Starting Fresh

I planned to have this blog be the last of a 3-part series on what I learned at the Communications Network conference. I was going to talk about two points that Sendhil Mullainathan, a behavioral economist and director of ideas42 and an affiliated professor of the Poverty Action Lab made:

• When people see numbers, they interpret the meaning of those numbers out of the context used around the numbers. Are we giving people scales and numbers they can relate to?
• When delivering a message, it's not the words or the messenger, it's the what the audience thinks that matters. Do we have the right model of how our audience thinks?

That was what I intended to blog about this week. But what's on my mind is vacation: I leave on Friday. Actually, what I'm thinking about is getting everything done before I go. And I think I have everything done. I've finished all the projects I currently have on my desk, and will have a batch of new projects waiting for me on November 12, when I'm back in the office.

As I sat down to write this blog, though, I realized that my time away will allow me to really start fresh with new projects on the 12th. I won't be bogged down with other work (except checking e-mail, of course) and can give more thought to the projects before I start them than I sometimes can. I can look at them with a fresh eye and make sure the scales and numbers make sense to the audience. I can take time to challenge myself about what model I think the audience members have in their heads and see if there are other models I haven't considered. Which is a good thing, because the first projects I'll tackle when I get back all deal with numbers and data. I know that it's vital with communications projects to make sure to keep the audience in mind. How they view numbers, what scales they use, and what frames of thinking they hold have a strong influence on how they receive a message. For example, U.S. college students consumed 430 million gallons of alcoholic beverages in 1991. 430 million gallons seems like a lot, but it's hard to wrap your head around.

But I can make it easier to grasp by changing the context, using what's known as "social math," and putting the amount in a different quantity: In 1991, U.S. college students drank enough alcohol to fill 3,500 Olympic-size swimming pools. That is something more tangible that people can relate to.

Audience, frames, and context are important. But when things get busy, it's hard to find the time to reflect on those things. It's easier to work under the assumptions we already hold. Challenging those takes time and energy, which are valuable commodities in short supply.

This reminds me that I have to build in that time, and not let it fall by the way side. Or save it until I get back from vacation. How do you build time into your busy work week for that critical thinking and reflecting? What tips or advice can you share?