Improve your writing without dumbing down.

Don't dumb-down. Smarten-up!

Lots of people want to improve their writing, but they worry they’ll have to ‘dumb down’ their work to do so. For them, writing in ‘Plain English’ means stripping everything back to the bare bones, ditching complexity and nuance. And complexity and nuance are often really important. As a result, they give up.

That’s why I prefer phrases like ‘Clear English’ or ‘Clear Writing’. Clear Writing isn’t about dumbing down, it’s about using language to your advantage. It’s about getting complexity across in a way your reader will understand. With Clear Writing, comprehension is key.

Sometimes, you do want to boil a message down to its most simple form. If you’re trying to explain your product to the public, for instance, then complexity is your enemy. You need to keep it super simple. Remember the Apple campaign slogan for the original iPod? ‘A thousand songs in your pocket’. Perfect.

But most of the time, you won’t be writing a public facing marketing slogan. You’ll be writing emails to your colleagues, reports for your boss, or letters to your customers. Here, complexity may well be vital, but you still want to write well, so what do you do?

First, take a step back. At work, we write to achieve an objective, to change the way a person thinks, feels or acts. To be in with a chance of achieving your goal, your readers must be able to understand what you’ve written. Common barriers to that understanding include ‘in-house’ language, technical terms and abbreviations.

In da house

You know when you start a new job? It’s like everyone is speaking a foreign language. For weeks, the most common words out of your mouth are, “What does that mean?” But before long, you learn this new language and start speaking it yourself. In no time at all you know it so well, you forget there was ever a time when you didn’t know it. You’ve gone native.

That’s fine if you’re talking to people within your organisation who share this common language. But it’s a disaster if you use it with those outside it. Customers or suppliers, for example.

Think about your reader and the words you use. Ask yourself if your friends or family would understand them. If they wouldn’t, choose words they would.

LTAs (Three Letter Abbreviations)

Abbreviations are another problem. HCAI, CQC, NAC, HCC, CAMHS, IRP, SHA, PEAT, NCEPOD, QUANGO — all from my years in the UK government. And no, I don’t know what they mean either.

Never assume your reader knows what an abbreviation means. Always explain what it means the first time you use it, and refresh their memory every now and then. If you’re writing a long document, think how your reader will use it. If you explain an abbreviation on page one, but your reader jumps straight to the bit their interested in on page 20, you need to explain it again. Think about your reader and be kind.

Let’s get technical

Then there’s technical language to consider. Many people climb the ladder of success by becoming more and more specialist, diving into the rich complexity of their subject. In a very real way, complexity pays the bills. But complexity also comes with its own vocabulary.

Imagine two highly specialised doctors discussing a patient. They will use words, phrases and abbreviations I couldn’t hope to understand. But that’s OK. For them, the technical language and acronyms they use are not a barrier to communication and understanding, but a bridge to it. However, if they then turn around and use that same language with their patient, then we have a problem.

E=MC what?

Some things are just complicated. Government policy is complicated, business is complicated, physics is complicated. Here, taking out the complexity is not an option. You need the complexity. But you have to explain the complexity in a way your reader can understand. For as Albert Einstein once said, “everything should be made as simple as possible, but no simpler”.

How do you do this? It’s not difficult, but it does require hard work, discipline and a constant awareness of the needs of your reader. Here are three things to try straight away: Always use simple words to explain difficult ideas and concepts. Keep your sentences short. Explain your abbreviations regularly. With just these three things you can make a significant difference to the quality of your work, the comprehension of your reader, and the achievement of your goals.

Constantly ask yourself, are my words going to help me achieve my objectives, or will they cause my reader to dump them in the trash? Remember, good writing is hard work and it is you who has to do that hard work, never your reader.