Six steps for planning clear communication

When you visit the Canada Aviation and Space Museum, I want you to connect with the content. As the museum’s Interpretive Planner, much of my work involves organizing ideas. I set up the framework for each exhibition: grouping objects, images, and facts in ways that make important connections clear. This way, you spend less time sorting things out — and more time exploring.

Every exhibition needs to be built on a strong foundation. The development team needs to be sure that all of their ideas fit neatly together before they can begin to create an experience. This can be said of many media — not just exhibitions. People naturally look for relationships and connections between facts, so whether you are planning a presentation or drafting a business plan, you need to organize your ideas carefully if you want to communicate them effectively. Taking a critical, intentional approach to content planning can take your communication to the next level.

Pulling meaning from a jumble of facts, ideas, and messages can feel daunting — especially on a tight deadline. Here are some techniques that I often use to sort through and simplify complex information.

1. Start by looking for general patterns

Write all of your facts, figures, and key themes on post-it notes, and move them around. Sort and re-sort them into different groups. What categories emerge? What is the relationship between these categories? How is this relationship significant? Often these answers can help you to focus in on your main point.

2. Look deeper for relationships and tensions

Look at the post-its in each of your groupings. Try placing them within a hierarchy, with general statements at the top and more specific ideas branching out underneath. Think about the connections and tensions that emerge. Do any of your ideas overlap? Do any contradict each other? Often these nuances can be helpful in getting to the core of what matters — and what will make your readers care about the topic.

3. Apply a familiar structure

As you group your ideas, see if you can apply familiar argument structures; this can help people to absorb your messages more easily. Can you structure some of your ideas as a point and counter-point? A cause and effect? A “then and now” statement or “either-or” dichotomy? Be cautious as you make these connections as they can sometimes lead to unintended assertions. In exhibitions, chronological structures can sometimes reinforce a myth of progress. It’s important to collaborate with your content expert and be sure that you don’t alter the meaning as you work to draw it out.

4. Step back, visualize, and reduce

Once you’ve established a general structure for your points, set up an organizational chart. Look at your hierarchy of main points, general statements, and specific ideas. By and large, are they distributed evenly? If they aren’t, some of your messages may overwhelm your audience, while others may seem too shallow. Do all of the “boxes” at the same level represent the same weight of information and/or importance? Do you need to “bump” any ideas up or down? A strong message structure will have a simple organizational chart that’s easy to navigate, so keep it simple; Marie Kondo that content plan!

5. Look for through lines

Your document’s most important through line will be the thesis, main argument, or “big idea” in the case of an exhibition — but do any other themes or ideas recur across all of your groupings? Depending on the scope of your output, one or two additional through lines could become effective recurring call-outs or side-bars. You don’t want to highlight too many parallel ideas, of course, or your messaging will be too complicated to be memorable, but a catchy through line can evolve into an effective layer of call-outs or sidebars.

6. Think about your word choices

The planning phase is not too soon to think about wordsmithing. Finding and creating patterns in your word choices can help you to reinforce key ideas through repetition. Looking at your main points, or perhaps one of your sub-sections: can you find a phrase that communicates each distinct point when you substitute one key word? Wordsmithing can also help you to further simplify your message. Can you unify any of your terminology? Your verb tenses? While it may seem too rhetorical, this type of thinking can help you to tease out clearer connections within your content.

The next time you’re trying to pull a bunch of ideas together, I hope these strategies will be helpful. If you take the time to set a strong foundation, you will find that things fall into place more effectively as you begin to craft your final output. Remember that when people read or see your product, it will likely be the first time they encounter the information you’re sharing, and making the connections you suggest. A well-laid plan will not only set up the structure for your content, but help you to craft clear and creative text.