When I was six or seven, my dad took me to Walgreen's to develop a few rolls of film.

For those unfamiliar, “developing film” is the ancient way photos were created prior to the dawn of the digital camera. In those dark times, you couldn’t print your photos at home; you had to leave your house and take them to a professional.  

From time to time, this practice would lead to unfortunate misunderstandings.

This was the case when dad and I went to the photo counter to collect our prints. The attendant couldn't find our pictures, because they weren’t in the bin with the rest of the Ps.

One more quick word of explanation: These "bins" are plastic cases where the photos were kept until someone came to pick them up. 

After a brief panic and some quick scrounging, the attendant found our photos under my dad's first name, Elmer. (Feel free to laugh at that for a moment—he’s used to it). 

Turns out, the photos were incorrectly filed by first name, the result of a simple, but avoidable miscommunication.

Higher up at Walgreens, failure to communicate isn’t always as forgiving. This is why it’s essential that its new communications manager provide the utmost strategic counsel to business leaders so that messaging between the company and key stakeholders and client go off without a hitch.

To learn more, simply click here—can’t communicate it any clearer than that.

(Image via)