Quotes About Clarity

If you want people to change, you must provide crystal-clear direction.

That's not intuitive knowledge.

finding the core," and expressing it in the form of a compact idea

The destination was crystal clear:

crystallization of discontent

This is what we mean by "thinking in moments": to recognize where the prose of life needs punctuation.

Statistics aren't inherently helpful; it's the scale and context that make them so.

There are, in fact, only two ways to beat the Curse of Knowledge reliably. The first is not to learn anything. The second is to take your ideas and transform them.

When you want someone to behave in a new way, explain the "new way" clearly. Don't assume the new moves are obvious.

Be simple. Not simple in terms of "dumbing down" or "sound bites." You don't have to speak in monosyllables to be simple. What we mean by "simple" is finding the core of the idea.

Ambiguity is the enemy. Any successful change requires a translation of ambiguous goals into concrete behaviors.

This is the Curse of Knowledge. Once we know something, we find it hard to imagine what it was like not to know it. Our knowledge has "cursed" us. And it becomes difficult for us to share our knowledge with others, because we can't readily re-create our listeners' state of mind.

This three-part recipe—a (1) clear insight (2) compressed in time and (3) discovered by the audience itself—provides a blueprint for us when we want people to confront uncomfortable truths.

This "moment-spotting" habit can be unnatural. In organizations, for instance, we are consumed with goals. Time is meaningful only insofar as it clarifies or measures our goals. The goal is the thing.

Sometimes, in life, we can't get our bearings until we trip over the truth.

To make our communications more effective, we need to shift our thinking from "What information do I need to convey?" to "What questions do I want my audience to ask?

The Curse of Knowledge: when we are given knowledge, it is impossible to imagine what it's like to LACK that knowledge.

A designer knows he has achieved perfection not when there is nothing left to add, but when there is nothing left to take away.

If I already intuitively "get" what you're trying to tell me, why should I obsess about remembering it? The danger, of course, is that what sounds like common sense often isn't.... It's your job, as a communicator, to expose the parts of your message that are uncommon sense. (p.72)

Common sense is the enemy of sticky messages, if I already "get" what you're trying to tell me, why should I be obsessed about remembering it.

The more we reduce the amount of information in an idea, the stickier it will be.

You say 10 things, you say nothing.

You don't have to speak monosyllables to be simple. What we mean by simple is finding the core of the idea.

The Aha! experience is much more satisfying when it's preceded by the huh experience.