Why Investing in Plain Language Training Is a Smart Business Move
Last year, I was trying to hook a big fish. One of those multinational consultancies was interested in plain language training, and I wanted to be able to say I’d worked for them. Adding that pretty little logo to my website would be good for my ego!
So I went along with the three hefty meetings spread over months. Then I went along with multi-hour meetings with the other trainers I was to collaborate with. I created the customised lesson plans they asked for, got set up as a supplier, and generally did everything I could to be great to work with.
The red flag rises
When they asked me to lower my price because those other trainers charge less, I said no. I was confident of the value they’d get from the training. A little red flag went off in my head.
‘That’s a weird reason. Those trainers specialise in other skills. Why does this client think the value of those skills is comparable to the skills I teach?’
When the client invited me to yet another meeting, I thought ‘What other details are there to go over? This must be the meeting where they say I got the work.’
But no. It was the meeting where they said I didn’t get the work.
‘All the executives can write. We decided we didn’t need them to hone this skill because they can already do it and AI will soon take over that part of their job anyway.’
If I don’t tell them, they don’t know
What a lesson! I realised I need to spell out why it’s worth spending money to train people in a skill that they can ‘already do’.
So here goes!
The compounding effect of reading and writing time
I’ve done test after test with workshop participants. They time themselves reading ‘normal’ emails and plain-language ones. (Email me at colleen@colleentrolove.com if you want to see the emails I use.)
It takes people half as long to read the plain language emails.
The time it took for 10 participants to read the ‘normal’ emails.
The time it took for 10 participants to read the plain language emails.
Can you imagine the effect of everything a team produces taking half as long to read as it used to? It’s massive. The efficiency within the team skyrockets. Everyone who’s associated with the team also reads their work more quickly, which means they can respond more quickly.
(As an aside, want to learn to write emails like this? Join the School of unProfessional Writing to find out how!)
What this might look like – a worked example
Let’s say you have a team of 10 office workers, and everyone’s salary is $80k. Each person spends a couple of hours a day doing their emails. That’s around an hour of reading and an hour of writing.
If we cut everyone’s reading down to 30 minutes instead of an hour, you save 300 minutes (5 hours) a day collectively. As a salary figure, that’s $192 a day you’re no longer spending so that your team of 10 can read things. That turns into a whopping $50k saving a year.
So when I charge 8k for a workshop, you recoup the cost in 8 weeks — if all your people do is read emails. But that’s not all they do. They also read bigger documents.
AND they spend lots of time writing emails and writing bigger documents.
Writing time reduces too
I help people speed up their writing process. I give them easy ways to remember what should come first, second, and third. I give them ‘ways in’ – steps to conquer the demon Procrastination.
I show them where their time is best spent when they’re polishing a draft.
Some people slow down a bit when they first start writing in plain language. Like learning anything new, it can take a while to get off autopilot and approach things from the reader’s angle. But once people get over that hump, they speed up, producing far more useful emails and documents.
Peer-review time reduces
When everyone’s on the same page about what good looks like, it’s much easier for reviewers to give effective feedback. It’s also easier for writers to understand why those suggestions would help a reader. Teams have a shared language to talk about writing’s effectiveness.
Can you see how quicker reading, writing, and reviewing has a compounding effect, adding huge value to a team?
And we haven’t even come to the best bit yet, which is that…
Your people like each other more!
Reading long, confusing drivel drives EVERYONE insane. The feelings all come out.
If it’s too long, you feel like your teammate is wasting your time.
If it’s too complicated, you feel dumb or annoyed (depending on your personality!)
If it’s vague, you feel frustrated that you don’t know what to do next.
If it’s a random smattering of tasks that … someone … should do, you feel annoyed that you have to ask for clarification.
Teams that all write clearly like each other more! There’s less frustration and putting things off because you weren’t sure how to respond or what to do.
There’s no more of that ‘Ooh no. Rory has emailed again’ feeling.
It’s great!
Your team also gets a great reputation within your organisation. You’re seen as on time, easy to work with, and pleasant.
Remember that test I mentioned earlier? I also test workshop participants’ emotional reactions to ‘normal’ writing and plain language writing. Here’s what they say.
Words participants used to describe the writers of the ‘normal’ emails.
Words participants used to describe the writers of the plain language emails.
Things happen
When people perceive something as easy to read, they’re more likely to get onto it straight away.
In my first corporate job, I was given three stacked trays on my desk. One said Inbox, one said Pending, and the last said Outbox. It took me a while to get up the courage to ask what Pending meant. But once I learnt it was purgatory for documents – not unread, but not yet acted on either – I filled that Pending tray with anything that felt ‘a bit harder than it should’ to do.
Confusing documents stayed in my pending tray for months.
We may not have Pending trays any more, but we do have email inboxes. Things wallow in inbox purgatory if they’re hard to read, but they don’t if they’re easy to read, because – say it with me – easy to read is easy to do.
Back to my workshop test
Here’s how ‘normal’ vs plain language versions of texts are perceived by workshop participants. Waaaay easier.
So, to summarise, plain language saves you crazy amounts of money by increasing your team’s efficiency in reading and in writing. Team members like each other more and the wider organisation likes your team more. Things happen, because easy to read is easy to do.
Do you want training for your team in plain language? Get in touch – colleen@colleentrolove.com
Prefer to learn online in your own time?
