The Culture Map by Erin Meyer is a great book about how to improve communication between different cultures when you work at a company with a global workforce. Recently I’ve been thinking about how these concepts apply not just at a (geographical) global level, but within the systems of a single organization. What are the norms of how people communicate with each other in meetings, in email, over Slack? What type of confusion/misalignment might happen because of those norms, and how can it be improved?

There’s one dimension the book covers that I think applies particularly well to modern organizations, and that is the difference between high context and low context communication.

High context settings are those where communication relies heavily on implicit understanding. The assumption is that everyone has the same frame of reference, which means a lot is left unsaid, with the belief that everyone “just gets it.”

Low context environments, on the other hand, are those where things are spelled out more clearly. There’s less assumption that everyone has the same background information or knowledge, leading to more explicit communication.

For instance, if you often don’t know what people are talking about in meetings and it makes you feel like you missed something obvious, you might be in a high context environment. Perhaps things move so fast that there’s an assumption that everyone already has all the context of the previous 10 meetings that happened about a topic. It’s natural for this to happen—but it reduces the effectiveness of our work and the health of our relationships.

I’ve been trying to be more deliberate about addressing this issue—at least for myself and the people I work with most closely—by actively going more “low context” in my communication. When something is implied through context, but not explicitly stated, I aim to go out of my way to make it explicit.

The goal is to ensure that no one has to feel like they can’t contribute (or be scared of making the “wrong” contribution) because they weren’t part of every conversation. By making the implicit explicit, we level the playing field. It’s not just about adding clarity to our communications, it’s about fostering an environment where everyone, regardless of their starting point or level in the organization, has the same opportunity to understand and contribute.

By breaking down our messages into clearer, more accessible information, we’re not dumbing down—we’re opening up. We’re building a foundation where everyone can work confidently, equipped with the knowledge they need to contribute meaningfully.

Keep an eye out for opportunities to say the quiet part out loud. To clarify a statement, or state the thing that appears to be said between the lines. It takes work and concentration, but it’s a shift that can make a big difference in how we work and relate to each other.

Every time I travel, just before I leave the house, I do a weird thing. I stop at the front door of our house, look myself in the mirror, and say out loud: “Remember, no running in airports today”. Travel is inherently stressful and I’ve found that once it boils over into having to run to catch a flight, I lose my ability to deal with things well. So I try to remind myself to keep calm and walk on.

Of course, there are a lot of variables in the “no running in airports” equation that are out of my control. A delay might cause a tight connection. A messed up security line could take longer than expected. I could miss a gate reassignment and try to board the wrong flight (yes, that happened). And yet, that statement helps to ground me in the two most important things I can do to stay in control of my travel day: be prepared (know when to go where, renew my Flighty subscription, etc.), and pay attention to detail (um, just, you know… read the gate assignment right).

I was thinking about this as I was getting ready to head into another workweek. There seems to be a lot of “running in airports” going on in the tech world right now, and it sometimes feels like it gets too much to handle. So what would it mean in a work context to look in the mirror on Monday morning and say out loud: “Remember, no running in airports today”? Yes, lots of variables are out of our control, but how could we be prepared and pay attention to detail in a way that reduces some of the likelihood of that happening?

For me? I could be prepared by looking ahead at my calendar and making sure I am spending my time in the right meetings—and that I go into them knowing exactly what is expected of me and what we expect to get out of them. I could try to anticipate “delayed flights”—those unexpected wrenches in projects—and what I could do to get things back on track if that happens.

I could pay attention to detail by listening intently when people speak, by hearing the meanings and feelings underneath the words in meetings where things seem a little wobbly. By noticing when “a gate assignment changed” (no, I’ll never stop being embarrassed about that one) and preemptively figuring out how and why it happened and what I can do about it.

There are, of course, no guarantees. But I still firmly believe that teams make better products in calm environments. Just like in travel, we can’t really create calm. The planes are going to do what they do. But we can remind ourselves that the goal is not to run, and that we have some agency over that.

Here’s to not running in airports this week.

We just got back from an incredible 2.5 weeks in South Africa. I have a lot of processing to do… but what I will say for now is that the sunsets in Africa are still the best in the world. Don’t @ me, it’s just science.

Also, here’s a Spotify playlist of chill South African jams that I think you will enjoy. Give it a try!