Declutter your speech

[source]This question jumped out me as I read my chapter of Quiet Leadeship tonight:

"What will it take for you to be really succinct when you communicate?"

An hour before, I had been reading to my husband The Most Dreadful Paragraph In The World from a piece of work I've been editing. But it's easy to laugh at other people's unnecessary verbosity. It's a lot harder to make every piece of writing sing, and every group of words that I speak sparkle.

David Rock says this: "Being succinct saves significant time and mental energy. When we're succinct we use less time to get across our ideas, the other person understands our ideas more quickly and there is less debate about any points that were not clear.... I personally find that when people start to waffle, a part of me stops listening."

So, the question. What would it take for me to be really succinct when I communicate?

The answer is this. I need to be mindful and present in every conversation. I need to take a breath before I answer. I need to know what I am about to say before I start saying it. And I need to be present with the other people in the room and know when to stop.

What about you? What would it take for you to declutter your words?