A Quick Dip into Plain Language - with Ema Naito

Sarah: Hi everyone. Welcome to A Quick Sip, a series of short conversations about culture, communications, and change. I'm Sarah Black, founder of Athru Communications. I'm the communication strategist who is passionate about making sure you're not endlessly creating comms content. You're actually starting conversations that matter to your organisation, and that's what this podcast is about.

It's a series of conversations, introducing ideas to help make your communications activity more culturally relevant, more inclusive. And more effective.

Welcome to this week's episode of A Quick Dip Into Culture, Communications, and Change. Um, I'm your host, Sarah Black, and I'm delighted to be joined today by my friends and occasional colleague, Emma Naito. Um, introduce,

Ema: Hi Sarah, I’m Ema Naito, I’m a bilinguinal, English language editor. And I also call myself a plain language advocate because I just, I really believe in the power of plain language to bridge cultures.

Sarah: Fabulous and that's something that I have learned a huge amount about in working with you in the last couple of years. So today we're gonna dip into what is plain language. So for people who maybe have never heard that term, can you give them the, the basics of what it's really about?

Ema: So it's communication, the way it's worded, how it's structured and designed are so clear that your, your readers, your intended audience can first of all find what they need very easily.

They can understand what they find, hopefully the first time they need it, and to make use of that information. So those are three things of language.

Sarah: Fabulous. And it’s been around for over 100 years actually, where people have in bureaucracies and people in law from a 100 years ago, have pointed out saying that people use the most difficult murky language why do we do that? A lot of it comes from sort of for the public good that people need to have access to, to be able to understand and use certain information to participate in society, to fulfil their rights. So this is, this idea has been around for really at least a hundred years and it's rather unfortunate that we're still talking about it.

Sarah: and clearly still working on it. So I mean, you've touched on some of the benefits of plain language, which sounded like it's easier for people to understand, it's easier for people to take action, but are there other reasons that we should be using plain language more in our communications?

Ema: Sure. So the first thing, those were kinda more from like a human rights perspective. I think that people have, um, the right to information and to use that information. I also work a lot with the international organisations, um, using plain language they found, somebody did a study on this, where they actually gave a bunch of readers the same sort of content, but written in very sophisticated, difficult language and the same information in much clearer plainer language, and they found that the readers, first of all, preferred the clearer version. The clearer version. They understand the content well. They actually also believed that the author was smarter and more credible. They believed the author. They said, oh, this author knows what they're talking about. I'll believe them. And more accepting of the messages so I mean this, you can clearly hear that there's a lot of benefits to everybody, including businesses.

Sarah: So what are some of the tips that you can maybe share with us in terms of implementing plain language because one of the things that I have found is that if I'm working with a client, they think they're being really clear. They think they've used plain language because often we can't see it in our own communication we think, oh, that's completely obvious. What do you mean you don't, what do you mean you don't understand? Um, so what are some things that people can think about kind of more objectively to look at their own work?

Ema: Yeah. Um, the thing about plain language, and I think if you're working in communications and marketing, you know this already.

It's first of all, who is your audience? Who are you? Who your intended audience, who are these people? What do they know? What do they want to know from you? What are they interested in?

So it’s really about centering the reader in this, if it's words in, your communications. So you think first, ok, who are you talking to? Reach, right? Who are you talking to? And then based on that, then you can say, okay, well then why am I writing? I mean to first know, what do you wanna say to them? And to think about what kinda words, format, phrases, even would your intended audience most likely be familiar with? What would they easily understand? So it's really about understanding who your audience is first and to write for them. That's very much central to communications and marketing, um, approach.

Sarah: Yet so often not really executed, perhaps we perhaps argue in some cases we'll not go any further, we have seen it.

Ema: Yeah. I mean, I have to say, I'm also still learning a lot about this and if you're really committed to doing plain language, then actually, so it's really important to test your material with people who belong to your audience to see like, did they really understand? And you can see like with like healthcare communications for example, this could be really important because you know, first of all, did your target audience understand what's being said or did they get a completely wrong, you know, understanding?

I mean, so you really should test it if possible.

Sarah: Yeah and presumably avoid things like jargon. I think one of the things that. I certainly have said in client situations is that plain language is hard, like being simple is actually difficult and there's a lot more work in creating simple, plain effective communication than there is, than just writing a whole lot of words and producing paragraphs.

I'm curious about your perspective on that, cuz obviously you're an editor as well, so you've come up against that, I would imagine.

Ema: Yeah. I work with academics as well, and of course, you know, it's like, oh, we have to write very high level English, again sound sophisticated, so that I will be taken seriously but I think the idea is that there are so many good ideas out there or messages that need to get out there.

And I really see a lot of times that the words and the way that they're being used actually get in the way. Plain language practitioners are like, it's not dumbing down. It's not like taking away the content, so you're left with like a very basic idea. It's like, it's not that.

It's about peeling away all those words and the, the the clutter and whatnot that's getting in the way of your message, you take them away so that you're left with your brilliant idea, with your wonderful message, and that people can actually understand it. Appreciate it. And hopefully also believe it.

I enjoy doing that actually. Like what are you actually trying to say? Let’s try to get the stuff away that’s getting in your way.

Sarah: Yes. And having been the recipient of you doing that to my copy, you're very good at it. Um, another thing that, um, I've learned the conversations that you and I have had about this is that plain language is also an accessibility issue.

And I'd like just talk about that because this is also an inclusion issue as well, isn't it? About making content more accessible to anybody that's from, a language point of view, whether that's from, they've got a visual or an auditory impairment. So I'd like to understand a little bit more about where plain language intersects with inclusion.

Ema: Absolutely. Yeah, that's a great, that's an area that really fascinates me as well because when we talk about accessibility, that comes from the perspective of making sure that people with disabilities are able to participate in study as you're taking away barriers that prevent their participation as anybody else.

And so part of that, of course is so writing, using plain language is part of it. I see a lot of overlap because you know, you think about words, in sentences, but it's actually not just about the wording. I think in the beginning I said that the wording, structure and design are clear. So it's not just about the words that are being used, but it's first, it's how you organise the information and also how you design it.

And I don't mean like making it look beautiful, I think that's, but actually making the design reflect the meaning that you're trying convey and also to reflect the structure. So for example, and all this is also part, um, accessibility practices as well. So yes, write in clear language, but it's also like on a page, are you chunking presenting the information in chunks of text. ins, smaller pieces, text, so that people can process it. Are their headings, subheading that are informative so that people are not overwhelmed and they're able to process what's out there.

Also, then of course, then the design aspect of this. So you marking things up as headings, for example. Yes, it's good for plain language because it presents the information clearly and it makes it easier for the reader, but also from accessibility.

One common one that is used is if someone is using screen reader, they can actually, the screen reader can actually say here are the headings on this page and someone can jump to the headings that they want.

So it's very much definitely part of plain language and the idea of presenting information in a way that can be found, understood, and used. And also from the accessibility point of view of being able to actually even perceive that information, to see where the headers are, and to understand it and to interact with it.

So I see a lot of overlap between the two.

Sarah: It's really valuable and I think one of the things that I've, you know, learned from you is, um, that issue of overwhelm. And if we look at the amount of information that we're exposed to day and daily, it's, it's staggering, right? And, um, being able to just look at something and grasp it very simply and very easily and navigate it.

So, as you said, plain language is not just the words, it's how the overall presentation of a piece of communication. And that can even be auditory, that you've got pauses and gaps and cues and things like that if it's, um, if it's voice communication. So fascinating stuff. Any other tips and hints for anybody who's trying to grapple with making their communication a bit plainer.

Ema: Again, the first thing is know your audience and know what you wanna say because if you don’t what you're trying to say, nobody knows what you're, nobody’s going understand anything that you produce. So be clear. What in your mind, before you start, what do you want to convey? What do you need to include? What you don't need to include, that's just as important.

And then you think about the words instructions, like the words that we use more commonly in our day-to-day and a lot of times that also can help with, uh, people who have different English language familiarity. You want to use the most precise word, actually, but if you can say use instead of utilise or start instead of initiate, I mean, it's a lot easier to understand.

So use those shorter, more familiar terms. Keep your sentences short. The longer the sentence is, the more you're going to get lost in what you're trying to say and it's harder for the reader to keep up. So keep it short, you know, you don't have to try to be fancy. And the other thing I would say is like, especially at least in English, although plain language movements and guidance exist in other languages, but in English, at least, make it clear who is doing what.

There's various parts of that. Like for example, if you can or if it's more appropriate, you just use the active voice. Things like this, it's possible. Just make it clear who's doing the what. And so one was the organising, the overall like, you know, having that big picture. The second one is, think about your words and sentences, and then the third part is the design part.

For this, there's many, many things, but again, you know, present your, your, your information, your writing in chunks, that sense, use subhead and really learn more about accessibility, actually, like digital accessibility. And I think that's also a great way to get into practices that help you use plain language and communicate more clearly and more inclusively.

Sarah: And I always say that if you wouldn't use the word in conversation, like I would very rarely say to you, we must initiate that. Um, if you wouldn't use the wording conversation, then you probably don't need to use it in your actual written communication. So one of my tips is to read things aloud and if it feels like, oh, I would never say that. in conversation with Emma or in conversation with my colleague, or if I was talking to our target audience, I would never say, we must initiate whatever then that has always been a good tip for me.

Ema: I think that's really good. And if you run out of breath before you get to the end of the sentence, that's probably too long.

Sarah: Yeah. I'm not a big fan of semicolons. I'm like, if you need a semicolon, you can put a full stop in, that's, that's, we've had discussions about use for semicolon, which we won't go into right now.

Emma, thank you very much. I highly recommend Emma's blog, um, on plain language and other ways in which to keep your writing clear and concise and effective.

So we'll drop a link to that. In the show notes and thank you, it's been a pleasure to have you today. Thank you.

Ema: Thanks, Sarah. It's always fun to talk to you. Thanks for having me.

Sarah: Bye. If you've enjoyed today's conversation and maybe wanted to join it, then please do get in touch so that we can talk more.

I'd love to hear from you. You can sign up from my newsletter by finding me on LinkedIn. And let's connect and continue the conversation. Thank you.