EXERCISE: Rewrite this invitation so your grandma could understand it

by | - Emails, - Exercises, - Grouping storylines, - Human Resources, - Q&A Recording, - Synthesis, - Test your structure, 2 - Develop your storyline, Calendar Invite, Writing

This week we worked on an email and ended up discussing another truism that can be very hard to execute on.

This morning’s one was: ‘Write it so your grandmother could understand it’.

As an idea it is both good and infuriatingly difficult to execute on.

How to do that?

The key to this morning’s example was to focus on the substance of the message, rather than on the ‘process’ required to gain accreditation.

Here are two steps to take to transfer the learnings into your own work:

In general, focus more on the ‘why’ …

  1. Introduce not just the topic but why it matters. In the example below you can see there is an embedded assumption that the audience knows why this accreditation process matters. I have added some definitions on the slide for those unfamiliar with the human resources landscape.
  2. Dig further into the ‘why’. Ask yourself why you are communicating to this specific audience about this specific topic that they now understand is important.

Practice this by leveraging the example we used in the working session.

  1. Take note of the graphic below that highlights some of the problems with the original.
  2. Download the original, be inspired by these problems and rework it yourself.
  3. Review the recorded working session where we wrangled with it as a group
  4. Check out an enhanced version of our ‘after’ for your reference. I took what we did in the group (which was helpful but not ‘finished’) and refined it further using my knowledge of the actual situation.

I hope you find that useful.

Have a great week.

Dav

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Why thinking into a doc is dangerous

Why thinking into a doc is dangerous

by | - Prose, - Thinking Skills (general), 2 - Develop your storyline, Communication Strategy, Writing

I was reminded this week how we must get our thinking straight in a one-pager before we prepare a document.

In using client material to prepare some exercises I had to work backwards from a document into a storyline.

Wow.

It is so incredibly easy to miss the thinking errors in a document, especially in a PowerPoint deck.

I have pulled out the main problems I gleaned from this example which would have been more easily avoided if the author had prepared a one-pager first.

I have described the top-line first and followed with three prominent errors I saw throughout the deck.

Spotting the top-line problems was easy as it was neatly laid out on an executive summary page. Take a look below to see what I mean. How many problems do you see?

The confluence of factors affecting the market have created significant uncertainty

0. Spot and futures prices are high relative to historical benchmarks and have increased significantly from uneconomic lows only 18 months ago

1. The are many internal and external factors influencing current market outcomes

2. The impact for energy companies has varied and one of the key differentiators has been plant performance

Finding and fixing errors in the supporting pages was difficult as the language and links between ideas were at best muffled. Here are three traps that I drew from the top and supporting areas of this story for your inspiration.

Ban meaningless words … say what you mean! Look at how general the language is and how lacking in specifics. There are very few descriptive words and even fewer numbers.

Follow through when you set up with a frame … Point 2 above references internal and external factors influencing (how???) market outcomes (meaning???). If you are going to introduce concepts like that, use them to group the ideas below.

Avoid repeating higher level ideas within sections … I commonly see people repeat the idea above in the same or similar words. Most often this will be the last point in a list. Be careful to avoid that sort of repetition within your storyline. These sorts of ‘tell them what you told them' tactics can be useful in a document, but muddy the thinking within the storyline itself.

I hope that helps and look forward to bringing more to you next week.

Cheers,
Dav

PS – A warm welcome to our new members.

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