I recently had an experience dealing with a university registration bureaucrat, which mirrors my experience with a host of government and university officials, computer technology people, and various employees of banks, utilities, airlines, and other organizations where routines have long since erased any notion of customer service. Here's a rough transcript of every conversation I've had in this vein:

Me: "Hi. [Brief statement of my need or problem]."
Cog: "You'll need to file your integrated P-11 form and pull a 990 sheet for rebooting."
Me: "I have no idea what you just said."
Cog: (Louder) "I said that you have to file your integrated P-11 form and pull a 990 sheet for rebooting."
Me: "I don't know what a P-11 form is, or how one integrates it."
Cog: (Frustrated sigh) "Your P-11 is under the Spalding Cap in the Finker section."
Me: "What?"
Cog: (Louder) "Your P-11 is under..."
Me: "I heard you, but I don't understand you. Pretend that I don't do what you do every day. What do I need to do to solve [problem at hand]?"
Cog: "Well, first you need to file your integrated P-11..."

Is it such a huge cognitive leap to understand that customers don't know the jargon and internal processes your organization uses? McDonald's doesn't expect me to be an expert on food packaging and heating before it feeds me; all I have to do is point and grunt, and they give me my freaking chicken nuggets and fries. If I have a question about my cell phone bill, on the other hand, I suddenly have to understand how satellite telecommunications functions integrate with SAP in an activity-based costing format.

This may be a consequence of rapid technological advancement and organizational complexification, such that individuals have increasingly greater difficulty articulating how their routines translate into outcomes.

On the other hand, it may be a consequence of stupidity. I'm sticking with this explanation, for two reasons. First, it suits my misanthropic constitution. Second, if the first explanation were adequate, then these people would at least understand the problems that arise when they speak in organizational code. But they don't. They respond as if the problem is that I'm deaf. Or blind; I once had a woman try to explain something by saying "see, my screen shows you need a 425 allowance."

We were on the phone.

Stupidity. It might explain more than you think.