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Structured communication helps us communicate with both clarity and speed.
Grain | LSD | Common Sense
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Common sense
How to be a good human
Structured communication
Improving lives through meaningful food experiences.
Principles
01
Create magic for customers
02
Be open and curious and committed to learning
03
Be excellent and insist on the highest standards
04
Have fun and care a lot
05
Disagree and really commit
LSD (Learning Skills Development)
In the age of AI, being able to communicate well, think clearly and exercise good taste matters more and more. We have been learning and sharing these in Grain for a while now, and they should be second nature to everyone. LSD organises everything back into one fun place.
LSD
01
Common sense | How to be a good human
02
People sense | How to lead
03
Product sense | How to build
04
Grain sense | How to amplify Grain
LSD modules
Common sense
Be 100% reliable and do what you say you will do
Be on time and present
Top goal
Productivity
TEA (Time, Energy, Attention) framework of productivity
Close loops
Structured communication
Mindful communication
Structured decision making
First principles
MECE
PCM (Pros, Cons, Mitigate)
Consulting 101
Magic loop
Trust battery
People sense
Communication is the job
[Wes Kao] Exec communication and influencing
Setting goals
Meetings
Who's got the monkey?
Performance management
Trust but verify
High Output Management
One-minute management
Building processes
Radical Candor
Amp it up
Never split the difference
Product sense
Product sense
Financial statements
Grain sense
Hiring at Grain
Onboarding at Grain
Today
Structured communication. A super high leverage skill to have.
01
Start with a clear synthesis
02
Top-down communication
03
Provide the right amount of context
04
Back with data
05
Write like a human
06
Structure thoughtfully
Check-in
What did you learn and apply from the last lesson?
One word state of mind?
What's your energy level now?
Energy level
12345
Super sleepy
Pumped up
Structured communication
Clarity and speed.
02
This will help us be clearer thinkers, make better decisions, solve more problems and gain more alignment.
03
A super high leverage skill to have, in every message, document and meeting.
Start with a clear synthesis
Always make sure that you answer the "so what?"
Summary
What did we do? What is this about?
Insights
What did we learn? Share the implications of the data. Why is this important?
Next steps
What do we do from here? Make a clear recommendation.
Convey all your information in a clear one or two liner. Learn to communicate clearly under 30 seconds.
Not this
"Finished the customer study."
Improved
"Finished the customer study. Customers tend to order more on Mondays."
Even better
"Finished the customer study you requested last week. Customers tend to order more on Mondays. Recommend launching promo codes to encourage demand on other days. This will help us utilise our kitchen and drivers better. Next steps: I'll work with Marketing team to create promo codes right away?"
Summary, insights, next steps. Answer the "so what?"
Top-down communication
Start with the synthesis, before diving into supporting arguments.
01
Focus the readers on the big picture
02
Clearer thinking
03
Low attention span
04
They may have made up their minds and just want to hear your answer
05
You sound more confident
Not this
"I did some research. Hours and hours later I finally learnt a bunch of things. So we can go with option A or option B, both have pros and cons. A is great because of bla bla bla. B is great because of bla bla bla. I think we should we do A."
This
"Recommend that we do A - this will help us reduce cost and get this project going fastest. Let me know if there are any other thoughts? Otherwise will activate A.
• First, cost. A is $2K a month vs $3.5K for B. That saves us $18K a year.
• Second, speed. A can go live in 2 weeks. B needs a 2 month integration with the tech team.
• Quick note on B: the extra dashboards are nice, but nothing we need this year."
Start with the answer. Supporting points after.
To be clear, there's a context where each works well.
Provide the right amount of context
Not too much or too little. Don't assume the reader knows what you know.
01
Avoid acronyms
02
No text walls or stream of consciousness
03
If something isn't of vital importance to the answer, link it out or leave it out altogether
04
Share background context and assumptions
Not this
"You there?"
Improved
"Can I borrow 30 minutes of your time?"
Even better
"Could I borrow 30 minutes of your time to run through the team dashboards at 2PM? Want to understand the metrics we're tracking a bit better."
Bonus
"Could I borrow 30 minutes of your time to run through the team dashboards at 2PM (see that you're free in our open calendar)? Want to understand the metrics we're tracking a bit better."
Back with data
When possible, use data and numbers to back up what you are saying.
Not this
"Don't think it make sense to hire another marketer now."
This
"Don't think it make sense to hire another marketer now. At $3K salary and $20K of revenues, this will bring our total marketing cost to 30% (good benchmark is 10%). Not able to justify this now until we 3X our revenues."
Readers will be more willing to listen to you and trust you.
Write like a human
Write the way you would speak.
Not this
"I refer to your email on Feb 12 regarding the quote for the hamster. I give my consent to proceed."
This
"Let's go ahead with the quote for the hamster. Think this makes sense because it's cute, affordable and available."
Write shorter sentences. Reread and remove all unnecessary words.
Structure thoughtfully
Use rules of 3. "First", "Second", "Third".
Rules of 3
Makes your argument more memorable. You sound more structured, confident and decisive.
Degree order
Present ideas in rank of importance, from most to least important.
Time order
If there is a sequence of events that form a cause-effect relationship.
Make use of bolding, underline, font sizes, colours. The less formatting, the better (and no more than 3).
Not this
"Our expenses this month is high because of 2 new hires ($5K), electricity ($20K), renovation ($100K)."
This
"Our expenses this month is high because of renovation ($100K), electricity ($20K) and 2 new hires ($5K)."
Structure logically and make sure it's always MECE (mutually exclusive, collectively exhaustive).
Super important note
After writing, zoom out. Take a few seconds to guess what will be the most likely issue, pushback, misunderstanding or clarification. Then preemptively add that piece of information in to address it.
This will help you get faster, better, clearer responses!
What does good look like?
Looks like
- -The first sentence answers the "so what?"
- -The recommendation comes first, supporting points after.
- -Data and numbers back up what you are saying.
- -Clear in one or two lines, under 30 seconds.
Not this
- -"You there?"
- -A text wall or stream of consciousness.
- -The answer buried at the bottom.
- -"Finished the customer study."
Show don't tell.
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Activity time.
15 mins
01
Find a real message you sent this week that was longer than 3 lines.
02
Rewrite it. Synthesis first, top-down, right context, backed with data.
03
Guess the most likely pushback, then add one line to preempt it.
Before we go
Start with a clear synthesis
Summary, insights, next steps. Answer the "so what?"
Top-down communication
Start with the answer, then the supporting arguments.
Provide the right amount of context
Not too much or too little.
Back with data
Use data and numbers to back up what you are saying.
Write like a human
Write the way you would speak. Shorter sentences.
Structure thoughtfully
Rules of 3. Order ideas by importance or time.
And before you send: zoom out, guess the pushback, preempt questions, and rewrite it!
Check-out
What is one key takeaway from today's session?
See you next time.
Start with the synthesis.