We often make our own jobs more complicated by believing that more is better. Perhaps this dates back to school days, when the assignment was a 6 page paper on the history of the blunderbuss. Naturally, we focused on the phrase "6-page" (do-able) rather than on "history" (which could go on forever).
Today, at work, the report we're working on doesn't have a page limit. Without the page limit structure, people often jump to the knee-jerk conclusion that longer (or more complicated, or more time consuming or more resource heavy) must be better.
So here's an idea: next report, get to the point and leave out the biz jargon and fluff pie charts. Not only will it speed up understanding for your audience and waste less of their time (in fact, they might even read the whole thing!), but you'll be less inclined to waste your own time filling up extra pages.
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I gate it when my professor hands back a paper with "Wordy" written all over it. But I'm prone to be verbose when I should be more terse.
Less, not more, is often more.
Posted by: Easton Ellsworth | March 14, 2006 11:56 PM | Permalink to Comment