“Mayor Jim Gray on the Rhetorical Force of Words” 
Town Branch p. 22
https://vimeo.com/103941623

JIM GRAY: I was really fortunate to uh have a class at the Kennedy School at Harvard a few years ago, now a dozen years ago, um, which um really presented problem solving in complex social systems, and it, too, you know, gives a process for doing that, and if you practice that, and do it effectively, then you will actually use words much more effectively, and language much more effectively. I didn’t know the, really the word intervention until I took that class. I mean I knew the word, but I might use a, I might use a word “intercede” instead of “intervene” or I might use uh some other language to describe an intervention. Well, you know I discovered through that class that an, that the best language to describe when we involve ourself, some way, in a, in a maybe a contentious issue that the best way to describe it is an intervention. It’s a, just a softer edge than interrupt, intercede, um, other language like it. So, in conflict management, or in engaging, you know, tough issues, you, you know, if you, if you’re always timing and pacing, and the appropriate language is really, an approach is really important, and it’s not always the language itself, but it’s, of course, the way in which the language is used.