I’m involved in a couple of complicated projects right now. When I update people, I need to understand what people might know.

I made a mistake yesterday by talking through a topic where I’d assumed the level of knowledge was higher than I’d anticipated. People on the call didn’t want the detail – they wanted to know what it meant for them. It led me to having to go back to someone and spend half the time again providing context to what I’d been briefing.

Brevity matters. Context matters more.