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Pablo Bermejo
Pablo Bermejo

Posted on • Updated on

I stopped saying "Sorry if this is too technical"

I am a technical guy and I wear this badge proudly. That's why this post got me thinking the other day. I concur with its reasoning and comments, and it is especially outrageous when you work for a company with the word technology in its name.

It shouldn't be a problem if the sentence "I am not technical" really is an invitation to the technical speaker to go ahead and explain (in detail or not) what are they talking about. But it is not. It's a shield of ignorance, an excuse that reads "the ball is in your court now" between the lines. In the worst case, its goal is to disdain the technical speaker's point by letting them know that they care about the important things, the business.

I have been on the other side so many times, and I never said "I am not a business person". If I don't understand something, I ask without any sign of embarrassment because I want to understand. I want to learn. So I would expect this social contract to be mutual. But it is not.

So that is why I stopped saying "Sorry if this is too technical" even in advance to my technical speech. There is nothing wrong with covering technical details for a group of business people. Especially for a group of business people working on an IT company. If they do not understand something, I expect them to raise their hands and ask, I'll explain thoroughly and I'll adjust the level of technicalities.

Every company is a Software company. This is becoming a major truth, gradually and constantly. So I'd be happy to help anybody understand the nitty-gritty details of why the world is changing ... if they want to.

When did we stop learning? What do you think?

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