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Brief: Make a bigger impact by saying less, by Joseph McCormack
WE ARE living in an” attention-deficit” era. We want our food faster, queues shorter, and our answers quicker.
Almost everyone is busy. From the executive suite to the shop floor, managers are too busy for a rambling presentation that gets lost in a flood of information.
Whether you are making a formal presentation or informally presenting you point of view, you are battling against the listener’s inattention, interruptions, and impatience. You must make your point before your audience or listener gets distracted.
The problem has multiple sources. We are inundated with information coming at us incessantly. Professionals receive 304 emails each week, according to software development company Atlassian.
Prevailing research shows that the average attention span of adults has dropped from 12 seconds five years ago to 8 seconds today. That is “seconds” not minutes! Add to this the stream of problems that compete for management’s time and consideration.
The effect of technology is to make everything happen faster. Technology has raised our impatience and our intolerance for waiting for results.
The consequence of all these factors is that being brief is a necessity, but is rarely delivered. Being brief is not only about the time you take to communicate. More important is how long it feels to the listener. It's not about using the least amount of time. It is about making the most of the time you have.
The subtitle of this book is “Make a bigger impact by saying less.” The book’s intention is to heighten your awareness of the problem and to provide a method for the solution.
“When we fail to be clear and concise, the consequences can be brutal,” author McCormack asserts. Clearly, time is wasted, but there are other serious consequences – we make decisions in confusion, and reject worthy ideas.
What being brief is, requires explanation. “There's a tendency to think brevity is pushing for less and runs the risk of being superficial and lacking substance,” says McCormack.
There are two types of brevity: “light brevity” and “deep brevity.” “Light brevity” is being concise without real comprehension. “Deep brevity” is being succinct based on deep knowledge or deep expertise.
You cannot share all the experiences or research that led you to your conclusions. Sharing it all would require of the listeners the same amount of time it took you to arrive at the conclusions. Given the background of the listeners, there is no alternative to deep brevity.
The solution provided by McCormack begins with an often forgotten premise. You must know what is important to the listeners. For example: what is the problem for which they need a solution? How much time can they devote to your presentation?
There is a skill required to be brief. It is the skill of absorbing “an hour's worth of complex information and summarize it in a 2-minute debrief.” Fortunately, it is a skill anyone can learn with practice. (I know this is true; I have been summarising a business book every week for 18 years, and I can see how much better and faster I can do it now than when I first started.)
The challenge also includes a balancing act - being concise, clear, and compelling. This balance is particularly necessary if you want people to act on what you are presenting.
Outlines are not childish
Teachers require schoolchildren to make outlines of their essays before writing them. Professionals mistakenly abandon outlines on the assumption that they have outgrown them. This is a mistake; great companies such as Boeing embrace them enthusiastically because outlines “provide a skeletal view that lets you think about your thinking”.
McCormack uses the acronym “BRIEF” for the organising thoughts using outlines. “B” is for the background to your presentation. “R” is for the relevance of your views to the listeners. “I” is the information you must include. “E” is the compelling ending. “F” is the follow-up questions you can expect.
An underutilised tool for holding people’s attention and sharing ideas is the well-crafted story. The power of a good narrative is that it speaks directly to you, creates instant clarity, and is more memorable. A well-crafted story can captures facts, nuances and insights.
Unveiling the first iPhone at MacWorld in 2007, Steve Jobs explained how Apple was going to deliver on his promise to improve the user interface and phone software. McCormack quotes part of this story to illustrate the point.
“Who wants a stylus? You have to get them and put them away, and you lose them… Nobody wants a stylus…. [the iPhone is] far more accurate than any touch display that has ever been shipped. It ignores unintended touches; it's super-smart. You can do multi-finger gestures on it.”
Instead of launching into a list of all the phone's features, Jobs told his audience a compelling story they could all embrace.
Stories are a more human and respectful way to communicate, as well. The warning is to keep them short and to the point.
When designing the Fiesta, Ford used a fictional 28-year-old woman living in Rome named Antonella, complete with a fictional life and preferences. Designers tested all decisions against what Antonella would like.
McCormack captures the power of brevity in this story: “Imagine it is Christmas Eve. You bought your child a bicycle, but you realize, "Oh no, I have to assemble it." Now imagine the relief you feel as you look at the box and see the words 'No assembly required'."
Deep brevity gives the listener a “no assembly required” message. This is a comfort to people today in a fast-paced world of information, inattention, interruptions and impatience. Brevity is making your point before your audience gets distracted.
The book does succeed in offering good advice on improving your brevity. However, it has a second unintended teaching – it is far too long for the actual lesson it contains. It keeps going long after the reader gets it.
It is a good example of why attention to brevity is required.
Readability: Light +---- Serious
Insights: High -+--- Low
Practical : High --+-- Low
-Fin24
*Ian Mann of Gateways consults internationally on leadership and strategy and is the author of Strategy that Works. Views expressed are his own.
WE ARE living in an” attention-deficit” era. We want our food faster, queues shorter, and our answers quicker.
Almost everyone is busy. From the executive suite to the shop floor, managers are too busy for a rambling presentation that gets lost in a flood of information.
Whether you are making a formal presentation or informally presenting you point of view, you are battling against the listener’s inattention, interruptions, and impatience. You must make your point before your audience or listener gets distracted.
The problem has multiple sources. We are inundated with information coming at us incessantly. Professionals receive 304 emails each week, according to software development company Atlassian.
Prevailing research shows that the average attention span of adults has dropped from 12 seconds five years ago to 8 seconds today. That is “seconds” not minutes! Add to this the stream of problems that compete for management’s time and consideration.
The effect of technology is to make everything happen faster. Technology has raised our impatience and our intolerance for waiting for results.
The consequence of all these factors is that being brief is a necessity, but is rarely delivered. Being brief is not only about the time you take to communicate. More important is how long it feels to the listener. It's not about using the least amount of time. It is about making the most of the time you have.
The subtitle of this book is “Make a bigger impact by saying less.” The book’s intention is to heighten your awareness of the problem and to provide a method for the solution.
“When we fail to be clear and concise, the consequences can be brutal,” author McCormack asserts. Clearly, time is wasted, but there are other serious consequences – we make decisions in confusion, and reject worthy ideas.
What being brief is, requires explanation. “There's a tendency to think brevity is pushing for less and runs the risk of being superficial and lacking substance,” says McCormack.
There are two types of brevity: “light brevity” and “deep brevity.” “Light brevity” is being concise without real comprehension. “Deep brevity” is being succinct based on deep knowledge or deep expertise.
You cannot share all the experiences or research that led you to your conclusions. Sharing it all would require of the listeners the same amount of time it took you to arrive at the conclusions. Given the background of the listeners, there is no alternative to deep brevity.
The solution provided by McCormack begins with an often forgotten premise. You must know what is important to the listeners. For example: what is the problem for which they need a solution? How much time can they devote to your presentation?
There is a skill required to be brief. It is the skill of absorbing “an hour's worth of complex information and summarize it in a 2-minute debrief.” Fortunately, it is a skill anyone can learn with practice. (I know this is true; I have been summarising a business book every week for 18 years, and I can see how much better and faster I can do it now than when I first started.)
The challenge also includes a balancing act - being concise, clear, and compelling. This balance is particularly necessary if you want people to act on what you are presenting.
Outlines are not childish
Teachers require schoolchildren to make outlines of their essays before writing them. Professionals mistakenly abandon outlines on the assumption that they have outgrown them. This is a mistake; great companies such as Boeing embrace them enthusiastically because outlines “provide a skeletal view that lets you think about your thinking”.
McCormack uses the acronym “BRIEF” for the organising thoughts using outlines. “B” is for the background to your presentation. “R” is for the relevance of your views to the listeners. “I” is the information you must include. “E” is the compelling ending. “F” is the follow-up questions you can expect.
An underutilised tool for holding people’s attention and sharing ideas is the well-crafted story. The power of a good narrative is that it speaks directly to you, creates instant clarity, and is more memorable. A well-crafted story can captures facts, nuances and insights.
Unveiling the first iPhone at MacWorld in 2007, Steve Jobs explained how Apple was going to deliver on his promise to improve the user interface and phone software. McCormack quotes part of this story to illustrate the point.
“Who wants a stylus? You have to get them and put them away, and you lose them… Nobody wants a stylus…. [the iPhone is] far more accurate than any touch display that has ever been shipped. It ignores unintended touches; it's super-smart. You can do multi-finger gestures on it.”
Instead of launching into a list of all the phone's features, Jobs told his audience a compelling story they could all embrace.
Stories are a more human and respectful way to communicate, as well. The warning is to keep them short and to the point.
When designing the Fiesta, Ford used a fictional 28-year-old woman living in Rome named Antonella, complete with a fictional life and preferences. Designers tested all decisions against what Antonella would like.
McCormack captures the power of brevity in this story: “Imagine it is Christmas Eve. You bought your child a bicycle, but you realize, "Oh no, I have to assemble it." Now imagine the relief you feel as you look at the box and see the words 'No assembly required'."
Deep brevity gives the listener a “no assembly required” message. This is a comfort to people today in a fast-paced world of information, inattention, interruptions and impatience. Brevity is making your point before your audience gets distracted.
The book does succeed in offering good advice on improving your brevity. However, it has a second unintended teaching – it is far too long for the actual lesson it contains. It keeps going long after the reader gets it.
It is a good example of why attention to brevity is required.
Readability: Light +---- Serious
Insights: High -+--- Low
Practical : High --+-- Low
-Fin24
*Ian Mann of Gateways consults internationally on leadership and strategy and is the author of Strategy that Works. Views expressed are his own.
