I forget what exactly we were talking about the other day, but I brought up the subject of my less-than-adequate skills in the art of tact.  My coworker jokingly commented that I didn’t know when to put on my ‘tact hat’.  Jocularity ensued – especially since that phrase is a bit tricky to say.  I proved this theory to be true later that day when reviewing a project with coworkers (sorry Amy and Nalini).  To nicely pair out this personality trait of mine, I’m a master at sticking my foot in my mouth.  Usually, I end up insulting someone in a backhanded, yet unintentional way.  It’s kind of like asking a woman ‘When’s the baby due?’ – only, she’s not pregnant.  I guess my only redeeming quality in all this is that I recognize – almost immediately – when I do it.  Some of my more positive-thinking friends and coworkers have tried to spin it into things like ‘you’re just passionate about things’ and ‘you’re opinionated – in a GOOD way’.  Regardless, it doesn’t excuse my behavior and, intentional or not, it not a good thing.

As usual, I have a moral to my little anecdote – be careful how you treat people.  Also as usual, I can apply this to what I do.  In this instance, it occurred to me that User Experience isn’t just about how pretty, usable and useful your site is.  It is also about how to talk to – and treat – your customers or users.  How you talk to them, what you say to them and how quickly and often you respond to them is just as integral to the process.  Colleen wrote about writing for the web and mentioned Tone and Brand, which speaks to how you talk to your users. But there is more.  It also matters how your customer service responds to users/customers.  It matters what you say to them, and how you say it, offline as well as online.   It matters how you market to them, how you treat their information (email, etc) and whether you know who they are.   It even matters how your error messages on your site are constructed!

So, in addition to what you say, think about how tactful, respectful and courteous you are.  And don’t stick your foot in your mouth.