I went to the PLAIN conference to give a talk on how lawyers can use non-text explanations (text tables, text boxes, and flowcharts) to explain legal topics. And I wanted to find out more about the plain language movement – an international version of plain English.

By the way, they’d prefer it if you didn’t say ‘movement’, even thought it is a movement. In the best sense of the word.

Non-text explanations summarise complexity and
draw readers into the text

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Getting lawyers to use non-text explanations

My talk covered my experience of getting lawyers to use non-text explanations in client updates and newsletters. The talk included real-world examples: from simple non-text explanations (the humble text box) to the more exotic (now-to-then text tables; flowcharts). And all of the examples can be put together in MS Word.

Here’s the blurb from the conference document:

‘Most readers find non-text explanations (ie text tables and flowcharts) really useful, particularly in long text documents. Non-text explanations can summarise a complex concept quickly: once you understand the bigger picture it’s much easier to absorb the detailed text.

I’ve found that lawyers value non-text explanations when they see them (eg in legal journals or newspapers), but seldom produce them for their own updates. The problem seems to be partly confidence (lawyers worry that they’ll ‘dumb down’ a legal topic) and partly mechanics (lawyers find it fiddly to put together a neat flowchart).’

I also set out a few suggestions on what firms need to do to get lawyers to put more non-text explanations into their client updates (see link below for details).

A post-PowerPoint slideshow: no bullet-points; a single page ‘briefing agenda’ handout

I also took the opportunity to prepare slides and a handout in a post-PowerPoint way.

It’s a pretty simple idea, and it saves your audience from the misery of text-and-bullets presentations. Here’s my post ppt recipe:

• Keep bullet-points off the slides:
  Say ‘no’ to text-heavy, bullet-point-laden slideshows; they hurt your message. You know about the disease (death by PowerPoint), and you’ve read the books (‘Beyond bullet points’, ‘Presentation zen’). So step away from the bullet-points.
• Give your audience a one-page presentation summary:
  Have a look at the handout and slides (see the link below) and you’ll see the one-page briefing agenda (and accompanying detail sheets) that I gave to the audience. The single page briefing-agenda is better than a printouts of the slides: your audience sees the whole flow of your presentation on one page.

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A briefing agenda, detail pages, and clear slides (see link below to the handout and the slides)

When you’re presenting you don’t want the audience reading your slides. But if you put text up there, that’s what your audience will do.

A simple point, but worth re-stating…

Click the link below to get the briefing-agenda handout and the slides. But the slides are only included to illustrate the ‘post PowerPoint’ idea – you don’t need to print them out.

So when you go to print, just print pages 1-5 (the slides rock, but you don’t need to print them out; the handout gives you all the detail).

Click to download briefing-agenda and slides.

Make simple changes that clients will notice

It’s not hard to improve professional services client-updates and newsletters, and investment research reports. Most are virgin territory when it comes to scope for improvement. They’re the blank bits on the maps of unexplored continents of client service.

But improving updates, briefings, or any kind of written document (this includes emails and websites) does take focus. Our pet mnemonic may be able to help you with that focus.

Here it is: ‘Running Animals Beat Crawlers’. It picks up on several principles in our writing training, and will help you remember the following checklist:
– Relevance
– Actions
– Brevity
– Context.

Relevance

Two points here. Get the right information to the right people, and make it clear who a particular update is relevant to – in the first few words of that update.

The first point (send clients and prospects relevant content) is a bit airport-marketing-book. And it’s often over-stated as a concern or risk. Firms of all kinds bewail the fact that they don’t have clean and reliable list and client-preference data. Well, no-one (or almost no-one) has.

The good news about the second point (make it clear who needs to pay attention) is that it’s easy to do, and it doesn’t involve huge software-and-data projects. All you have to do is make it clear who your information is relevant to right up front – in the headline, on the cover, in the first sentence.

You might highlight that this is a development that’s particularly relevant to smaller firms, or firms that are involved in a certain type of business. Or maybe you can flag that this is information that compliance officers, or general counsel need to pay attention to. Or finance directors and plc-board members.

So there’s a lot to be said for doing what you can in about relevance in the (rather long) interval between where you are now, and an idealised clean-data future.

The flipside is the effect that poorly targetted updates can have. Imagine you’re a general counsel at a commercial property firm, and you receive update on disputes over leylandii hedges. Your regard for that real estate team might slip a few notches. Don’t laugh. It happened.

Actions

Highlight any actions that clients can take. If you can’t think of any appropriate actions, ask yourself why a client should read what you’re writing – and why you’re sending it to them.

If actions aren’t clear-cut, but you think it’s a development that your clients and prospects will care about, then make the implications clear. Maybe you can describe common pitfalls, areas of uncertainty, or how relevant rules are usually applied.

Or use scenarios to sketch out what the development might mean to different kinds of firms in different situations – a good technique where the situation is a bit murky. Scenarios help to turn abstract problems into specific situations – you might even think about testing the scenarios with a couple of friendly clients to see what they think. And they’ll like as not give you further ideas, or the confidence that you’re on the right track.

Whatever you do, avoid the most depressing final sentence ever… “we will watch these developments with interest”.

Brevity

Send clients the briefest possible summary and make it easy for them to request further information.

Context

Make the context clear for clients. Expert authors often forget that clients may not be as up to speed on the detail and background of a particular development. While you may have followed the events and issues around a specific development, clients may have had other things on their mind.

Think about whether it would be helpful to explain the background to new regulations, or other cases that have covered similar issues. It’s often a good idea to put some of this background in a box, or text table. Or you might use a decision tree, flow chart, or data, to help clients see the bigger picture.

Lawyers who use numbers and data will stand out from the crowd

There’s a myth that lawyers don’t ‘do’ numbers. Believers say it’s because lawyers live in a world of words where numbers don’t get a look-in.

We’re less convinced – 0ur view is that business is pretty numbers-focused, and lawyers are part of business. Numeracy may not be a lawyers’ first skill, but it’s definitely in the skillset.

Clients do ‘do’ numbers even if lawyers appear not to. And there’s a lot of data that relates to legal topics – but when did you last see a chart in a law-firm update or briefing.?

Charts and data-tables (and interactive charts like the one below) would make memorable legal-update features.

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Here are three examples of data that clients would find interesting

A firm that uses data to explain or illustrate legal developments would show clients that they speak their language (our writing training includes a module on using data and charts).

Here are just a few charts that clients have never seen from a law firm (as far as we can tell, but we’d love to be proved wrong):

• Trends in EU competition fines:
  Here are some quick snippets of EU-competition data: over €2.25 billion in fines in 2008; six of the ten largest individual fines since 1969 were handed down in just two years – 2007 and 2008.
• Pension-fund debts of UK Plcs in last five years:
  It may sound like something you’d find in the FT – but pension-fund trustees would find this interesting, if a tad depressing.
• Statistics on IP mediation and dispute resolution:
  We couldn’t find published data on this topic, let alone charts of the data. It doesn’t mean that the data doesn’t exist, it just means that it’s not been gathered and presented in a way that supports an argument or illustrates a point.

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Interactive charts: a neat way to give clients an insight into data

A first step along the data-presentation road would be more charts and data tables in updates and e-bulletins. But if your team has found some interesting data that supports an idea you’re keen to explain to clients, then step right up to the interactive chart.

Interactive charts let you change variables and see how this changes results. As humans, we find this kind of thing very helpful because we learn a lot about the data-set as we see the results change. The demo we’ve put together uses data from a number of US clinics on the amounts of a specific drug, Avastin, prescribed to treat different kinds of cancer.

Interactive charts help you understand data. You can see the data change as you alter filters and parameters (see video above – full-screen view is best)

The key interactive feature we’ve added is a slider that lets you ‘time slice’ the data – as you drag the slider over the upper chart area detailed data on a specific month is displayed in the lower chart area.

The video above shows a very short (38 second) clip of a demo website we put together to show how interactive web-based charts can work. This kind of technology is pretty simple now: all it takes is a little thought and imagination, and knowing the right people (which means us).

Go to the live interactive chart (thanks to Majestic Research*)

Firstly, it’s a demo so there are a few glitches. Secondly, please note that the data shown is purely indicative and not for investment purposes. The data was provided by Majestic Research* – a New York based investment-research firm we’ve done some interesting work for.

Do have a quick look at the video above before you try the live chart – the video shows how the chart works.

To see the live chart – you can click-and-drag and timeslice to your heart’s content – click here.

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*Find out more about about Majestic Research at www.majesticresearch.com