Seriously, Folks, Congress Expects The Government To Use Plain English

The House and Senate have actually passed a bill that insists on plain language in government writing. Here are some salutary examples from a website devoted to such clarity:

Before (fishermen in my home state of Maine have seen far too much of “before” as they struggle with federal catch limits):

After notification of NMFS (National Marine Fisheries Service), this final rule requires all CA/OR DGN vessel operators to have attended one Skipper Education Workshop after all workshops have been convened by NMFS in September 1997. CA/OR DGN vessel operators are required to attend Skipper Education Workshops at annual intervals thereafter, unless that requirement is waived by NMFS. NMFS will provide sufficient advance notice to vessel operators by mail prior to convening workshops.

After:
After notification from NMFS, vessel operators must attend a skipper education workshop before commencing fishing each fishing season.

Before (only the government could write itself into predicting avian demise):

This rule proposes the Spring/Summer subsistence harvest regulations in Alaska for migratory birds that expire on August 31, 2003.

After :

This rule proposes the Spring/Summer subsistence harvest regulations for migratory birds in Alaska. The regulations will expire on August 31, 2003.

Before:

When the process of freeing a vehicle that has been stuck results in ruts or holes, the operator will fill the rut or hole created by such activity before removing the vehicle from the immediate area.

After (brevity yields clarity):

If you make a hole while freeing a stuck vehicle, you must fill the hole before you drive away.

Dave Griffiths, a former national security correspondent for Business Week, does freelance writing and freelance editing, as well as media training and instruction in marketing messages, business writing, communications skills, presentation skills and business communication. His website is http://www.davegriffithscommunications.com

How NOT To Make A Presentation

“I gave a speech in Omaha. After the speech I went to a reception elsewhere in town. A sweet old lady came up to me, put her gloved hand in mine, and said, ‘I hear you spoke here tonight.’ ‘Oh, it was nothing,’ I replied modestly. ‘Yes,’ the little old lady nodded, ‘That’s what I heard.’”

President Gerald Ford

Greetings once again. No, Jerry Ford wasn’t a great orator. But he was gracious and self-confident enough to be candid about it. Sadly, though, when it comes to public presentations otherwise clever and intelligent people fall flat on their faces – and never get the point. Instead, they just keep plodding along, hoping that somehow the content of what they have to say will
penetrate their listeners’ consciousness.

I recently saw a prime example of embarrassing ineptitude before about 12 citizens gathered in a small New England town to talk about possible long-range zoning changes. The presenter was a professional planner and he sat at one of four or five tables arranged in a rough circle. It was the first meeting of several to come, and the volunteers were eager to be engaged.

Here’s how he started out: Head down, eyes focused on the table in front of him, one leg (then the other, then both when he crossed his ankles) bouncing spasmodically, he began by telling us why this process was going to cost the town some money. His tone was negative and almost apologetic as he described an arcane bureaucratic process involving insidey details about what the state once required of towns and what it requires now. A couple middle-aged men nodded wearily – a sort of “That’s the government for you” attitude – and others started glancing around the room.

Unbelievably, I found myself wishing for a PowerPoint, which, in the hands of most presenters I’ve witnessed, is a technological crutch that gets in the way of genuine face-to-face communication. But at least PowerPoint would have forced some structure on him.

So what was missing? How about an opening? Why were they there? What did he hope to accomplish? How could he help us? How could we help him?

He eventually caught up when someone interrupted to ask, “Why are we doing this?” That brought his head up, and fairly continuous eye contact followed. The rest was genuinely educational, and I’m sure most if not all of the citizens were primed for the next step.

But just think about the wasted opportunity at the beginning to establish a conversational tone, a sense of authority, a willingness to listen, a personality. That’s what the opening is all about – getting and keeping the attention of an audience that wants to be drawn in.

The point here is to AIM straight and true. In this case:

• Audience – As they introduced themselves, it was clear that all but two or three of his listeners had minimal or no experience with town planning. Knowing that before he started, the presenter should have gotten right to the point and explained how the state wanted to bring everyday residents together to discuss the future of their communities. That answers the “what’s in it for me/us?” question and heightens the participants’ sense of involvement.

But you can’t reach them if you talk as if you’re chatting with a colleague. In other words, banish professional jargon for such an audience. That’s not condescending; it is respect for your listeners.

• Intent – Once he finally got their attention, the presenter set the stage for edifying his listeners and adding some sophistication to their understanding of municipal planning. Over several meetings, that makes his job easier as they converse in a relatively common language about what are often arcane matters.

• Message – “I can’t do this without you.” Not only does the state mandate public participation, but the presenter doesm’t know the town that well, and can’t help them fashion a long-range plan if the locals don’t contribute. What’s more, of course, is this unstated, but spot-on message: “If you help craft this plan, you’ll be persuasive local voices when it’s time to sell the blueprint to the voters.”

What I’m saying here applies well beyond small group settings to speeches before larger crowds as well as press conferences: You don’t have to be slick. Just get to the point, keep it simple, answer the 5Ws and 1 H (who, what, when, where, why and how), and you’re on your way.

Dave Griffiths, a former national security correspondent for Business Week, does freelance writing and freelance editing, as well as media training and instruction in marketing messages, business writing, communications skills, presentation skills and business communication. His website is http://www.davegriffithscommunications.com

Will You PLEASE Get To The Point, and Bridging A Bridge To Somewhere

I hear and I forget.
I see and I remember.
I write
and I understand.
- Chinese Proverb

That says it about as well as you can say it. Add that to novelist Anne Morrow Lindbergh’s thought that “Writing is thinking,” and you’ve got the gist of how the writing process opens the door to creative and analytical cogitation in ways that spontaneous phone or in-person exchanges can never hope to achieve.

What brought that home for me recently was a comment from a fellow communications trainer about a need she has seen in the corporate and nonprofit world: Writing effective requests. I do a lot of business writing and presentation skills training with federal agencies, and she hit the right note with that one. It’s tough to get a response when you don’t word the request precisely with a specific goal in mind.

Here is a federal agency’s instructions to field offices:

“Special actions have been necessitated to reduce the adverse impact on our military and space requirements, postal operations, and public necessity, and in order to cooperate in these essential objectives, it is requested that you instruct your employees to defer any travel by air that is not a matter of immediate necessity until such time as full operation of air travel is restored.”

And this from the purchasing manager at a construction company in Virginia:

“E-mails – that are received from Jim and I are not either getting open or not being responded to. I wanted to let everyone know that when Jim and I are sending out e-mails (example- who is to be picking up parcels) I am wanting for who ever the e-mail goes to to respond back to the e-mail. Its important that Jim and I knows that the person, intended, had read the e-mail. This gives us an acknowledgement that the task is being completed. I am asking for a simple little 2 sec. Note that says ‘ok,’ ‘I got it’, or Alright.’

Simply put, the first example can be written this way: “Tell your staff to postpone non-essential air travel.” Then, in a sentence or two, a thoughtful boss could explain why. As to the second – other than egregious grammar and quality control (self-editing) abuses — the solution is: “Please respond to emails promptly.” The “writers” in the “before” examples risk losing the message, not to mention modeling bureaucratic wordiness for the staff, particularly in the first instance.

But here’s the real rub: In both cases, the message, the reason for writing in the first place, doesn’t happen until the end. When I was doing some writing and presentation training for six or seven SEALs down in Virginia Beach (they were on staff duty between overseas deployments), they mentioned a just-right acronym that I’ve passed on to every class since then. They picked it up at the Pentagon and – typical of that five-sided Puzzle Palace which I used to cover for Business Week – whoever coined it may have missed the overall impression of “BLUF.” But you can’t beat its intended meaning: “bottom line up front.”

Last May, during a writing class at the Energy Department in DC, I wrote that one on a flip chart, and in the back of the room one leader of the agency’s training department nodded vigorously; they were all too aware of the problem. The point is that in a workplace setting, you owe your busy readers one consideration above all others: Get to the point, and do it early, in the first paragraph or two. Wait any longer than that and you risk losing or befuddling your audience.

Somewhere around that same time in any writing class I also write “AIM” on the flip chart. It stands for audience, intent (or impact) and message. Knowing your readers, you must make ntent and message clear early. “Message” should be obvious to most of us, but before you can frame it unambiguously for your chosen audience, ask yourself what result you’re seeking – answers to questions you pose, renewed emphasis on a project, a shift in emphasis, explanation of layoffs, an appeal for shorter emails., etc. Then you can back up your first couple grafs with relevant details.

One thing’s sure. If you don’t get to your point without rambling, your point may not hit home.

Building a Bridge To Somewhere

It’s called “bridging,” and it works. If you’re trying to get something out of media relations – whether a press conference or an interview or even crisis communications – you can’t expect the press to write it all down passively and turn it into a story. It’s their job to get you to talk about other things, pushing you “off message.”

When I did some communication skills training a couple years ago with the new CEO of a large VA hospital in the Midwest, we talked about bridging away from questions, such as politically loaded queries about veterans funding in DC that have little to do with her hospital. In some role-playing exercises, she tried out phrases that led her naturally back to her local message.

Examples:
–”What’s important to remember, however…”
–”That’s a good point, but I think you’d be interested in knowing…”
–”Let me put that in perspective for our hospital.”
–”What that means is…”

See how that maintains a polite dialogue while gently steering things your way? In my reporting days, it all sounded like verbal sparring and I didn’t like it. But making a reporter happy isn’t your goal. Staying “on message” is what it’s all about.

Dave Griffiths, a former national security correspondent for Business Week, does freelance writing and freelance editing, as well as media training and instruction in marketing messages, business writing, communications skills, presentation skills and business communication. His website is http://www.davegriffithscommunications.com

Why Writing Matters, How PowerPoint Stifles, and Appealing To Reporters’ Egos

Greetings once again. I’d like to get back to some basic precepts in business writing, presentation skills and getting your message out through the media – all of them still timely.

First, why should we care about sharpening our writing skills? Well, as a former Washington correspondent for Business Week magazine (aerospace industry and national security beat), I continue to follow business news closely. George Will once observed that business journalism is arguably the most reliable reporting, in large part, I suppose, because its consumers count so heavily on its daily and weekly offerings.

What’s dominated corporate earnings reports recently is that profits are growing ahead of the rest of the sputtering economy because so many firms are keeping a tight lid on costs. And where do they find so much of those savings? They hire very selectively, if at all, and count heavily on their existing work force. Fewer employees translates into greater productivity, right?

So where does writing enter the picture? Consider a headquarters or regional office where business communication expectations are unclear, even nonexistent – a place where:

• Overly emotional emails written under stress are far too personal in what should be a professional environment. Worse, employees keep pounding emails back and forth when the best solution would be an old-fashioned face-to-face clearing of the air.
• Failure to get to the point early clouds the message and irritates readers, who have every right to ask: “What’s he trying to say? Why should I read further?”
• Pompous, insidey language excludes the reader, particularly an external audience of existing or potential customers or vendors, when it should include them.
• Numerous delays in accomplishing the intent of communication – questions to be answered, opinions to be solicited, directives to be distributed, complaints to be addressed, etc. – are all too common thanks to morale-sapping edits and re-edits and rewrites up and down the line.
• Clotted, copycat phrasing aims to impress rather than edify. See what you you think of this cliché fest of a paragraph from a consulting firm’s website:

“Projects are customized based on client needs. Due diligence services range from initial validation of targets to detailed on-site due diligence visits to the preparation of complete integration plans. Management consulting services, aimed at enhancing organizational effectiveness, are typically intensive studies that identify cost-saving opportunities and define appropriate actionable go-forward plans. Strict confidentiality is maintained for all engagements.”

Does deploying “due diligence” twice in the same sentence mean you’re doubly due diligent? “Validation of targets?” Does the “writer” mean goals, or is he promising to destroy something?

—————————————————————–
What one wag referred to as the “cultural disease” of PowerPoint is, I’m happy to say, taking some hits in several LinkedIn groups and other forums that I frequent. Yet I’m sure I’ll never lack for examples of this modern technological crutch screwing up what could be a powerful presentation.

A couple weeks ago, I attended a contractor conference put on by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency in Baltimore. I counted about 75 contractors, by far most of them from engineering firms, crowded into an ornate hotel ballroom. They were eager to learn how they could benefit from the largesse of an agency that is sure to be more aggressive after some fallow years in the Bush Administration. Highlights of the day, senior bureaucrats promised us, would be presentations by two current EPA contractors who’d reached out to many small business subcontractors, clearly a point of pride for the agency.

Well, each one of them stepped to the front of the room…and blew it: One slide after the other, bullet points read verbatim as they repeatedly broke eye contact with the audience, fonts too small to be read more than two rows of tables back, and – perhaps worst of all – a compulsion to go through every slide at the cost of genuine communication.

By genuine, I mean the lively and informative Q&A that should be the ultimate goal of any audience-friendly presentation. How can you learn if you don’t ask questions? Don’t the experienced pros in any such gathering have much to share with colleagues at other tables? Are we to assume that the presenters chosen by the EPA are the fount of all wisdom in the world of government contracting? Why doesn’t someone insist that any meeting must include time for a Q&A, and who cares if we miss yet another set of bullet points?

There was talk at the meeting about the EPA eventually taking over more of the clean-up in the Gulf of Mexico. Just imagine how angry, weary citizens and municipalities along the Gulf would react to a tedious PowerPoint. They’ll have many questions and they’ll demand answers, not another slide show.

One other thought about leaving time for Q&As, and I got this from a contractor who’s attended many a meeting in which departments within a company or representatives of government and industry make initial contact aimed at partnering on a project: “We always leave time for Q&As because that’s where personal bonds are formed.”

——————————————————————

Now to the media and marketing. Consider these words from columnist Anna Quindlen: “Being a reporter is as much a diagnosis as a job description.”

There’s a popular misconception out there that reporters and their editors and producers bring some sort of political bias, or “agenda,” to their work. Yes, they do bring a bias, but for most it’s not political. It’s personal. Their agenda is themselves. They satisfy their egos and earn peer recognition and promotions when they get the news ahead of their equally driven competitors.
If you want to turn a news media encounter into a plus, understand reporters and where they come from. A few tips:

• We’re not in it for the money. We are in it because our curiosity about people and their triumphs and foibles drives us.
• Our agenda doesn’t have a political slant. What we really want is recognition, preferably envy, from our peers.
• Our real bias is for the story, the “man bites dog” angle, the “what’s new?”
• Getting that story often leads to obsessive, obnoxious, manipulative behavior, none of which is to imply that we’re dishonest. The best of us are determined, which can make us unpleasant to deal with if you’re the one answering the questions.
• Reporters taking those traits to the extreme become editors and producers, who in turn make reporters they deem unworthy quite miserable.

Dave Griffiths, a former national security correspondent for Business Week, does freelance writing and freelance editing, as well as media training and instruction in marketing messages, business writing, communications skills, presentation skills and business communication. His website is http://www.davegriffithscommunications.com

Matching Storytelling To Writing Skills

Greetings. I have a story to tell you. Early one evening many years ago, I returned to the Kansas City Star newsroom after covering a bizarre, ritualistic cattle-slaying incident in northwest rural Missouri. I had a notebook full of great quotes from the county DA and many others, and a photo of one very nervous principal dealing with nasty rumors flying around his high school.

My editor was holding front-page space for the story, and he wanted it now if not sooner. It was a busy news day so he told me to hold it to a modest 10 inches. “But,” I protested, “I don’t have time to keep it short.”

“Too bad,” he said with a shrug and turned away without a backward glance.

Somehow I distilled a compact story that left no questions unanswered from all those notes, but it was a struggle. It would have been much less stressful to let it run and use up all the juicy quotes, adding detail about the small town, its inhabitants and the way those cows had been eviscerated.

Therein lies a lesson central to the business communications training I offer to government agencies, nonprofits and private companies: It’s much easier to let it roll.

I trust you’ll agree that the lesson is clear: Brevity in business writing is no easy matter, in good part because it demands that we make decisions about tight organization and about what to write and what to leave out. But like so many other pursuits, doing the job right requires effort. In a newspaper full of articles, I probably got more readers to stick with the cattle-slaying story by keeping it short, particularly since it didn’t “jump” to an inside page.

Now, what if I had started this business communications newsletter issue by, instead of citing the above anecdote, stating that brevity is often a handmaiden of clarity and that you shouldn’t be long-winded, particularly in the world of workplace communications – written or presented? Your attention may have wandered, or not even been fixed in the first place, if my experience reading other newsletters is any indication. But with the newspaper tale, many of you wanted to know why I was writing about dairy cows with their guts hanging out, and how it ended for me. In other words, I had your attention.

My point is that adults learn by hearing or reading stories. At the very heart of effective business communications (or any communications, for that matter) are “ideas and details.” Tell a relevant story, connect it to your idea, and back it up with details. That goes for the main theme or message of your report or email (the Pentagon has come up with BLUF, or “bottom line up front,” a rare concession to clarity at Fort Futility), as well as the several sub-topics that back up and elaborate on that main point.

So tell a story. Here’s another one: I grew up in a churchgoing family, and noticed early on that Jesus offered many a parable, while Paul – in the numerous epistles that followed the four gospels – preached what amounted to platitudes. The point of Jesus’ stories was never in doubt, and I can cite many of them to this day. What about Paul? Well, I’m sure his tenets were crucial to the founding of Christianity, but all I remember, with good reason, is this quote from his first letter to Timothy: “Drink no longer water, but use a little wine for thy stomach’s sake and thine oft infirmities.”

When it comes to presentations, where you want spontaneity in a conversational setting, I’ve often witnessed one good story lead to another as audience members chime in. By contrast, ask yourself: How many times have you seen seemingly endless PowerPoint bullet points lead to anything but glassy-eyed stares and glances at wrist watches?

Dave Griffiths, a former national security correspondent for Business Week, does freelance writing and freelance editing, as well as media training and instruction in marketing messages, business writing, communications skills, presentation skills and business communication. His website is http://www.davegriffithscommunications.com

Email Etiquette That Works For Business Communications

Email, for all its blessings, can also be a source of annoyance and frustration. While hosting a business writing seminar last month for U.S. Dept. of Energy mid-level managers chosen for senior executive training, I saw unmistakable evidence that email has yet to evolve, at least in parts of that bureaucracy, as an efficient form of business communications. Too often, the byproducts are confusion, impatience and resentment.

Two things struck me. First, some people fail to see how email is a vast improvement over telephone voice mail when it comes to getting a timely response after you hit the “send” button. To explain: How many times have you left a voice mail and waited around for someone to get back to you? Have you been tempted to leave another message to convey the importance of what you want? If you have, you know that waiting time can be an awkward and anxiety-inducing interlude.

Now switch over to email. If I ask you for some information, and you can’t get to it right away, all you have to do is hit “reply” and say something to the effect of, “Got it. I’m swamped now, but I’ll get back to you by close of business tomorrow.” So without having to pick up the phone, you tap out a few words and the sender is satisfied, knowing that the original email got through. Fail to send back that simple acknowledgement, and the irritation mounts.

Second, email has a serious limitation. Your notion of the recipients’ immediate reaction is nonexistent when you can’t see their expressions and other non-speaking cues, as you would in a face-to-face encounter or tone of voice over the phone. Lacking those signs, you may not be cautious about injecting too much emotion (anger) or levity (sarcasm about a colleague) into your message. And remember: Email can be forwarded to addresses unknown to you, and it can be stored in someone’s file for a long, long time.

So, we decided at the Energy Dept. business writing seminar, when in doubt get up out of your chair and make it an in-person conversation. Don’t let high-tech electronic communications take the place of the direct give-and-take that has sustained the workaday world for many years.

Dave Griffiths, a former national security correspondent for Business Week, does freelance writing and freelance editing, as well as media training and instruction in marketing messages, business writing, communications skills, presentation skills and business communication. His website is http://www.davegriffithscommunications.com

Improve Your Writing Skills By Absorbing The Language

Greetings yet again. In case you didn’t know, I’m from Maine. It’s been a fine and lovely place to live for reasons that have nothing to do with this newsletter on business communications (it’s also a bit of a hassle because by far most of my communications training business is outside Maine). For our purposes here, it’s the home of Stephen King, who’s given some thought to what it takes to write well.

One of his key points goes something like this, paraphrasing from memory: “To be a good writer, you have to write a lot and you have to read a lot.”

That says it all. Writing, particularly business writing, is not a finite body of knowledge that you can learn from a “sage on the stage” who passes out nuggets of grammar and organizational expertise. Work at it, submit what you write to critical self-editing – editing by others is even better – and read, read, read. Consuming everything from newspaper journalism to novels to biographies to the spare word usage in good poetry is sure to sharpen your writing skills, if only by osmosis. The goal is straightforward: Clarity in your business communications.

(I’d rather not discuss what “texting” is doing to the younger generation’s grasp of our native tongue, but I’m sure it concerns most of us.)

King also said this, displaying the link between brevity and clarity: “The adverb is not your friend.” In other words, why “walk slowly” when you can “amble” or “stroll” or “saunter?” Why “run fast” when you can “dart,” “dash,“ “sprint,” “scurry” or even “flit?” Simply put, the heart and soul of the language is the active verb.

Dave Griffiths, former national security correspondent for Business Week, does freelance writing and freelance editing, as well as media training and instruction in marketing messages, business writing, communications skills, presentation skills and business communication. His website is http://www.davegriffithscommunications.com

The Government Taketh And The Government Giveth When It Comes To Business Writing

What is it about officialdom in America that shies away from clear communications? Why do bureaucrats deliberately use words that shade or obstruct meaning instead of taking the direct path that honors the readers’ or listeners’ needs and intelligence?

We all know the blowout disaster in the Gulf of Mexico was about a huge oil slick and the damage it would inflict once it reached shore. Yep, it was oil plain and simple, just like the Exxon Valdez tragedy. But did you hear those early briefings from the Coast Guard rear admiral? She called oil “the product.”

I’ve done some media training with the Coast Guard, and I couldn’t believe my ears. The product?!?! What is this, “1984?” Are we back in Vietnam, where “pacification” was an antiseptic stand-in for torching villages. By using “product” to stand in for oil, was the admiral trying to soften the blow, hoping that we’d be less alarmed at harm to the environment and tourism? Was “product” her invention, or is that the sort of nonsense that uniformed PR people are now selling on a regular basis when they try to “help” high-ranking officers prepare for press encounters?

Sadly enough, It doesn’t get any better when it comes to less public communications between government officials and the rest of us. In a recent conversation with a contractor who does business in Washington, I complained that bid solicitations going out to industry are often couched in impenetrable jargon, acronyms and insidey phrasing – shot through with dense federal regulation citations in one LONG paragraph. Right, the contractor said, and that’s how the government keeps the number of respondents at a reasonably low number. In other words, the language is a deliberate choice.

So the solicitations are written to exclude, when the language we share should include as many readers as possble. The fallout, of course, is that taxpayers probably aren’t getting their money’s worth because the verbiage artificially limits the number of bidders, which in turn lowers prospects for the most economical outcome.
What I find most disturbing is that obfuscation by language is hardly a fresh issue. Twelve years ago, Vice President Al Gore, who led a government reform panel, had this to say about our “public servants” and language: “We are talking about more than a new approach to communications. We’re talking about enduring principles of self-government. Clarity helps advance understanding. Understanding can help advance trust. And trust — especially trust in the promise of our self-government — is essential if we are to come together to solve the problems we face as a nation.”

What’s happened since then? Not enough, but I am encouraged by recent developments at the Dept. of Energy, where I’ve been teaching writing classes. The department’s Office of Human Capital Management has come up with a “Leadership Transition Program” for mid-level officials singled out as having promise for senior positions.

Along the way, they will be exposed to “Executive Core Qualifications” that include 28 “leadership competencies.” I know, I know. It sounds like someone with a clipboard will mark off each “competency” as the trainees achieve them. But I looked into descriptions for each of the 28, and was gratified to see how communications – both written and presented – play a key role.

Take “conflict management” as an example. Nothing can ratchet up the tension in any office like overly emotional language (“Sorry, but I just had to vent!”) in emails. After all, it’s easy to display anger or frustration when all you have to do is hit the “send” button, as opposed to more traditional face-to-face or phone conversations. So perhaps effective leaders should set the tone for respectful email by example.

Then there’s the competency called “team building.” Any group could benefit from top-down expectation about email and use of plain English to avoid misunderstanding and morale-sapping editing delays up and down the line. That means greater productivity, which any private company or nonprofit is sure to value as we recover from this recession the way we recovered from the last one – adding jobs, but not as many as in the boom years.

Or how about “customer service?” This is where inclusive language comes in again because the customer (or for that matter, the vendor) may not share your understanding of more technical, bureaucratic or even scientific language. But there’s also the matter of tone. I’ve worked with federal agencies where the tone is official – and often officious – enough to please the lawyers, but leaves taxpayers and other constituents cold.

Another competency is “oral communication,” which is sure to improve as you sharpen your wrting skills. It’s a matter of confidence. Beyond that, I’ve ranted in several newsletter issues about the technological tyranny of PowerPoint, suggesting instead that use of flip charts or a whiteboard/blackboard is a more flexible and audience-friendly way to get through to people.

Just recently, the New York Times quoted an Army lieutenant in Iraq, “The one thing I spend more time on than anything else here in combat is making PowerPoint slides.” His boss, Gen. David H. Petraeus, who oversees the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, says sitting through PowerPoints is “just agony.”

Enough said.

Dave Griffiths, former national security correspondent for Business Week, does freelance writing and freelance editing, as well as media training and instruction in marketing messages, business writing, communications skills, presentation skills and business communication. His website is http://www.davegriffithscommunications.com

Business Writing Language Hall of Shame

Greetings. I’ve been compiling a business writing Language Hall of Shame over the past year or so, and publishing installments in the electronic newsletter that I send out every month from www.davegriffithscommunications.com. Someone asked me to gather them in one place, and here they are (I welcome your comments and additions):

• Past history – I wonder what the legendary iconoclast and journalist H.L. Mencken would have made of anyone using this phrase. My guess is that he’d consign them to what he called “the booboisie,” which needs no explanation. I’m flabbergasted at how often I hear that, along with its twin descent into copycat idiocy, past experience. Here’s the point: Hearing someone say something of such mouth-breathing stupidity – no matter how often – doesn’t make it right.

• I, personally… — Right. Is that to be used when you don’t mean, “I, impersonally…?” Or are you using “personally” as a sort of punctuation/pause, a clearing of the throat before moving on? One advantage of taking a writing class and subjecting yourself to peer review and lessons in self-editing is that learning to be a more efficient, to-the-point communicator transfers easily to speaking. It’s all about discipline and respect for your audience.

• Low-hanging fruit — When this one pops up I’m tempted to make eye contact with someone else in the room and share a knowing grin. But let’s try to be serious. Here’s the day-to-day “business world” interpretation of low-hanging fruit: When faced with a challenge, you do the easy stuff first. So how about instead: “Let’s confront this problem one step at a time…”? I recall attending a planning meeting where “low-hanging fruit” entered the discussion early and was repeated eight times by four or five other adults. Apparently, all it takes is one brief utterance to turn otherwise bright people into language lemmings.

• Defining moment – I take that to mean the one crucial stage or decision that lets us know whether we’re facing success or failure. If so, then by its very definition, the phrase must be used sparingly. Yet it sounds so precise that we overuse it because we feel authoritative and insightful. But how many “defining moments” can there be? Pile up too many of them and they lose their impact while you look shallow and unimaginative.

• Rgds and tks — Whoa, you must be one extremely busy and important executive if you can’t find the time to write out “regards” and “thanks.” And lest I forget that, tks for reminding me of your stature every time you send an email. Maybe, as the poet William Wordsworth said, the child really is “father of the Man,” and we should start aping the shorthand that our brilliant offspring use when they “text” each other.  

• Out of the box – I thought this sucker would be gone by now, consigned to some ash heap like “this particular point in time” subbing for “now,” but I’ve been hearing it far too often lately. If you’re really thinking outside the box, should you be using tired phrases like “outside the box?” And if everyone thinks outside that ubiquitous cardboard container, maybe the “most unique” course for you would be to climb back inside and hunker down in lonely, risk-free splendor.

• Taking it to the next level – Okay, I know this is a sports cliché, and I know we can blame it on a host of ex-jocks in broadcast booths across America. But I’ve been hearing it creep into consultantspeak and what passes for business communications. One thought: In the workplace, writing skills are most effective if they’re precise. So the “next level” doesn’t have to be a glorious ascension, does it? It could be a step downward, couldn’t it?

• Step up to the plate – Sports again. This one’s achieving critical mess (that’s not a typo). And it’s an absurd example of what occurs when copycat, mindless writing masquerades as effective business communication. Do you know what happens to the top 20 or 30 baseball hitters when they “step up to the plate?” Nearly seven times out of ten, they strike out, hit a grounder, a foul pop-up, an infield pop-up, a line drive to an infielder or a fly ball to an outfielder. In other words, they fail.

• Negatively impact – As in “Our failure to fabricate even one paper clip that actually holds two sheets of paper together is negatively impacting our sales performance.” First of all, “impact” became a verb only about 30 years ago, even though the verbs “affect” or “influence” did the job quite nicely.

  But now that it’s here, as I tell my business writing skills students, why compound the damage by adding an awkward adverb (fellow Mainer Stephen King said in his book on writing, “The adverb is not your friend.”)? Why not rely instead on unambiguous, active, space-saving standbys such as “harm” or “hurt?” 

• Core competencies — As in “Our core competencies include a flexible attitude about quality control and a collective tendency to stretch the lunch hour beyond normal parameters because we adhere to the principle of saving personal energy.” Does anyone realize that by using the adjective “core” to define “competencies,” you’re implying that you have other “competencies” that might not be so “core?” And that a careful reader could deduce that those other competencies might actually be subpar, or at least rather pedestrian? Here’s a solution in plain English that makes business communications work: “What we do best is…” or “Our reputation rests on the way we…” or “We are known for…”

  I bring this up because I don’t doubt that your readers are critical thinkers (at least that’s what I tell my business writing seminar students to expect), which means they will view phrases like “core competencies” as lazy, unproductive thinking.

• Skill sets – As in “Our employees can bring the most unique set of skill sets to finding a solution to your problem, which is why we consider ourselves a high-end firm that can justify overcharging you for our services.” First of all, you can’t be “most unique” because “unique” means one of a kind. I used to think that foolishness was restricted to the sports broadcast booth, but now I’m seeing it on websites, which was probably inevitable.

  Anyway, I ask you: What’s wrong with just using “skills?” How can adding “sets” possibly add anything beyond the useless appendage of another four-letter word? If you use “skills sets,” ask yourself: “Why? What have I gained beyond the obvious tendency to imitate others unthinkingly?”

Dave Griffiths, former national security correspondent for Business Week, does freelance writing and freelance editing, as well as media training and instruction in marketing messages, business writing, communications skills, presentation skills and business communication. His website is http://www.davegriffithscommunications.com

Second Thoughts On PowerPoint When It Comes To Presentation Skills

  I think I’ve finally come to a reckoning with PowerPoint. In blog entries past, I’ve vented my spleen on the way this technological crutch can dominate a room, inhibit discussion and have many in the audience looking at their watches, not always surreptitiously, while the slides move inexorably on, swamping us with statistics and bullet points beyond measure. And more often than not, the presentation starts with a technical glitch that interrupts whatever momentum the speaker had hoped to build in his or her introduction.

   Well, I’ve softened a bit on that, and it has to do with the best teacher of all – experience. Context, as we all know, is everything. A couple months ago, I spoke about marketing through the media at a conference of water utility engineers and bureaucrats (in these times, it seems that everyone on the public payroll is struggling to keep their share of the budgetary pie from shrinking). The crowd in the large ballroom numbered around 100. It was the first presentation of the day and they were juiced on coffee, pastries laden with thick white frosting and bonhomie.

  I was doing fine with my spiel about AIM (audience, intent, message); plain English; getting your point out through op-eds, letters to the editor and “media events;” befriending reporters; the brevity-clarity connection, etc., etc. But when I turned to my feelings about PowerPoint, I got stares in return, not the nodding heads I’d encountered in other settings.

  Before long one middle-aged woman raised her hand, stood up and told me point blank, “I think you’re wrong. I’ve seen PowerPoint work many times, with charts and graphs. It’s the best way to get information to an audience. I’m sure of it.”

  Oh-oh. That stopped me, particularly since no one rose to dispute the lady. All my clever denunciations of PowerPoint were falling flat. Not sure how to react, I acknowledged another hand in the air, and we moved on to a different topic.

  A week or two later, a friend who’d been general manager of an urban water district told me that engineers need charts and graphs, and nothing else will do. His point: Such detail is a common language in his line of work no less than our native tongue, and should be put to use in any gathering of professionals who deal in precise measurement and the investment of tax dollars in efficient and safe public projects.

  OK. Point taken. Feeling a bit fallible, I went back to my office wondering about other advice I offer in my presentation skills seminars: Instead of PowerPoint, why not use flip charts or whiteboards/blackboards to jot down your points and solicit ideas from your audience? In other words, be “interactive.”

  That’s when the notion of “scale” hit me. Attendees at my presentation skills and business writing seminars – and many videotaped media training sessions, for that matter – rarely exceed 25 in number. Flip charts work fine in that setting. But when you’re in a much larger room, PowerPoint really is appropriate. It’s far more visible, and no one in the back is straining to make out my handwriting on a chart. Either that, or you distribute 100 handouts, which has the added benefit of allowing your audience to relax without taking notes.

   One last thing. As a school board member, I’ve been to several briefings at a law firm that represents school districts. At each one, where the room holds around 25 or 30, the lawyers hand out booklets on school law and use PowerPoint for just one purpose – humorous quotes, which never fail to lighten the mood and bring the audience together. Not coincidentally, the law firm no longer uses PowerPoint when making presentations to any clients. “It just didn’t work,” a senior attorney told me.

Dave Griffiths, former national security correspondent for Business Week, does freelance writing and freelance editing, as well as media training and instruction in marketing messages, business writing, communications skills, presentation skills and business communication. His website is http://www.davegriffithscommunications.com