In other words, why name mispronunciation is my all-time biggest pet peeve.
At my first office job, my boss never learned how to say my name. Despite being corrected multiple times (by myself and then by colleagues after I gave up), I was, for the entire year that I worked there, always "Alisha," "Ah-leecya," "Alison," "Alyssa," or "Alice," but never "Uh-leesh-uh." Ever since, I wince a little whenever my name is is mispronounced in the workplace.
That is why I think LinkedIn's new name pronunciation add-on for profiles is somewhat pioneering—if not long overdue in the professional and digital landscapes. Other social platforms like Facebook have allowed users to include phonetic spellings of their names, but LinkedIn's new feature takes it one step further with a personal audio recording so that others in your network know exactly how you want them to say your name.
Having the first and last names that I do, I learned at a young age that people generally don't pay a lot of mind to really learning names. I've been guilty of it myself a few times. Names only really seem important when they are our own. Hence why a name like Alicia Dutkiewicz ("Doo-keh-vitch") has been botched in middle school basketball games, graduation ceremonies, classrooms, and meeting rooms. My first name is still occasionally misspelled on birthday cards from relatives and emails from coworkers.
I almost always give people a pass on my last name. It's a lot of letters and slavic and, frankly, I don't even know if my family in America pronounces it the same way our relatives in Poland do. So when someone, stranger or close friend, says it incorrectly, I take almost no offense whatsoever. In fact, I usually stop people before they try to stumble over it.
A considerable amount of understanding on my part is given to people saying my first name for the first time too, especially since there are so many variations of it. If I'm not on a personal basis with someone or if the encounter is short, call me whatever you like. However, I find it is much more annoying and a bit insulting to consistently have to be called by a name that is not mine by people I am closer to (hi, relatives and colleagues!) or am in the process of getting to know better (such as recruiters).
I genuinely really like my name. It's what my parents picked out for me, and it's relatively unique in that I haven't had to share it as often with classmates or coworkers as Brittanys or Emilys or Sarahs have. So, in my perception, my name and the way I pronounce it is "me".
Alicia, in any of it's various pronunciations, isn't even that difficult to say (or remember once corrected). It is also eons easier than many other names out there. Nevertheless, it is on the long list of names that a significant amount of people think they should be able to pronounce however they want to, no matter how the person with the name wants it said.
I have heard so many stories of individuals—especially those with "non-traditional" (read: non-American or non-Anglo) names—who have to deal with their classmates, coworkers, and sometimes even friends to call them by the wrong name vocally or in written form. I've also known many people who put up with being called a common nickname that they dislike. (For me, I don't particularly like being called "Leesh," but have had many friends in the past that insisted on calling me that.) This issue extends even further when you consider how many people are misidentified and unsupported after going through a transition, or maybe moving to the United States and having to choose a more "American" name to go by in order to be accepted or hired.
The point is, names and identity can be complex, but everyone should be welcomed and respected regardless of what they want to be called. Sometimes there are mistakes or slip ups and many times this is because these people were never corrected; but more often than not, it seems to usually be out of lack of care to make a real effort. In these cases, the antagonist is basically saying "I cannot bother myself to learn your name so I'm just going to stumble over it whenever it unfavorably crosses my lips."
My question is, why are names like Alicia, Xavier, Kamala, Sean, and Isla treated as an inconvenience, while names like Tom and Ashley are comfortable, and, in a way, more worthy of consideration? We need to stop normalizing this distinction.
Bringing this lecture of mine back into the workplace environment, I can attest that having your name mispronounced or mispelled by a colleague that you engage with everyday is belittling and confusing. It's the micro-ist of microagressions, but it's discriminatory behavior nonetheless.
LinkedIn's product team made a logical decision to add name pronunciation recordings to profiles. This feature will help recruiters, new connections, and coworkers start off on the right foot. It puts the onus on the other person to learn your name, rather than making you repeat it, correct them, or deal with mispronunciations in the future (or at least I hope it does).
I really believe it has the potential to promote inclusivity and equity, and reduce this annoying and disrespectful conduct that has become so unfortunately commonplace. So, kudos to LinkedIn as well as to everyone who already has the common courtesy to make sure they pronounce people's names right.
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