I’ve often argued that there is a cultural literacy factor to all professions that demonstrates whether a person is an initiated member of the group or some wanna-be neophyte. It’s why all the television shows set in hospitals have medical consultants to ensure characters don’t end up spewing nonsense:

Nurse, this patient has a decurdescenc rhinitis reticulum with static malignant ischemia. Get me an EEG with an IV, stat! Do you concur?

Technology is the same deal. You have to be able to talk the talk to be trustworthy both in the industry and with clients. And I don’t mean in some purposefully over-your-head, acronym-filled, buzzword-of-the-moment, I’m-obviously-smarter-than-you-are sort of way. Learning the tech speak vocabulary allows those in the industry to speak with specificity, describing a complex thought in just a few words.

Today, I ran across Andrew Gonsalves’ list of 10 Reasons Why “Tech Speak” Is The Best Language To Learn and smiled. He gets it.

Here are a few more reasons:

11. Credibility
If you are billing yourself as a member of the information technology set, others in the industry, as well as your clients, assume you have already been exposed to and understand key concepts and historical references. It’s like what those in the literature world call “canonical knowledge.”

We’ve all seen those people who, in a discussion or classroom, smile and nod to get through a conversation when they don’t understand what is really going on. It’s pretty easy to see through them if you’ve been around for awhile (because you’ve probably done it before yourself) and assign them a position of less credibility in the conversation to follow.

12. Links and Connections
If you are able to discern the allusions and subtleties within information that you read or that you hear at a lecture or in conversation, you’ll be able to make connections that aren’t readily apparent to novices.

This kind of language prowess and quick thinking makes for valuable team members and more elegant solutions. It’s pretty much what separates senior team members from junior ones and comes with experience.

13. Continued Relevance
I once worked with a developer who was a walking reference version of the HTML 4.0 Bible. That was great; however, we were in 2006 when this happened. We’ve all worked with people who were once at the top of their game, and then got to a comfortable place and just stopped learning.

The same is true for people who have honed their skills in some proprietary language or tool and find that they aren’t employable at the same level outside their company. Continuing to cultivate one’s tech speak vocabulary (and the underlying skill set) keeps techies relevant in contemporary settings and also gives them the benefit of having truly portable skills in that they can work on a new team, solving new problems, and immediately bring something useful to the table.

Want to Know if You Can Speak Nerdy?

There are a few tests out there (some take themselves more seriously than others) to test your cultural literacy in the world of technology including:

• Nerdity Test
• Cultural Literacy Tests (in a variety of subjects, including technology)
• Nerd Quotient