What Exactly does "Illusions of Agreement" mean in Business?

Recently I was reading a book called "REWORK" by Jason Fried & David Heinemeier Hansson who are also the founders of 37signals which is a software co.

The Book is been divided into certain chapters, so while I was in Chapter PROGRESS I came across "Illusions of Agreement" and what it exactly means in business.

I hope this article will be of help to whoever is reading it, Cheers!

The business world is littered with dead documents that do nothing but waste people's time. Reports no one reads diagrams no one looks at, and specs that never resemble the finished product. These things take forever to make but only seconds to forget.

If you need to explain something, try getting real with it. Instead of describing what something looks like, draw it. Instead of explaining what something sounds like, hum it. Do everything you can to remove layers of abstraction.

The problem with abstractions (like reports and documents) is that they create illusions of agreement. A hundred people can read the same words, but in their heads, they're imagining a hundred different things.

That's why you want to get to something real right away. That's when you get a true understanding. It's like when we read about characters in a book—we each picture them differently in our heads. But when we see people, we all know exactly what they look like.

When the team at Alaska Airlines wanted to build a new Airport of the Future, they didn't rely on blueprints and sketches. They got a warehouse and built mock-ups using cardboard boxes for podiums, kiosks, and belts. The team then built a small prototype in Anchorage to test systems with real passengers and employees. The design that resulted from this getting-real process has significantly reduced wait times and increased agent productivity.*

Widely admired furniture craftsman Sam Maloof felt it was impossible to make a working drawing to show all the intricate and fine details that go into a chair or stool. "Many times I do not know how a certain area is to be done until I start working with a chisel, rasp, or whatever tool is needed for that particular job," he said.