One of the best lines in Hamlet is a rambling monologue with the phrase, “Brevity is the soul of wit.” Lacking a lick of self-awareness, the character is trying to highlight the importance of few words while using too many.

We’ve been asking how to say the most with the least for years now, while sectors such as health care, higher education, and science advocacy will always be addicted to detail and information. Communications professionals in these fields have to balance the importance of big ideas with the need for small word counts.

Why is this so difficult?

Some content managers are unfamiliar with new best practices. 
I italicize Hamlet based on the 500-year-old rules of Venetian printers, but Internet standards may be different. Thomas Jefferson said to stand like a rock on principles while moving with the tide of style. The message is the principle in communications, while some still treat classic styles with the same priority as accessibility needs.

Some leaders are used to big ideas that come with big words. 
A lot of definition and specificity may suit the demographic of the well-read people who run institutions, but it doesn’t always serve late Gen-Z and Gen-Alpha mobile users (the majority of potential college students) or busy overstimulated middle-class knowledge workers (the plurality of mid-level donors).

Some organizations have just too much to say. 
It’s hard to set priorities when an institution, or even the cause it supports, is in existential danger. Although the need to survive could simplify some matters, times like these can stack up priorities and cause dissent on which needs to communicate when. That may lead to more comms and content with less clarity in them.

How can we help?

Offer options that can help unify content strategy. 
If you’re suggesting brevity as part of a plan, be ready to sell it. Stock style guides with short and medium words that give content owners some specifics. Consider short modular versions of key pieces of content like mission statements. Even if these aren’t popular at first, they’re something to get the conversation going — which is always a key part of a good collaboration.

Cite a trusted source, or at least a memorable one.
People love a good source. When I taught grant writing, I reminded students of the importance of keeping words short and easily readable. Students loved where I found that rule: a grant writing book by Don Fey, immortalized in a chapter in Bossypants, the hit book by his daughter Tina Fey. That fact has led more people to remember the importance of brevity than anything else I’ve used.

Find allies in your battle for brevity.
Does the client have any Gen Z staff? Any busy middle-class knowledge workers? Probably! Check any user testing or competitive analysis that the client has to offer. Someone will have to agree with you to make this work, and they should be the thought leaders and decision makers of the organization. They need to trust your point. Who close to them can make it?

It’s against my family-based instinct and my grad-school training as well: why use one word when ten will do? But that time is long past in comms. Now, words can be diamonds – when silence is golden.