How to Organize Your Thoughts

“The world rewards the people who are best at communicating ideas, not the people with the best ideas.” - David Perez

Who else has the best ideas, but feel like they're not the best at communicating them? I learned tricks in law and management consulting that will help you organize your thoughts when you speak, remember what you actually want to say and really get the point across in an effective way.

Watch this video for three ways to organize your thoughts.

Find a quote
Use intentional visuals
End with a simple action

#1 Find a quote

Find a quote that expresses your idea.

Quotes are concise, impactful, and get straight to the point. When you use quotes to open, you skip the rambling at the beginning, trying to find “how do I start talking about this topic?” and move on to your point.

The second function of quotes is that it establishes your credibility. We are taught to be judgmental; we're always looking for fault in other people's arguments - if we agree with what they’re saying or not. It's quite difficult to start an open conversation when the other side is very defensive. By starting with a quote from someone that they know that they trust, you've already aligned yourself to start from a very positive position where the other person is willing and open to listen to what you have to say. This is what we do in law. This is what we do in management consulting. We always invite experts, so you don't have to believe me - you can believe whoever it is that has expertise in this field. And when you've already established credibility through others, the rest of your talk gets so much easier.

Example: How to articulate your thoughts [link to blog post]

In this video, I use Steve Jobs as an example, as well as Aristotle - very credible people with important things to say.

The third function of quote is that it anchors your point. You prime the audience with what it is that you want to talk about, and help them be open to the idea. And for yourself, it's kind of like a guidepost for where you want to go next. You can transition from the quote to your main point and help you remember the link. And once people are hooked, then you want to just get to the point.

#2 Use intentional visuals

Intentional visuals are not any visuals. This is a visual intended to show at least one of the two things: change and contrast.

Example: Speed vs Velocity

This is one of the most fundamental mental models - showing the difference between speed and velocity.

[insert image]

We see that speed is about covering distance, whereas velocity has direction.

Without using words, I can immediately show someone if they are currently thinking in a “speed” perspective, (where they’re not really going anywhere), they should change to think about things in a “velocity” perspective (thinking with direction).

Showing change and contrast is so crucial because it gives context to your point. Think about every time you've made a decision, or every time something made you think you need to act. It’s because something said you need to change something and/or because something compared to something else is better or worse. That's the change, as well as the contrast.

So why do we want to put these points in visual form? There are two reasons for this.

The first one is that our brains process visuals so much faster. It's literally at the blink of an eye - 13-15 milliseconds, whereas for words, it takes us about 200 milliseconds. We need to use so many more words to get the same point across over longer time periods, whereas having a visual will get the point across immediately. And whatever it is that you say will be so much easier for the audience to understand.

Point number two, more importantly, is that these visuals actually help you recall because they're so impactful and easy to process. Not only will your audience remember it, but you will remember it too. Even if your talk is casual and you don’t need to put anything on PowerPoint, visuals will help you remember what you want to say and get the point of the change and the contrast across because you actually remember them instead of trying to remember bullet points.

Let me know in the comments if you currently visualize in this way.

#3 End with a simple action

You want to end with an action item, but not just any action item.

This is where a lot of people drop the ball and make the mistake of not thinking about their audience - do not do that. Humans are energy preserving creatures; we don't want to use excess energy for no reason. We want to survive and we want to thrive. So make sure you give an action item that is very simple.

Example: Climate Change

Climate change is a difficult issue to resolve with just one simple action.

If you think climate change can only be combated if people vote for the right leaders who are committed to the idea, that’s a high-barrier action step for people to take. You have to get out there, see which leaders are interested, and go vote. That’s not the action step you want to leave people with because they won’t do it.

Instead, you want to leave them with something simple, like “bring your own bag to the grocery store.” Why? Because humans have consistency bias: if we make a previous commitment to something, we feel tension every time we don’t act according to that commitment.

Now, every time that person takes your action step - bringing their own bag to the grocery store - they are (hopefully) reminded of your talk, remembering the importance of combating climate change. Over time, even after your talk is finished, you’ve given them something that’s just enough to commit themselves and to feel that consistency bias to act towards that. And when they see other things - for example, the news reporting of ice melting and polar bears not being able to get fish to sustain themselves - they’ll be reminded of their commitment to do their part in combating climate change. And since it’s not a one-person effort, maybe they should go out there and vote.

Create consistency bias and make it easy for people to take action. If they feel overwhelmed, they won’t take action and after all your planning and organizing, you’ll lose them in the end. Make sure your action is simple.

TL;DR

Three ways to organize your thoughts when speaking:

Use a quote to anchor your talk, establish credibility and transition easily from the beginning to the main part of your presentation.
Use intentional visuals to help you get your point across in an effective way that works with how we think and make decisions, which is by showing change and giving the context of contrast.
Finish strong and end with a simple action that will leverage consistency bias and create chances for recall.

Use these three ways to organize your thoughts in an effective way so that you don’t end up trying to memorize everything, get nervous and have your mind go blank. And just like that, you’ll get your point across that will stay with people over time.

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