The richness of our language allows the same word to have different meanings.

(Of course, this also makes English a bit of a nightmare if you’re learning it as a second language!)

The E3 Recruit poster (and photo illustration above) seen in a window I passed recently forced me to think, then smile (and take a picture).

Whatever way they ‘get’ people can be conducive to that person, someone else (and E3 Recruit, and its own people).

By forcing our brains to alternate between ‘finding’ people and ‘understanding’ people, the company runs the risk of being more memorable – whether for an employee or employer.

In fact, ‘get’ is the English word which comes in number six for its number of meanings according to the Oxford English Dictionary.

For the record, here’s the top 10, with their number of definitions, as outlined in Curiosity.

• 1- Set (430 definitions)
• 2 – Run (396)
• 3 – Go (368)
• 4 – Take (343)
• 5 – Stand (334)
• 6 – Get (289)
• 7 – Turn (288)
• 8 – Put (268)
• 9 – Fall (264)
• 10 – Strike (250)

Of course, from a business perspective, there’s useful multiple meanings and distinctly unhelpful ones. Sometimes businesses don’t realise there’s negative connotations in what they’ve come up with for their value proposition, tagline, first most important story or Million Dollar Message.

If you want help unpacking an expression that instantly tells customers your what and why, give Punchline a yell…we stand for value and persuasive power.

P.S.

Colleague Grant Symons also pointed out that ‘get people’ could have an assassination/hit meaning. We’ll have to assume this is not what E3 Recruit means.