Communicating
Getting your point across.
Communicating
“When researching strategies, emphasize patterns over stories. One person succeeding means nothing. 100 people succeeding is a signal.
When explaining strategies, emphasize stories over patterns. People forget numbers and charts. Everyone remembers a great story.”
When explaining strategies, emphasize stories over patterns. People forget numbers and charts. Everyone remembers a great story.”
James Clear • 3-2-1: Prioritization, making the most of what you have, and reading as a form of travel
“The truth shrinks as the crowd grows.
In a large meeting at work, people hold back their honest opinions. The resulting conversation offends the fewest people but is often not the truth.
Smaller groups are more likely to find truth than larger ones.”
In a large meeting at work, people hold back their honest opinions. The resulting conversation offends the fewest people but is often not the truth.
Smaller groups are more likely to find truth than larger ones.”
Farnam Street • Your Mental Diet
“My friend, who sometimes shares his writing with me, once said my feedback always falls into three categories:
1. Make it shorter.
2. Make it more appealing.
3. How could it apply to more people?”
1. Make it shorter.
2. Make it more appealing.
3. How could it apply to more people?”
3-2-1: My advice for writers, what silence says, and the chapters of your life
When we know a lot about a topic, it can be difficult to write about it in a way that makes sense to the layperson. To improve writing, Cognitive psychologist Steven Pinker suggests several strategies:
- Use concrete nouns and refer to tangible things instead of abstractions.
- Assume that readers know less about the topic than you do, but are still
Attention Required! | Cloudflare
“How to clarify a concept you can’t articulate:
1. Change mediums. Draw it. Photograph it. Sing it.
2. Change levels. Explain what is one level up (bigger picture) or one level down (finer details).
3. Change fields. What would this concept look like in different fields?”
1. Change mediums. Draw it. Photograph it. Sing it.
2. Change levels. Explain what is one level up (bigger picture) or one level down (finer details).
3. Change fields. What would this concept look like in different fields?”
James Clear • 3-2-1: On hard conversations, how to ruin a good strategy, and asking for what you want
“Writing is the process by which you realize that you do not understand what you are talking about. Of course, you can learn a lot about something without writing about it. However, writing about something complicated and hard to pin down acts as a test to see how well you understand it. When we approach our work as a stranger, we often discover... See more
Attention Required! | Cloudflare
“The simplest way to clarify your thinking is to write a full page about whatever you are dealing with and then delete everything except the 1-2 sentences that explain it best.”