The other day I received a morning news update in my email.  The message contained a series of stories.  For each there is a headline and a few sentences.  There is also a link that allows you to get more information.

One article caught my eye:

New data: Inequality runs even deeper than previously thought 

New research shows the average pretax income of the bottom 50 percent of U.S. adults has stagnated since 1980, while the share of income of U.S. adults in the bottom half of the distribution collapsed from 20 percent in 1980 to 12 percent in 2014. In a mirror-image move, the top 1 percent commanded 12 percent of income in 1980 but 20 percent in 2014. (Crain’s Morning Update, June 14, 2017)

The story itself isn’t what drew my attention.

What stood out was the number of times that I had to read it figure out what the author was saying.

This paragraph wasn’t particularly unique.  I often see (or hear) similarly long and complex sentences in white papers, presentations, or reports. That’s a problem.

We are living in a world where information and complexity are increasing while people’s attention is decreasing. The more effort that a person has to put in to understanding you, the less likely they are to try.  For those who do try, wading through the complexity will often result in your original point and message getting lost or distorted.  After all, “sense-making” is just our brains applying their pre-conceived notions and biases to a new situation to understand it.

As a communicator, your goal should be to make statements that require the least amount of interpretation or sense-making to understand.  Simplicity is the key to understanding.

The news story on inequality had a reading grade level of 14.5.  That’s considerably above the grade 6-9 level at which most people are accustomed to reading.

I re-wrote the article to see if I could get the same point across more simply.  Here is the result:

Inequality runs deeper than thought.

New research shows that the bottom half of US adults have taken quite a hit. Their average pretax income has stagnated since 1980. Also, their share of income decreased from 20 percent (1980) to 12 percent (2014).

The trend is opposite for the top 1 percent.  During the same timeframe, their share of income increased from 12 percent to 20.

The revised version is written at a grade level of 8.4.

It’s much easier to read and understand. You probably got through it faster than the first version.  It also probably felt much shorter.  It’s not. The second version has only five fewer words.  Your perception of length is driven by how easy or hard the paragraphs are to understand.

The two versions differ in four key ways

• Context setting – I pulled out the fact that these data were about the bottom half of US adults. I then added it as an upfront statement to set context. That way, I didn’t have to keep adding that additional information prior to each point.  In addition, through the context statement, I provided a high-level summary of what the data were going to show.  That made it easier for your brain to “place” the facts that followed.
• One idea per sentence – The first version combined multiple ideas into a single sentence (pretax income changes and share of income). The new version splits those into separate sentences. That makes it easier to quickly understand the points being made.
• One idea/theme per paragraph. The first version was written as a single paragraph which talked about both the bottom half of earners as well as the top 1%.  The revised version separated those into paragraphs.  This allows the reader to be more focused on one thing at a time.
• Connector words. The first version lists facts.  The revised version uses connector words and phrases to pull those facts into a “story”.

Applying these techniques in your writing, your speaking, and even your presentations will make them much easier to understand.

Simple doesn’t have to be superficial.  It’s possible to communicate complex ideas and thoughts in simple ways.  That should be your goal.

Don’t make your audience work to understand you.  It’s your job to deliver your message in the most simple, consumable way possible.  Doing so doesn’t only help your audience.  It helps ensure that your message is received the way that it was intended.

 

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Brad Kolar is an Executive Consultant, Speaker, and Author with Avail Advisors.  Avail can help you bring simplicity to complex issues, problems, and data.  Contact Brad at brad.kolar@availadvisors.com.