Smart Brevity: The Power of Saying More with Less (Revised and Updated)

by Jim Vandehei

We tend to think too much about what we want to say versus what others need to hear.

the single most important lesson of modern communications—short, smart, simple and direct can break through and persist.

“Vigorous writing is concise. A sentence should contain no unnecessary words, a paragraph no unnecessary sentences, for the same reason a drawing should have no unnecessary lines and a machine no unnecessary parts.”

You will truly achieve Smart Brevity when you figure out what you want this person to remember specifically—and find taut, vivid, memorable ways to express it.

Test yourself: Ask a friend to read what you’ve just written, or read them a few paragraphs. Then ask them to tell you the one big idea you were trying to get across. It’s humbling, but so useful.

Don’t be fancy—be effective.

Cowards hide in clauses.

Focus on ONE person you are targeting.

Plot out ONE thing you want them to remember.

Write like a human, for humans.

Then write it down.

Then stop.

The most important words you type are subject lines, headlines and the first line of tweets, notes or papers. You need to grab me, entice me, seduce me.

Stop being funny. Or ironic. Or cryptic. It’s confusing, not clever.

Fine.