You are as many a person as languages you know.

Armenian proverb

Language is the principal means of personal communication, both in its oral and written forms. So it is worth reflecting on this marvellous human creation, the greatest legacy we owe to our forebears.

All languages have evolved to perform the same function, but they sound and look very different. Each is a key to an experience of the world, in many respects common to yours or mine. Thus we can more or less accurately translate one language into another, but each language also reflects a unique culture.

The practical implication is that if you want to communicate effectively in any language, your native one or an acquired language, you should appreciate its peculiar strengths and weaknesses, the mirror of its usually long history.

Equally, however, you should seek to understand the natural language of those with whom you are communicating, especially its frames of reference. Remember, too, that if they can speak your language it is not necessarily the case that they will understand the frames of reference – the nuances or overtones behind words – that you take for granted.

Once I asked a Finnish audience to discuss in groups of two or three the differences between being a manager and being a leader.

They looked at me blankly, but did as I requested. Only later did I learn that in Finnish the same word means both leader and manager!