World Day of Social Justice (20 February) and Youth Voices on Multilingual Education (13 February) are often framed as policy conversations. These tend to sit in the domains of governments, NGOs and education systems.
But an equitable transition—towards sustainability, new technologies, new economic models—is not only about energy grids or regulatory frameworks. It is also about how change is introduced, explained and absorbed inside organisations. How strategies are translated into everyday practice, how new systems alter roles and responsibilities, how risks are communicated, and whether people understand what is expected of them as the ground shifts beneath their work.
… It’s also about language.
It is about:
- Who understands what is changing
- Who gets heard during change
- Whose risks are acknowledged
- Whether communication reduces harm—or amplifies it
Multilingual education goes far beyond the classroom. Most workplaces are already multilingual. Not only in terms of native languages, but importantly in terms of:
- Professional jargon (essentially dialects): legal, financial, ecological, technical. etc
- Generational vocabularies
- Cultural assumptions
- Digital fluency
When organisations treat communication as a technical afterthought, they create what we call communication debt—the accumulated cost of being technically compliant but not genuinely understood by those affected by the communication. More simply, by the hidden cost of clarity deferred.
And this has consequences…
Justice in communication terms
An equitable transition requires more than policy alignment. It requires shared understanding.
Many organisations believe that once something is legally correct, it is “done”. The report is compliant. Legal has given the green light to the branding campaign. The slide deck is approved.
But compliance does not equal comprehension.
Organisations need to move from being just technically compliant to being genuinely understood and trusted. This means shifting the focus of communication from simply meeting regulatory or procedural requirements to ensuring real clarity, meaning and credibility.
In communication terms this shift represents justice.
Because when people do not understand what is changing—or why—they infer. They fill gaps. They disengage. Or they resist.
Silence during a transition is not neutral. It is risk.
Youth Voice: The Linguistic Gap No One Talks About
Younger employees often navigate language differently from senior leadership.
They are fluent in digital nuance, cultural reference, and rapid linguistic shifts. They can detect jargon at twenty paces. They know when a message has been shaped for optics rather than substance.
But are they invited into conversations about how organisational language is formed?
Non-inclusion creates three tensions:
- Corporate language that excludes younger talent
- Overly formal, abstract language that signals hierarchy and distance rather than inclusion
- Vocabulary that may feel performative to younger people
When messaging leans on fashionable terms or jargon that do not describe clear action, younger teams quickly disengage. (Edelman—Trust Barometer, multiple editions 2019–2024 and The Deloitte Global Gen Z & Millennial Survey). In essence, younger teams can tell when values are being presented—rather than lived.
Gaps between digital-native fluency and executive vocabulary
Leaders often communicate in strategic shorthand. Younger employees expect context, transparency and dialogue.
When these gaps widen, organisations accumulate communication debt. Externally, they may appear aligned—but internally, trust is being eroded.
Jargon, Silence and the “We Can’t Communicate Yet” Reflex
During periods of transition, one leadership reflex repeatedly appears:
“We can’t communicate until we’re sure.”
The intention is understandable. Leaders fear creating uncertainty or raising expectations. But uncertainty already exists!
In earlier pieces, we’ve explored how, when early communication is kept out of decision-making, people don’t simply wait for clarity. They interpret fragments without context. They read messages into silence. They misconstrue tone shifts.
Jargon becomes a shield. Silence becomes a signal.
And both disproportionately affect those with less structural power:
- Younger employees
- Multilingual staff
- Those outside informal networks
A more equitable transition demands more precise framing earlier on in the process:
- What is being explored
- What is not changing
- What risks are known and acknowledged
- What is still uncertain
This is not about over-sharing. It is about reducing preventable harm.
Multilingual Education as Organisational Practice
If we take multilingual education seriously in a workplace context, it means:
- Translating meaning across professional dialects (jargon)
- Making sustainability language precise and accessible
- Ensuring discourse (on safety, compliance and policy) remains accurate, clear and legally sound when used across different languages, cultures and disciplines
- Safeguarding brand messaging and reputational strength when used across languages, cultures and generations
- Inviting younger voices to help shape communication
It means recognising that accessibility is not simplification. It is respect.
In global organisations—and increasingly even local ones—misunderstandings are rarely dramatic. They are quiet, subtle. A softened term. An assumption left unexplained. A phrase that makes sense in one cultural context but not another.
Until something breaks.
Managing a just and equitable transition requires more than strategic ambition. It requires linguistic integrity.
When change isn’t clearly explained, people are left out. And when inclusion isn’t clearly defined, justice disappears.
Not louder messaging, but:
- Clearer thinking
- Earlier framing
- Language that allows people—across generations and geographies—to move forward together
This is how communication reduces harm instead of amplifying it.
If you’re navigating change and want to reduce preventable risk,
we’re here to help you strengthen your communication right from the start.
Call or e-mail us.