Tuesday, December 30, 2014


Christmas has passed us. And I am sure most of us have become an expert gift wrapper and we all know how to package our gifts in the most interesting/ attractive manner, so that even the crappiest gift will look awesome anyway… that is before it was unwrapped of course. But the point of this post is not to talk about Christmas (if you are interested to read on a post about Christmas, please click here), it is to talk about packaging your words so that you can be more effective in your communication in the coming spanking new year!

A lot of people thought that you have to be highly educated or a voracious reader to be refined in your speech, i.e. your choice of words. However, that is not entirely true. There are ways for you to cheat. You just need to follow these 5 simple steps;

1. Keep it CONCISE.
Make it short and sharp. Always remember, not many people will stick around to listen to your points if they are going to take more than 5 minutes. Just like stand-ups; if it’s too winding, it would be cold. You gotta catch your audience while they are still hot in listening.

2. Elaborate LATER
Elaborate only after you’ve made your points. If your points cannot stand on its own, i.e. without the elaboration, then your points are not clear enough. Rethink and repackage your points.

3. Use SIMPLE WORDS
The richest business person or the most successful person doesn’t have time to figure out metaphorical phrases or flowery languages. Use simple words, unless of course, if you intend to write a script or prose or the next big novel.

4. Rules of 3
Always repeat that one point three times in three different ways. For a good example, always listen out to jingles and how they repeat the product’s/ brand’s name for three times in three different ways under 30 seconds.

5. Proofread.
After you’re done, read it once through. If you keep stumbling on some words, chances are, the structure of the sentences you’ve just written isn’t succinct enough, or it doesn’t naturally roll off a human’s tongue. If that happens, you’ve gotta repackage that sentence, so that it sounds more natural. People can relate better to the point you’re making if it sounds natural to them. I mean, would you go for something unnatural over something that is natural?