affliction, condition, or procedure.
The author played up readability and comprehension tests to support his argument that policies were incomprehensible. I understand the point but disagree with the tactics. Arguing that a text is “too complicated” makes the insured look simpleminded and the policy-drafters smart. It also points to “dumbing down” as a possible remedy.
I take another view. Insurance policies often are drafted so that they fail to communicate and can’t be understood, by anybody. They perpetuate ambiguity. This makes some sense because the insurer can make a case-by-case determination and, as the case may be, argue its position in court (even if the judge follows a cannon of contract interpretation that resolves ambiguity in favor of the insured).
Ultimately most drafting problems stem from laziness: reusing old text, making piecemeal changes, having no incentive to draft clearly.
Several protagonists who built the institutions that became the European Union have names that can cause confusion, because other famous Europeans have names that are nearly identical. There is no need to blush or deny the confusion, which actually opens doors to discuss European cultural figures.
Here’s a brief review to keep the names straight:
Jean Monnet (1888-1979) was a European statesman. His name is written with two “n”s.
Claude Monet (1840-1926) was a French impressionist painter. Take care not to confuse Monet with Manet (1832-1883), a contemporaneous French painter. Monet’s subjects are generally outdoors and clothed: Impression, soleil levant, the Rouen cathedral, and water lilies at Giverny; Manet’s subjects are often indoors and may be unclothed: Le déjeuner sur l’herbe, l’Olympia, and Le bar aux Folies-Bergère.
Robert Schuman (1886-1963) was a European statesman and French prime minister. His name is written with one “n”.
Robert Schumann (1810-1856) was a German romantic composer. His name is written with two “n”s. Schuman and Schumann have the same first name, which make their case trickier than the Monnet/Monet quandary. And Schumann is sometimes confused with Franz Schubert (1797-1828), an Austrian composer. As an illustration of this confusion, the stamp pictured here features Schumann’s likeness but a score by Schubert.
A reminder to avoid confusion:
- to adopt is to start, to take over, to follow
- Parliament adopted the amendment
- Banks adopted new risk-management policies
- to adapt is to change, to modify, to adjust
- When circumstances change, regulations must adapt
- Supply arrangements had to adapt to just-in-time practices
The two expressions can be used in conjunction, even in the same sentence:
- In order to adapt to increasing insolvencies, banks adopted more loan-review procedures
The noun forms differ:
- An adoption usually refers to the assumption of parental responsibilities by someone other than the birth mother or father
- An adaptation is a reworking or rewriting, for example an abridged or translated version of a book
Finally, a person or organization is adept when he, she, or it is skillful.
- The trade association adeptly adopted new guidelines to adapt to the new rules on sharing sales and pricing information
Affect or effect? American speakers pronounce the two words identically, but their meanings are different.
When used as a verb, affect means "to change", and effect means "to make" or "to cause":
- The desert heat affected the athlete's endurance.
- The airplane effected a 180° turn before landing at the airport.
Sometimes usages are close:
- The new legislation affected the price of fuel.
- The new legislation effected a durable drop in fuel prices.
In the first case, the legislation was an influence, among others. In the second case, the legislation caused the change.
I received an e-mail alert last week from the New York Times, reporting that former vice-presidential candidate and Alaska governor Sarah Palin was resigning, "citing a desire to affect change outside of government". Minutes later, the online edition of the newspaper corrected the error and reported on Palin's desire to "effect positive change outside of government".
When used as a noun, effect means "a consequence", and affect (used rarely, usually in psychology) means "an emotion":
- cause and effect
- the patient showed no affect
Another noun form, affectation, means "putting on airs" or "acting in an artificial way":
- an affectation of cleverness
When used as an adjective, effective means "to work":
- medication must be proven safe and effective before it is offered to the public
A few other usages:
- laws take effect or become effective on an effective date
- personal effects are private belongings
- special effects are used in movies to create an illusion