Why names may carry more significance than you realize and how you can be better at owning your own name.
Have you ever brushed it off when someone got your name wrong? Most of us can relate to the experience of a substitute teacher mispronouncing our name, of a barista butchering the spelling of our name, or of a workplace colleague who innocently blunders the correct spelling every few emails.
Perhaps you voluntarily (or involuntarily) adopted a nickname or an anglicized name just to avoid these awkward encounters.
The truth of the matter is our names are highly meaningful to our identity. Whether we’d like to admit it or not, allowing others to erode our name is a disservice to oneself. Names inherently carry deep personal significance that can be cultural, historical, and impactful beyond our realization.
But if it’s so significant, why does it feel so difficult and awkward for us to correct others when they get it wrong?
Paradoxically, it is often ourselves that become embarrassed when correcting others on how we wish to be addressed. For some of us, we feel like we’re being narcissistic or annoying when repeatedly correcting others. Or for others, we may simply be confrontation avoidant and conclude names are “not a big deal anyway”.
So, what are some everyday actionable methods to avoid this name game predicament? Here’s four:
1. Show & Tell
When making introductions, emphasize the spelling and pronunciation of your own name. Nowadays the spelling of full names is readily displayed as a result of our work-from-home environments, which is a great bonus! As for pronunciation, it’s a common practice to give an association word that can others remember correct phonetics. For example, my Chinese family name is “Zhou”, which is pronounced like the common English first name “Joe”. As long as this tactic doesn’t undermine the original heritage of your name, it becomes a great way to easily communicate phonetics difficult to pick up right away. Making sure that everyone is fully aware and capable of correctly addressing you during your first meeting with them helps reduce confusion down the line.
2. Practice Makes Perfect – and the same applies to names
It’s not easy to get the pronunciation right on the first attempt – never shy away from repeating your name back and forth until it is pronounced correctly. Additionally, the same applies to learning others’ names – so don’t be afraid to repeat, repeat, repeat!
3. Call-In
Calling-in is defined as creating a 1-on-1 space for reflection and active listening. If you notice a co-worker, manager or friend continues to mistakenly address you (either by name, pronunciation, or gender), it would be a good time to call in. This allows you to fully express your feelings directly, which hopefully results in others changing their behaviour upon realization of the impact of their actions.
4. Call-Out
The last resort if misnaming continues is calling-out. This entails calling out the person in a public setting so they are held accountable by others as well as yourself. Keep in mind this should be done respectfully and in a small group setting. The intention should never be to shame the person but instead to educate and stand up for yourself. Alternatively, it’s important to take action and support others who you notice are often getting misnamed.
Taking the time and effort to learn others’ names will never go unnoticed. If you follow this mantra, maybe one day you will end up in the hall of name!
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