Say just enough...

We as people have been communicating with each other for thousands of years; and yet, fundamental rules of personal communication were formulated... in the 1970’s by a British scientist Paul Grice. These rules are captivating in terms of their content and brevity. There are four rules, plus one super-rule. This is good news because 4+1 can be easily memorized; and, with just a bit of self-discipline, it should quickly become a habit. All you need is… self-discipline. There are no pills or smartphone apps for that one.

I have already discussed the Rule of Quality, presenting its interpretation and my own arguments in a separate article (LINK). It was a success, which encourages me to discuss the other rules as well.

Here’s the second one:

Rule of Quantity

Make your contribution as informative as required for the current purposes of the exchange

In short: Say just enough

This is one of the basic problems that I constantly encounter being a professional listener. Theoretically, you can predict potential problems on both ends of the scale, i.e. excessive laconicism and excessive talkativeness (too little or too much information). The real distribution is unambiguously different. Most of us talk too much, which is also not necessarily very clear... In fact, we talk much too much and not clear at all. That is, in the business environment. In a café, with your friends or family, it’s all up to you and it’s none of my business.

Already in high school (for what it’s worth, I did specialize in maths/physics) I have encountered an exercise in logic that illustrates the argument well. It is extremely short and consists of just one simple question: Why does the sultan wear green suspenders?

Practice shows that most people will focus on the word "green" and look for answers right there. Of course, you can do it this way too. Although the most universal and perfectly sufficient answer is: To keep his trousers up.

What happened? Well, too much information can harm. And harm even more if the excess is given in an imprecise manner, allowing various interpretations. It misleads the recipient. For this reason, in mathematical jargon, all unnecessary additions, which do not say anything important, but only obscure the essence of the message, are referred to as "green suspenders". And how much we love to speak in green suspenders!

How old are you? Well... I was born in 1973. Oh, so I have to do the counting myself, and it was such a simple question…

What is this book about? Well, in the first chapter Harry Potter did this and that, and this evil wizard did that, to which Harry's friends reacted so and so. In the second chapter, they went there and there and talked about this and that. Oh! I didn’t say who Harry is, so Harry is a little wizard who has a wand and supernatural powers and his parents are dead. And in the third chapter, this and that happened, and in the fourth... And so he/she goes, page by page. Is that what I wanted to know? Did I ask for the table of contents? Or should I just read the book myself?

Behaving this way, we are presenting several things, which usually have negative effects.

Firstly, disrespect for the partner. He needs specific information. He even asked the question in a quite precise manner, and we're throwing pieces of picture puzzle at him to pick something out of it. Instead of cooperating, we are clouding the picture.

Secondly, we are revealing our own sloppy thinking; or actually, an aversion to thinking. Instead of thinking about what our recipient needs and give it to him on a tray, we're throwing everything we have at him. We shift the weight of thinking onto the recipient. And we provoke a situation when, in good faith, he will come up with something completely different than we wanted ("because green is the colour of Islam, so the sultan must be religious..." and so on and so forth).

Thirdly, we are poor in conveying the meaning, or in action. This is probably the worst effect. How many things have failed, even though both parties were sure that they had understood each other well? Because later they did something completely different than they expected from one another. And all this being 100% sure that they are implementing what they both had agreed on!

What do we do with this? Practice, just practice. It's not rocket science. You don’t have to be born with it. You can learn how to communicate efficiently. If we can master foreign languages, which we have not sucked in with mother's milk, we can improve our own too.

My suggestion is to do three exercises and to follow a simple rule.

Exercise 1

When you’re opening your mouth to start speaking immediately, then... take a deep breath and close your mouth. Give yourself a moment, a second or two to gather your thoughts; think about what is the essence of the question (the need!) of the interlocutor and start from that. If you have any doubts at this point, just ask them. Yes, just ask and make sure what they need. It sounds easy, although it is not so simple at the beginning. We prefer to talk much more than we listen and think.

And now, the most difficult part. Answer "top to bottom", so start with the most important thing, preferably expressed in one sentence. Nothing leads the interlocutor to despair like starting from the bottom, i.e. the story, how and why I came to a specific conclusion just to present the conclusion (the most important thing!) after many minutes of useless talk when the other person has already fallen asleep or lost all hope.

If, for example, you are reporting the results of an analysis of whether to buy a company or not, start with this recommendation. This is the most important thing for the recipient. Only then it’s time to present the arguments that lead to this conclusion. It will give the recipient the opportunity to engage in discussion and to trim or expand topics that he considers appropriate (because it is to serve him).

Exercise 2

Summarize each book you have read, each movie you have watched, each discussion (especially all-day sit-ups) in three sentences. Include what matters most. Think what a person, who has not read it, watch it, or participate in it, should know so that they would have a basic idea about it. This is difficult at the beginning. You will have a natural tendency to disperse and rationalize that "it can’t be done". I assure you, it can. Search for the most important thing and say it in the shortest possible, precise and unambiguous manner. Remember the principle of Antoine de Saint-Exupery: Perfection is achieved, not when there is nothing more to add, but when there is nothing left to take away.

Once you have built these three sentences, put them on paper and check again if they sound precise and unambiguous to someone who has not read it, seen it, etc. If in doubt, ask someone what they understood from these three sentences.

Over time, it will become a habit and you will make such summaries practically automatically, with little effort. And that's it. This will mean that you have achieved a higher level of communication skills.

Exercise 3

Prepare your speeches or presentations in layers.

First, put the thought in one sentence. In this sentence, you will identify key conclusions/areas.

Then add the second layer, that is, a few sentences precisely developing each of the above conclusions/areas from the first sentence. And stop talking after saying them aloud. Give the interlocutor a chance to digest and decide which one of them is most interesting for further discussion (because it’s not always, or mostly, all of them). Let the interlocutor choose which of these sentences is important to him and what they want to elaborate. It’s not a problem for you because you are prepared. How? Well, for each of these sentences you have a third layer, which is the next few sentences, which add on to what you said. Let me repeat that, a few sentences, not a million of them; again, because you have thought them trough and prepared them earlier.

Due to such a sequence, the information is transmitted in portions (or quanta – for the home-grown enthusiasts of quantum physics applied to everything...). For the recipient the portions are digestible, and the clearly set full stop gives him time to think, ask questions and choose whether and which part of our information he wants to deepen.

I will also emphasize this - full stop and silence on your side are important and powerful tools for conversation. Emphasize the full stop. Enjoy the silence.

The Rule

A universal military rule: repeat.

Giving a task, in the end, the commanding officer always adds: repeat. The subordinate has to say what he understood the task is. Both sides then have greater certainty that they understand the situation identically and continue to act. Because human life depends on it. In business conditions, not in combat, we can ask both the interlocutor and ourselves (!) to repeat. This is nothing more than a precise and short summary of what was agreed on. You can initiate it yourself, regardless of your role in the meeting. If you are consistent in this, you will quickly find out how the beneficial effects of this principle affect the effectiveness of further actions.