I work in a really interdisciplinary group, where several labs in disparate fields work together and it's not possible for our projects to move forward without everyone cooperating. I think (we all think) that the biggest challenge to this kind of collaboration is communicating across disciplinary lines. In fact, that's part of why I was hired - to be a bridge between two of these labs.
There is a spectrum of miscommunication. Some situations have glaring communication issues, where you can tell that people just aren't understanding each other at all. Other times, we are using two different words for the same concept, or more commonly, the same word for two different concepts. This one is particularly insidious because you don't necessarily realize that it has happened until much later. My best example of this one so far is "open system". I bet many of you have some context for that phrase, and they all refer to something different. The mildest situation is when it simply takes more words to get your point across but the listener gradually understands. That last one happens a lot.
I had a big long convo with my old advisor a couple of weeks ago and it felt so relaxing. I'm sure it was largely because it was so easy to communicate. There wasn't any need for back stories to fill in weak conceptual understandings, words were used in contexts common to us both, and words loaded with other meaning were understood with all that extra meaning intact.
It's getting better, though, as I'm learning both the science of these other labs and their way of speaking. We recently had a meeting with members of my old lab and my new lab. I could see when things were getting confused due to word choice and then intervene to keep things on track. It's slow, but I'm learning to be the bridge.
3 comments:
Good for you! And I hope you get credit for it.
I did a lot of that in my past lives and in retrospect, I think nobody really noticed.
It was fun for me, and I felt like I was contributing, but nobody ever turned to me and said, "Wow, thanks for clearing that up! You really saved us from an otherwise near-disaster!"
They should do that for you, though. If they're smart. ;-)
Too bad your colleagues didn't see what a critical task you were performing. So far, I think what I'm doing is well received. It should be, though, as it was articulated from the start as something I should do.
Ahh, the irritating part of interdiciplinary work. It's even more annoying when people from different fields refuse to realize that the fact that we use the same words but mean completely different, and sometimes even opposite, things might actually be a problem. At least from your description it seems that your coworkers seem willing to face the problem and try to solve it.
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