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I have to do this in my emails. Most people just ignore the second and third sentences in a paragraph. No idea why, drives me crazy - but this does help. You

I have to do this in my emails. Most people just ignore the second and third sentences in a paragraph. No idea why, drives me crazy - but this does help. You can tell they don't read them because they ask questions that were answered in them.

warmwaffles 4y ago
Why would you do that in your emails? /s
ghaff 4y ago
>No idea why Because that tends to be how people skim. If the first sentence of a paragraph doesn't catch their attention in some way, they subconsciously assume that the rest of the paragraph (which is presumably related) doesn't need to be read.
- hinkley 4y ago
  Which is why “don’t bury the lede” is such important advice. Also please rehearse what you would say to your family if you got into a car wreck and they wanted to check you out at the hospital versus “mom is going into surgery for massive hemorrhaging.” “Hey son, we’re okay, but we got into a bad fender bender and we’re getting checked out at Hoskin’s Hospital. The car is dead so can you come pick us up, maybe bring X and Y and have your sister check on the cats?” Is a way shorter moment of sheer terror than switching around the sentence fragments at the beginning. Also if you’re a boss having an unscheduled meeting with someone, stalling the agenda is just torturing the other person.
  - Groxx 4y ago
    This is all also useful advice for helping people deal with notifications for work. They might see "@xyz can help you with this..." and miss "... when they have time next week". Help people triage. Make the urgency clear in the first couple words. Don't just send "hi" and then wait for a response, nor "X is down" when someone else is already on it and you're just giving them an FYI.
- april_22 4y ago
  Plus attention spans are getting shorter. I feel like it's getting harder to simply read for more and more people.
afterburner 4y ago
Although the article does mention this is supposed to be an organization trick for your eyes only: > Not publishing one sentence per line, no. Write like this for your eyes only. HTML or Markdown combine separate lines into one paragraph.
- crayboff 4y ago
  Ironically it seems he may have only read the beginning of the article and skimmed past the rest.
dctoedt 4y ago
> Most people just ignore the second and third sentences in a paragraph. The military expression is BLUF - Bottom Line Up Front. (It works for paragraphs as well as for entire documents.)

warmwaffles 4y ago

Why would you do that in your emails? /s

ghaff 4y ago

>No idea why Because that tends to be how people skim. If the first sentence of a paragraph doesn't catch their attention in some way, they subconsciously assume that the rest of the paragraph (which is presumably related) doesn't need to be read.

hinkley 4y ago
Which is why “don’t bury the lede” is such important advice. Also please rehearse what you would say to your family if you got into a car wreck and they wanted to check you out at the hospital versus “mom is going into surgery for massive hemorrhaging.” “Hey son, we’re okay, but we got into a bad fender bender and we’re getting checked out at Hoskin’s Hospital. The car is dead so can you come pick us up, maybe bring X and Y and have your sister check on the cats?” Is a way shorter moment of sheer terror than switching around the sentence fragments at the beginning. Also if you’re a boss having an unscheduled meeting with someone, stalling the agenda is just torturing the other person.
- Groxx 4y ago
  This is all also useful advice for helping people deal with notifications for work. They might see "@xyz can help you with this..." and miss "... when they have time next week". Help people triage. Make the urgency clear in the first couple words. Don't just send "hi" and then wait for a response, nor "X is down" when someone else is already on it and you're just giving them an FYI.
april_22 4y ago
Plus attention spans are getting shorter. I feel like it's getting harder to simply read for more and more people.

afterburner 4y ago

Although the article does mention this is supposed to be an organization trick for your eyes only: > Not publishing one sentence per line, no. Write like this for your eyes only. HTML or Markdown combine separate lines into one paragraph.

crayboff 4y ago
Ironically it seems he may have only read the beginning of the article and skimmed past the rest.

dctoedt 4y ago

> Most people just ignore the second and third sentences in a paragraph. The military expression is BLUF - Bottom Line Up Front. (It works for paragraphs as well as for entire documents.)