Simplify Everything. Especially Language.

I'm a tech writer and editor, who remotely from Thailand online for Envato, an Australia-based company. And it's great. The only problem is, my job title is inherently confusing to anyone who's not geeky. Say you're a writer, and people assume you've published novels (now that'd be nice, but...). Say you're an editor, and people either assume you work in a newspaper (not bad), or stare blankly. Try to say you're a tech writer, and it simply doesn't make sense. Perhaps this all wouldn't be so hard in an English-speaking country—I can easily get by saying I'm a writer in English, but anything beyond that still tends to break down—but in Thai, it just doesn't work.

The simple question of "What's your job?" has, for so long, been the most annoying part of meeting new people for quite some time. That's ridiculous.

And then, finally, it hit me a couple months back: when asked, just say I "work in IT." Everyone gets that—even old people. It conveys that I work with tech, sounds like a real, respectable job (especially without any published books to back up that "writer" title), and even makes people not surprised when I say I work remotely. That one tiny change to the way I refer to my job has simplified my life way more than it seemingly should have. It was one of my best life decisions of the past few months.

Seth Godin recently asked the question on his blog "Should you teach the world a new word?" He discussed his own challenges with finding a job title for himself that didn't cause confusion, something that obviously struck close to home for me. He then expanded the idea to naming products, careers, and anything else, saying:

"Your job might be like no other one like it in the world, but that doesn't mean you need a new job title. ...if you can happily succeed while filling an existing niche, it's far easier than insisting that people invent a new category for you.

It doesn't matter if you're right, it matters if you are understood."

Isn't that the truth? Being understood—getting our point across—is the whole point of language and communication and titles. And yet, it's easy to want to call your thing something 100% new. Who wouldn't want the world's most unique and impressive job title? Who wouldn't want their app to add new words to the vernacular?

That's preposterous. There's enough real words out there to describe what you're doing with out having to invent something new. So simplify. Use normal words the way they were intended, and make what you're saying as clear as possible to everyone. It'll simplify what you're saying for others, and will actually simplify your own life, too.

Life's a lot easier when you're not having to explain everything you say a second time.

...though if developers keep using real words for their new app names, it's going to start getting harder to say anything that doesn't have a tech double-meaning...

Thoughts? @reply me on Twitter.