Lean Communication

Book excerpt: What is lean communication and why do you need it? Lean communication is a mindset and a set of principles and practices to apply lean thinking to become a better thinker and communicator. In the manufacturing world, lean thinking has produced exceptional improvements in productivity and customer value. Manufacturing is a process that takes in raw materials, applies work to them, and produces something a customer values. Lean thinking, with its single-minded focus on creating more value with less waste, carries many lessons that also apply directly to communication, which is a process that takes in information, applies thinking to them, and produces a message a listener values. This book distills those lessons into ten powerful keys to maximize the value others get from hearing or reading your ideas. As a knowledge worker, you need lean communication more than ever today. That's because your contribution depends on your ability to communicate ideas and insights that others can use to improve personal or business outcomes. That task is becoming ever more challenging as the ever-expanding volume of information makes it more difficult to separate useful signals from the noise. Precisely because talk is so cheap, fast, and ubiquitous, useful and meaningful communication is at the same time harder than it's ever been. The very ease of generating and transmitting it means that useless information is churned out much faster than ever, and it becomes tougher for your listeners to get exactly what they need to make good decisions or take the right action. They often feel like the Ancient Mariner: "Water, water, everywhere, nor any drop to drink." Your listeners will naturally gravitate to those who provide useful information briefly and clearly, so your path to increased influence and sustained attention depends on giving them more value with less waste-to talk less and say more.