The Importance of Effective Communication

It's one of the biggest aspects that differentiates business as a whole, piracy in EVE can be consiered a business and therefore I would say that this topic title is appliicable and it is just as critical here as it is in the real world.

It is also an aspect of EVE that has provided me with much consternation since my return to the game.

As a corporation, The Tuskers use a mix of verbal communication through Ventrillo, and written communciation through corporation channels. The preferred method of communication being over ventrillo and it is insisted upon that if you are online in EVE then you should also be on vent. An excellent rule.

This morning provided me with a superb demonstration of why this is so important when I logged in to update my skill training to find an Armageddon in a belt in Hevrice. I had no intention when I logged in to undock, but curiosity bit me to see who was this other person in local. I should have logged into vent to advise my corpmates but I didn't. There is more than one reason for not doing so, the first was not really a good one and the second, well I'll come onto that in a minute. Ultimately I undocked, warped in on the battleship and sprung a trap. Losing a Hurricane, an avoidable loss had I advised my corpmates I am certain and we probably would have come away with the big "W". Once I was engaged, I put some comments in a text comms channel but these were too little too late.

Over the last couple of days I've seen this sort of thing happen a few times, admittedly this is the first time I've done it myself. I don't know the reason for it, or why there is a reluctance to use vent as its such a powerful asset, not using it costs iskies and pride. I imagine part of the reason for not communicating about targets, and I know I am guilty of this on rare occasions is the desire to get the solo kill. But really, we're a corporation and a team who should be working for the "greater good" and not individual benefit. I know for one that I should listen to my own lecture here. Today is the marker in the sand for me personally, and I want to rid myself of this bad habit.

Unfortunately for me, and the second reason for me not being on vent is that I seemingly have developed a technical issue since re-subscription which prevents me being understood by everyone else when I speak on vent. Don't get me wrong, I don't speak swahili or anything and my communication skills are very good, they have to be in my job. My vent is normalized and connected/logged in just fine. I can hear everyone else clearly, however when I speak a proportion of people can hear and understand me just fine but a bigger proportion of people say that either they can't hear and/or understand me. It's doing my head in to be honest and I wish I could fix it. It is having a detrimental effect on my ability to work with and effectively contribute to my corporation and is just completely doing my fruit in! I'd love to hear any suggestions on how it could be fixed. For the record, my headset is just fine.