In 1993, I took a quantum theory class at college. Like many people, I struggled. Nils Bohr supposedly once said, “If you think you understand quantum mechanics, you don’t understand quantum mechanics.”

But my struggles led to a bigger problem—as I struggled to understand quantum theory, I started to lose motivation more broadly and barely wanted to pick up a book. So, in a last-ditch effort to help, my tutor told me to put down everything else and handed me his copy of Lectures on Physics by Richard Feynman.

The book was a revelation for me. Feynman’s area of expertise was as complex as things get – he won the Nobel Prize for his work on Quantum Electrodynamics. But he refused to believe that complex topics had to be explained in complex terms. In fact, he felt that a sure sign of deep understanding was the ability to explain it simply. Reading Lectures on Physics didn’t just help me enjoy my studies again; it helped me understand more deeply the importance of clear communication.

Feynman’s overall approach is now usually described as the “Feynman Technique”, a fantastic tool for ensuring that you understand your topic well and can explain it clearly to others.

We use the Feynman technique to help us develop great programs at BillionMinds. But it’s only one part of our process for transforming lengthy, complex concepts into ideas that are effortlessly understood.

Today, I want to take you “behind the curtain” of how we do it, which is a tribute to Feynman I’ll call the Laws of Concept Communication.

Think of these laws whenever you communicate a concept to others, whether you are a founder trying to explain your business, a learning and development team developing content, or a team member trying to explain your work to others.

Let’s go.

The Zeroth Law: Human Attention Trends to Zero

According to psychologist Dr. Gloria Mark, the average attention span for a video has declined dramatically – from 2.5 minutes in 2004 to 47 seconds in 2023.

And we don’t just struggle to watch videos. The data from almost every content website shows that the latter half of long-form articles are, at best, skimmed over – only being read by the author, their editor, and a few superfans.

Even the makers of traditional long-form content understand this. Movie shot lengths are a fraction of what they once were, and novels increasingly adopt “potato chip chapters” short enough to keep the reader engaged.

If you ignore the reality of human attention, your explanations might be like a tree falling in the forest—if nobody hears them, do they exist?

The First Law: Concepts are Atomic

When we work with people to help them get their ideas across, we often find they know the topics so well that their explanations are a mishmash of many concepts, all pulled together under one umbrella of “stuff they know” about a topic.

For example, you might give a presentation about your team. In that presentation, you might cover mission, vision, why work happens, who does the work, and how the work is organized.

That might seem like one concept, but actually, it’s five. Trying to explain it as one is sure to result in the recipient of the information only remembering a tiny fraction of what you passed on.

This isn’t because they are lazy; it’s because you are mixing all the concepts up and providing no time for the recipient to internalize the information.

If, instead, you separate out each concept, the recipient can focus on each individually. This is an example of change at the pace of your brain – a concept captured beautifully by Natalie Wood at Engage to Evolve.

The Second Law: Brevity Increases Understanding

Once you’ve honed in on an individual concept, how long do you need to explain it? Well, in several years of developing content, we have yet to find an individual concept that cannot be explained well in around three minutes. As an example, here I am explaining how our company does business in 2 minutes and 58 seconds:

But in our research, we’ve found a second, more important benefit. Because of the brevity, the recipient of the information understands the concept better. It shouldn’t be surprising. In 3-4 minutes, you have less time to tune out, and because the information is distilled down to the most important elements, you are left with the most essential stuff.

If you are struggling to explain a concept in 3-4 minutes, it’s likely you are not actually down to one concept, or you are obfuscating your message by over-explaining elements. This leads me to:

The Third Law: Clarity Supercharges Understanding

You can also reduce comprehension with your choice of graphics. As Juan Madiedo – COO of Vloom – explained recently, “Every visual element should be aligned to ensure the learner stays engaged and doesn’t feel overwhelmed. Never create unnecessary competition between what’s being seen and what’s being heard.”

These considerations apply to written communication, but they are even more critical in the case of spoken or pre-recorded audio/video. After all, it’s easy to track back a paragraph if you are reading, but it’s much harder if you are listening and watching.

How To Apply the Laws

Optimizing communication for those receiving it is obviously a good idea. But it also makes good business sense.

To illustrate this, consider the following math: Imagine you deliver 100 5-minute learning experiences to 1000 people. If you can turn them into 3-minute experiences, you will save your company over 3,000 hours.

If you can do that while increasing understanding, why wouldn’t you?

Applying the laws seems simple on the surface. But if you are going to do so consistently, you will need to overcome some barriers.

Firstly, you will need to put in some effort. Blaise Pascal’s quote, “If I’d Had More Time, I’d Have Written a Shorter Letter,” speaks to a profound truth: Optimizing communication for the recipient is time-consuming. Tools like Grammarly can help a little, but they don’t break more significant concepts down into smaller ones or figure out how concepts might build on each other. You might spend up to 40% of writing time simplifying and shortening content, continuing to do so until you reach a point where meaning may be lost. This is a specialized, largely human skill.

Next, you will need to internalize the idea that you are communicating for the recipient. If you know lots of long words, congratulations. But if those long words result in reduced comprehension, what are they, other than performance? Use them to help you in your next game of Scrabble, but put them to bed here.

Lastly, you will need to overcome skepticism, possibly even your own. When you get really good at this, your explanations might appear so simple that it could seem you aren’t explaining anything at all. In our BillionMinds programs, we even have a lesson to help people overcome this skepticism. However, as you apply it in everyday work, it might take a while for others to realize that your simple explanations have value.