When you bridge the gap between IT and Facilities, where is your dictionary?

I get a good laugh whenever I see companies announce or promote they have a service/solution that will bridge the gap between IT and Facilities. DCIM is the latest service to be promoted as bridging the gap between IT and Facilities. But, guess what there is something more at the core of bridging the gap than technology.

Can IT and Facilities communicate? The reason there is a gap, a communication gap is because they use words in different ways.

To illustrate the communication gap that can exist when groups are separated without a common dictionary check out this post on The Guardian on South Korea’s efforts to create a common Korean dictionary to support the communication between the countries.

Two Koreas make strides to talk the same language

The Korean People's Comprehensive Dictionary will iron out the differences between the North and South

• 
  
  Steven Borowiec in Seoul
  
  




• The Guardian, Friday 11 July 2014 12.22 EDT

Joo Yeon-ah did not realise how hard it would be to settle in South Korea. The 45-year-old defector says she was prepared for the dangerous journey out of North Korea, and the unfamiliarity of everyday devices such as mobile phones and cash machines.

But what she wasn't expecting was a communication barrier with people who spoke the same language.

"I didn't understand [what people were saying]," said Joo, who has lived in Seoul since 2009. "Everything is so different in South Korea, but I thought at least our language would be the same."

What she discovered is that after more than 60 years of division, different forms of the Korean language have evolved, with the South incorporating many words from English.

this work is not trivial.

Han says he and his South Korean colleagues have completed comprehensive definitions of more than 20,000 words. The completed dictionary is to contain more than 300,000 words.

When someone starts discussing a common dictionary between IT and Facilities then I’ll spend more time discussing how they are reconciling the differences in communication between the groups.