Speech Acts: Driving Efficiency Through the Language of Action
At VISION, we’ve been helping water and construction companies tackle one of the industry’s biggest challenges: delivering projects faster and more efficiently. By focusing on the power of speech acts—we’ve helped teams unlock new levels of coordination and productivity.
The term ‘Speech Acts’ come from the philosophy of language and linguistics, a seemingly unlikely partner for construction projects. Speech acts draw attention to a special kind of language which generates change in the world – words which get things done.
The teams we work with operate in the middle of a highly complex network of relationships. Projects are typically delivered within a partnership model, meaning that in addition to the levels or relationships you would expect to see in any large company, they must also navigate collaborating with other organisations as part of one team. Even small levels of miscoordination in this environment can produce significant delays.
For people delivering construction projects, speech acts are the building blocks of communication (and miscommunication). A degree in philosophy is not required to deliver these projects effectively. What is required, however, is a set of often sophisticated communication skills to enable people with a variety of backgrounds, skillsets, interests and motivations to develop and deliver a plan together. By paying attention to speech acts, we can train individuals to cut through the superfluous and focus on those moments in a conversation where action happens and the value in communication is delivered or lost. Doing this well regularly and repeatedly contributes to dramatic savings on projects.
Common Speech Acts We Listen for on Construction Projects
Request / Offer |
Every construction project starts with somebody making a request or an offer to somebody else. When we make requests or offers, what we are really doing is opening a space with another person to look after a particular concern. Often, we find on projects that people have concerns that go unsaid, or that concerns will be aired in a meeting but no action is taken. These are lost opportunities where a good offer or request could prevent project delays in the future.
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Promise |
A promise is a commitment to take care of a particular concern for someone else and frees up other people to plan their future with confidence. Strong promises remove wastes such as miscoordination, micromanaging, and rework. People find making promises difficult when they feel they don’t have full information about the future. These are challenging moments in construction projects that often carry some level of financial risk, yet the failure to act through uncertainty leads to delays and increased costs. We do a lot of work with teams to make sure the promises they make to each other are clear, timely, and will address the concern at hand. We also work with teams to make promises to each other even when they don’t have full information available.
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Assertion |
An assertion is a statement of fact, something that can be evidenced as true in some objective way. What is the project budget? Where is the project site? What weather is the construction team working in today? Assertions set boundaries for a project, imposing certain limits within which action must take place.
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Assessment |
An assessment is a person’s point of view about a particular situation. People are assessment making machines – we are constantly, often subconsciously, forming opinions about the world. Who do I like working with? Is this approach going to work? Who do I trust? Are we on track? Assessments help us make sense of the world around us, but when we take assessments as fact it can distort our view of the world. We work with teams to share important, unsaid assessments with each other. Often in construction projects this means addressing the mistrust that can arise from different organisations partnering with each other to deliver. By preparing people to share and listen to assessments in a way that is open rather than defensive we can produce breakthroughs in the relationship, and open up opportunities for shared successes during delivery.
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Declaration |
A declaration is when a person in authority creates a new space for action in a community. We work with leaders to prepare and make declarations that produce a change in the world around them. “I now pronounce you man and wife” is an example of a declaration which changes a person’s world. “We will get construction projects to site in half the time” is another.
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At VISION, we’ve seen firsthand how the power of speech acts can transform the way construction projects are delivered. The construction industry thrives on collaboration, yet miscommunication and miscoordination remain some of its biggest challenges. Speech acts offer a way to navigate these challenges, turning conversations into opportunities for clarity, trust, and progress. Working with water and construction companies, we’re reminded that while the tools and technologies of the industry evolve, the ability to communicate effectively is key to project delivery success.
