Forgive a poor metaphor. Communication is a boat we ride in an ocean most have not charted and which is, worse, always changing. We will return to this metaphor, in the end, to find whether it is so poor after all.

Diplomacy is an art of communication. As opposed to the warrior, diplomats bear no arms, their sole weapons words, spoken or written.

How does effective communication vary from one diverse profession to another? We spoke to an ER doctor who became a writer.