If we are referring to life situations, YES if we are referring to business specific, NO
A common habit that business owners fall into is the thinking that what they know is common sense.
As the owner of your business, there is this part of you that says:
“I did this with my knowledge and experience, that’s why I am successful”
And irrational part of you says:
“If I explain the experience and knowledge in simple terms, slowly anybody will be able to understand it because after all, it's common sense and they will get it”
You keep on persisting but it always seems to come back and bite you. You just get more and more frustrated with them and yourself…
Why does this happen all the time when you want to move your business forward?
I would say its in the rush to grow your business faster, you initially take the time to explain your knowledge, then become very impatient, when it's not moving fast enough. Having to train and educate your people doesn’t really translate into results you want.
You have this constant battle of doing it RIGHT and the TIME SPENT with people in your business.
Let's go back to your common sense statement, to understand this a little more…
Wikipedia explains it this way “Common Sense”
Natural human sensitivity for other humans and the community, just like the everyday meaning, Basic awareness and ability to judge which most people are expected to share naturally, even if they cannot explain why.
This is all about basic awareness, we think because it is in our common knowledge that it can be in other people’s common knowledge too.
The sooner you can work out ways to explain and train your people with your habits and routines of your common knowledge. The sooner they will be able to be an effective part of your business. Once they are an effective part of your business it will grow exponentially.
Doing it RIGHT and the TIME SPENT, is something we imagine in our own mind.
Instead of RIGHT think who will be the people that you are employing or contracting, what will integrate them into your business in the quickest possible way. Time Spent is set on how best suited to the role your people are, the quickest path for them to have the business specific knowledge.
The key to getting there quicker is to relate your business specific tasks to things that would be in your peoples common knowledge so it could become common sense quickly. Stay away from using jargon too early. Here are some examples;
Computer type businesses, software and hardware specific terms will be hard to understand at the start of employment.
Food service/ Café / Restaurant business communicating customer service, may mean many different things to different staff members, so its setting your expectation what it would mean to them.
Chiropractic / Massage can have different implications of how your people could treat your patients. Be specific with detailed examples until you're people demonstrate they understand. If you assume that the people that will work for you have the same knowledge and experience, and they simply reply with a yes and don't show any reason for you to believe they do, then clarify with a specific question.
Best way to start I have found…
Ask the new person what their background is in the real world (in other words, what experiences they have had in life) and what they have good knowledge about. Once you have set the baseline for their knowledge and you can talk on the same level and in relationship to what they know, then you can give them terminology that is specific to your business and their experience in words they will know.
Have you had to learn something new lately and struggled with what the person teaching you was saying, because they treated you in the same way that the knowledge is common sense?