With the help of this article you will learn how to correctly present information, and therefore – will be correctly understood by your interlocutor.
Principle of hierarchy (pyramid)
You should not give information to your interlocutor on an “all at once” basis. To be properly understood – stick to the hierarchy in presenting information! First, describe the essence of the question. Then – emphasize the main details. And only then – draw out each detail separately.
Now turn on your internal timer and, after reading the assignment, try to complete it in about 4 seconds. But first, have a pen and paper to write it down. Ready?
So, memorize as many nouns as you can from the following list: crucian, owl, giraffe, hippopotamus, pike, crow, hare, burbot, nightingale, fox, carp, duck.Immediately write down what you remembered.
Now count how many animals have “settled” on your list. Six? Seven? But do not hurry to get upset, the average result of such a test is five names written down from memory, and it is not because most people have a bad memory, because of the abundance of information “garbage” in their heads.
It’s all about the way the task is set up. After all, it would be much easier for you to memorize more if the task was formulated as follows: “Memorize as many creatures as possible from this list: Fish: carp, crucian carp, pike, burbot; Birds: crow, owl, duck, nightingale. Animals: giraffe, hippopotamus, hare, fox”. So, you have asked the nouns for the second time, but still, check what the result will be with this formulation of the task (on yourself or on your colleagues). For sure, the result will be better than the one you got after the first time.
It’s simple. Structured information is perceived more easily. And this structure can be visualized as a kind of pyramid. As a matter of fact, this approach to structuring information is known as the “pyramid method”. Its essence is that information is presented from general to particular. First, a holistic, but not detailed picture is presented, and then, step by step, block by block, the basis of the “pyramid” is “built up”.
According to this principle, you can well fix any explanation in the mind of your interlocutor. Let’s say you are a resident of Tanzania and have never heard of the existence of such a dish as sushi. And here, they start telling you how to make sushi. Imagine that this story sounds something like this:
“To make sushi, salmon is cut into long strips, up to one centimeter in diameter. Avocado in flat strips up to 5 mm thick. Rice is washed in “seven waters”. The washed rice is boiled until ready, and then seasoned with a tablespoon of a mixture of rice vinegar, sugar and salt. A sheet of pressed seaweed is laid on a sushi mat and a thin layer of rice is laid out on it with fingers wet with water, about 3/4 of the area of the sheet, with an indentation from the edges of the sheet about a centimeter. In the middle of the rice layer, a “track” of ingredients – vasabi, avocado and salmon – is laid out. After laying the ingredients on the layer of rice, we start twisting the roll towards the empty part of the sheet, helping ourselves with a mat – so that the roll turns out tight and does not fall apart. When the strip with a layer of rice is over, slightly moisten the remaining part of the sheet with water and twist the roll to the end, thus “sealing” it. Using a bamboo mat, give the resulting “roll” a rectangular shape and cut it into 6 pieces with a well-sharpened knife moistened with water. Enjoy your meal.
What do you say, after reading such a recipe you have understood how rolls are prepared and are sure that you can make them yourself? Arranging the information according to the pyramid principle, we would get a classic culinary recipe – from the private (essence) – to detailed steps and description of the result.
So, in this case, we should start by describing the essence of the dish. Then, continue with a list of ingredients for sushi. And to finish with a breakdown of the process of making sushi into a few, clearly recognizable, stages. For example: 1) Boiling the rice; 2) Preparing the ingredients; 3) Laying out the ingredients; 4) Rolling and cutting the rolls; 5) Setting the table. With a short description of each step.
By describing a recipe in this way, we would have arrived at the very “pyramid” that helps us first understand the essence of the dish/concept, and then clarifies what are the ingredients used to prepare/form and consume it.
The principle of “responding to the needs of the listener”
Start the story with what your listener is interested in – their questions, opportunities, challenges or problems. Compare the following two texts. Which one will interest you more?
Option 1. “The fruit of the banana tree is covered with a thick peel. Because of the peel’s good protection of the fruit, a banana can be safely eaten, even bought on the street, without washing…”
Option 2. “How to have a hearty and healthy snack right on the street, in just a couple of minutes and without the risk of getting “dirty hands disease”? Very simple – buy a banana, peel it, holding the tail of the fruit, and immediately eat it. The part of the fruit protected by the peel is always clean and ready to eat…”.
It is clear that the majority of readers will vote for the second option, because it starts with something that interests and concerns the majority of people, with a task that needs to be solved almost every day by millions of inhabitants of the Earth!
It is likely that those who chose the second option will also be interested in the following two texts:
“You don’t have a minute of free time – after work you immediately need to pick up your child from kindergarten, then quickly rush home, feed/change clothes/occupy your child without delaying for a snack, take your bag for training, and… and… run to the gym… And you’re hungry! So here it is – your solution – at the corner of your house, at the fruit stand selling bananas!…”.
или:
“The working day is over, you want to use EVERY minute of your free time with the enjoyment of every moment of FREEDOM! BUT – you are not into cooking, only – sports, fishing or leisurely socializing with friends. In that case, why would you want to waste your precious time cooking!!!? On the way to the sports center, fishing or visiting friends, buy a banana, peel it and eat it immediately – because under the peel the banana is clean and full of useful microelements for the body!…”.
The first suggested option starts with a problem relevant to the listener and the second with an attractive opportunity. In both cases – the target audience is interested in what we are talking about!
So, the essence of the above two principles is now clear to you. information should be presented in a structured way(from the essence – to details) or, having a target message – from the purpose – to the offer.
How can these principles be applied in practice? For example, not when communicating, but when writing an academic paper. Let’s consider the following example. Let’s say you are writing an article for beginners or future financiers about the basic principles of assessing the investment attractiveness of an enterprise. In this case, you can structure your story about the indicators you use in the evaluation process as follows:
“P/E” (price to earnings) are measures of value – that is – the ratio of stock price to earnings per share.P/S (price to sales) is the ratio of stock price to sales per share. The P/E ratio helps calculate the number of years it takes to break even on the price of the stock being purchased.
ROS (return on sales) and ROE (return on equity) are measures of profitability…”
But, given the suggested principles for presenting information, you might start your description this way:
“In order to decide whether to buy a stock in any company, you need to understand whether the company’s stock is worth the money being asked for it:
- Whether the stock is capable of recouping your investment within a reasonable period of time;
- whether the company is profitable;
- how fast the company’s profits will grow.
You can estimate the ability of a stock to pay back your investment by calculating how many years it will take you to recoup the price of the shares you purchased through the dividends you receive. There are several ways to calculate this indicator. Calculating the ratio of the market price of a share to the earnings per share for the year is the P/E ratio (price to earnings). In addition, it is possible to get this indicator by calculating the ratio of share price to sales per share for the year, this is the P/S (price to sales) ratio….
The profitability of a company can be assessed by determining how much return the company gets from its working capital. This indicator is calculated as the ratio of the company’s net profit to its sales revenue (ROS or return on sales), or to the sum of all the company’s assets (ROA or return on assets), or to the company’s equity (ROE or return on equity)….
The company’s ability to grow is measured by…” Well, etc. You should agree that readers who are yet to become advanced financiers will understand the second version of the description of the essence of the question better.
The “acceleration principle”
If we need to talk about something that is unfamiliar, complex, and contains scientific terminology, we don’t go into details and terminology right away. To “ramp up” the story, we start it with something close and understandable to the listeners.
For example, compare the following two texts (J.M. Williams, “Style. Ten Tips for Beginning Authors”). And answer the question, which one is clearer to you?
Text 1. “The control proteins, actin, myosin, tropomyosin and tropinin, form the sarcomere, the main element responsible for muscle contraction.”
Text 2. “The main element responsible for muscle contraction is the sarcomere. It is formed from the control proteins actin, myosin, tropomyosin and tropinin.”
While the content is absolutely identical, we perceive the unfamiliar topic more easily in the second presentation. In the first text we get into unfamiliar terminology from the start, while in the second text we approach the terminology gradually, i.e. through the principle of “topic acceleration” from the generally understandable to the complex.
How can you use the principle of “acceleration” when writing an article? Let us turn again to the article for future financiers. We can start our story about one of the calculation coefficients in the following way:
“Another useful ratio is P/E (price to earnings). It is defined as the ratio of the market price of a company’s stock to the annualized earnings per share. The ratio shows how many years the company will be able to recoup the money spent on the purchase of shares with profits”.
And you can talk about the same coefficient this way:
“One useful calculation ratio is theP/E ratio (a.k.a. price to earnings). It allows you to know how many years it will take for the company to recoup the current value of its shares. This period is calculated by dividing the market price of one share of the company’s stock by the earnings per one such share for the year”.
That is, once your readers are able to grasp the “universal” essence of concepts, they will not be afraid of formulas! It should be said that this idea can be applied to all the above-described principles of information presentation. From the general to the particular. From the generally understood to formulas and details. From the particular to the base and causes.
By learning this way of presenting information to your interlocutor, you will increase the effectiveness of your conversation or article – many times over! Remember this, formulate your information correctly and always get good results. Share useful information with your colleagues, because it will help them to work and communicate with people more effectively.
