Tips for Clear Communication - 5. People want to hear about People

5. People love to hear about people - and not abstract ideas.
Take a look at the front page of the Sydney Morning Herald sometime. Are interest rates rising? Then you’re almost sure to see a photograph of an affected family. Graphs and statistics can come later. The journalist’s rule is, if there are no people, there's no story. Accordingly, populate your preaching with real people. Use people-based illustrations, use people-based application. I confess. Instead of talking concretely about somebody dealing with a situation, I talked about abstractions. And nobody was listening.