For years, I’ve been told my writing is too direct.
I’ve never taken it as an insult. I’ve taken it as an observation.
The funny thing is, nobody ever says my writing is unclear. They don’t say it lacks evidence or logic. They don’t say they don’t understand my point. What they usually mean is something else entirely. They mean I arrived at the point sooner than they expected.
It took me a long time to realize those are two very different criticisms.
I don’t think my approach to writing came from journalism or marketing. I think it came from spending my career watching smart people bury great ideas beneath unnecessary words. Somewhere along the way, business writing stopped being about helping readers understand something and started becoming a performance. Documents became longer. Presentations became denser. Emails became friendlier. Every additional paragraph was treated as evidence of diligence rather than evidence of uncertainty.
The irony is that the longer a document becomes, the less confidence I have in it. That’s not because long writing is inherently bad. Some ideas demand space. It’s because I’ve learned that people rarely add words to sharpen an argument. They add words to protect themselves. Another qualifier. Another disclaimer. Another paragraph acknowledging an opposing viewpoint. Another sentence reminding the reader how excited they are to be writing in the first place. The document grows, but the idea shrinks.
Somewhere along the way, we started equating longer documents with harder work. In reality, the hardest part of writing usually begins after the first draft. Writing creates ideas. Editing reveals which ones deserve to survive.
Exhaustiveness becomes a proxy for rigor. That habit follows people into boardrooms, committee meetings, and executive offices, where documents continue expanding long after their ideas have stopped evolving.
Organizations reinforce the behavior. Nobody gets criticized for adding another paragraph. People get criticized for leaving something out. Every stakeholder contributes another caveat. Every reviewer asks for another example. Every committee member wants their perspective represented. Individually, the edits seem reasonable. Collectively, they suffocate the argument.
I’ve watched this happen hundreds of times. A proposal begins with one sharp observation and one clear recommendation. After six rounds of edits, the recommendation is still technically there. It’s just hidden beneath enough context to make it feel optional. The document is more complete than when it started. It’s also less persuasive.
That’s why I’ve become an aggressive editor.
Not because I dislike words.
Because I distrust unnecessary ones.
Every sentence occupies space in the reader’s attention. If it isn’t introducing a new idea, deepening understanding, or advancing the story, it’s competing with the sentences that are. Readers don’t consciously notice this. They simply feel the writing getting heavier. Momentum disappears. Curiosity fades. Before long they’re skimming, not because they’re lazy, but because the writer stopped rewarding their attention.
That’s the part I think many communicators miss. Writing isn’t primarily about transmitting information. It’s about sustaining attention long enough for an idea to take root. Every extra sentence is a tax on the reader. Sometimes the tax is worth paying. Most of the time it isn’t.
When people tell me my writing is too direct, they’re probably right. I don’t spend much time cushioning conclusions or narrating obvious facts. I assume my audience is intelligent. I assume they can connect dots without my drawing every line between them. More importantly, I assume their time matters. That assumption shapes every paragraph I write.
So my editing process has become surprisingly simple. I don’t ask whether a sentence sounds good. I ask whether the reader would think differently if it disappeared. If the answer is no, I delete it. Not because shorter is always better, but because clearer almost always is.
Every writer has a philosophy, whether they realize it or not.
Mine is this:
The reader is giving me something I can never return: their attention.
Every word should earn the privilege of receiving it.