If you work in an emerging technology space, knowing how to talk in business language instead of pure tech talk is one of the most valuable skills you can develop. Why? Because it can mean the difference between getting buy-in for your idea or watching it die a slow, painful death.

Why Speaking Business is a Superpower

1. The Business Will Actually Understand the Problem

If you want decision-makers to approve a project or fund an initiative, you need to articulate the problem in a way that matters to them. Saying, "Our database architecture lacks horizontal scalability and needs refactoring to improve microservices performance" will get you polite nods at best. Saying, "Right now, our system slows down when we add more customers, and if we don’t fix it, we’ll lose revenue"? That gets attention.

At the end of the day, business leaders don’t care about the tech itself—they care about what the tech enables. Learn to translate the problem into business impact, and you’re already ahead of 90% of tech people in the room.

2. You’ll Get Better Buy-In (And Not Annoy the People Holding the Purse Strings)

Want funding for a project? Trying to convince leadership to approve a new system? Ditch the techy monologue and speak their language.

Imagine you're pitching to someone who controls the budget, and you say:

"We need to transition from monolithic to cloud-native architecture with a containerised deployment model."

Response: "Interesting."

Now, let’s try again:

"If we don’t modernise our system, it’s going to slow us down, cost us more money to maintain, and make it harder to compete. Investing in this now will save us X dollars and reduce downtime by Y%."

Response: "Tell me more..."

It’s not about dumbing things down—it’s about making them relevant. The moment you stop overwhelming decision-makers with unnecessary tech-speak, you start building real rapport. And when you do that? They’re way more likely to listen to you.

3. The Right Solution Won’t Get Lost in Translation

One of the biggest tragedies in tech is when the wrong thing gets built—not because the tech team is bad, but because the business and tech teams were never really on the same page.

When business leaders hear something different than what tech teams intended, misalignment happens. Deadlines get missed. Costs balloon. Frustration levels spike. Projects fail.

But when you bridge that gap and ensure the problem is clearly understood by everyone in the room, the right thing gets built the first time. That means fewer reworks, less wasted time, and a product that actually solves the intended problem.

How to Stop Bamboozling and Start Translating

So, how do you avoid drowning your audience in tech jargon? Here’s what’s worked for me:

• Use analogies. If you can compare a tech concept to something familiar (e.g., "Think of cloud computing like renting an apartment instead of buying a house"), you’ve already won half the battle.
• Frame problems in terms of business impact. Costs, customer experience, revenue, risk—these are the words that make execs sit up and listen.
• Ask more questions. Before diving into a solution, make sure you actually understand the business need first. The better you grasp the big picture, the easier it is to align tech solutions with business priorities.

Want to Get Better at This? Let’s Chat.

If you’re stuck in a cycle of lost-in-translation moments between tech and business teams, I can help. Whether it’s simplifying complex ideas, aligning strategy with execution, or just making sure the right thing gets built—I’ve got you covered.

Reach out, and let’s talk!