I used to worry that if I got to the point first, I wouldn't be able to give enough detail or nuance to do justice to the subject. I had it exactly backwards.

I used to worry that if I got to the point first, I wouldn't be able to give enough detail or nuance to do justice to the subject. I had it exactly backwards. By giving a quick, direct answer, I set myself up to follow it with the necessary detail and nuance and I set the other party up to want it. If I go into detail without giving the big-picture answer, I find the other person ignores the detail as they wait for the big-picture answer, but if I give the big-picture answer and immediately follow it up with detail, they very often become interested in how the detail affects the big picture. "Will this work?" "blah blah blah blah, so probably" is the wrong approach. "Will this work?" "yes. To do it, we may need to blah, blah, blah" is much more direct, and it gives the listener a reason to care about the details.