Here at Wilson-Taylor, we often coach each other to ‘not make the audience work too hard’ to understand what we are trying to get across.

Turns out that the most basic ground rules of good communication — good grammar — supports our advice.

With apparently very little to occupy themselves, researchers at the University of Oregon hooked up some subjects’ brains to measure what happened when they heard bad grammar. 

Poor things. Their brains had to work harder to understand the meaning of a syntactically scrambled sentence.

Maybe we should update the classic KISS formula from Keep It Simple, Sweetie, to Keep It Short and Sweet. And uncomplicated.  It’s just easier on all of us that way!

Coining a catchphrase is like catching a wave: once you get on top, it takes you whereever it wants to go.

As noted in a recent New York Times commentary, Sheryl Sandberg’s ‘lean in’ advice to women, and book title, has taken on a life of its own. In a nanosecond, ‘lean in’ has moved from emerging concept to pun platform.

Not feeling especially ambitious today? Get your lean on.

Feeling overworked? Lean over!

If I were Sheryl Sandberg, I’d lean all the way to the bank. When a phrase quickly ascends to pop culture touchpoint, every mention — direct and indirect — reinforces your influence.

Position your expertise at the right point in the news cycle. That’s what I did when I got a call to comment on the Yahoo telecommuting controversy.

They call it breaking news for a reason: it crashes like a wave into the news cycle. A corporate executive decides to cancel a much-coveted employee benefit– telecommuting — the memo leaks and all of a sudden Marissa Mayer of Yahoo finds herself at the eye of a storm of commentary about work-life balance.

Her misstep was news precisely because it was part of a much bigger, ongoing conversation about how and when we work.  When you hope to be a source for a news story because you are an expert on the topic, it’s important to distinguish between the breaking news and the news trend.

The breaking news is an opportunity for a very short, pointed observation or judgement about the situation, using the available facts. Initially, the story about  Yahoo’s cancellation of telecommuting pivoted around the apparent hypocrisy of multi-millionaire Mayer, who had a nursery built next to her own office to accommodate her own baby, denying less affluent parents the right to be close to their own babies.

As the story evolved, it opened up opportunities for comment about the perennial work-life dilemmas facing working parents. I was asked to contribute comments to a blog geared for thrifty moms about how working parents can hold onto a telecommuting arrangement and not get Yahoo’d. Because I served up tips that readers could use any time, my comments are part of the ongoing conversation, and won’t be intrinsically linked to the breaking news.

No amount of media training will overcome the lack of a message.  You know right away when someone is talking just to hear their own voice. You don’t want to be that person.

The Accounting and Financial Women’s Alliance had that problem.

Wilson-Taylor had the solution. We’d go on, but we already did, in this article just published in Signature magazine — MOVE in Signature March ’13 —  the publication for association communication executives, put out by their own association,  Association Media & Publishing.

First, it was bloggers who’d come up to you at a conference, video camera or smartphone in hand, asking for a few comments and a snip of video about industry trends.

Then local publications launched “backpack journalists,” who were expected to take notes, photos, video and audio, all at the same time, while reporting. From AOL’s Patch to cash-pinched local newspapers, staff reporters were suddenly doing all of it.

Now, big media has gone backpack. In August, the Wall St. Journal launched WorldStream. Now, WSJ reporters use their smartphones to upload micro-interviews, video snapshots of scenes, and spur-of-the-moment commentary, all the time.

What does this mean for you, the potential source?

It means that you must have a messaging formula memorized. Not a message itself — because you’ll customize what you say according to whom you are addressing. Having a formula at the ready means you can quickly frame up your comments. Even if a WorldStream reporter catches you at the baggage claim carousel at the airport, just like Mike Huckabee.

To a journalist, you’re a ‘source.’

That means that you bring insight, information and the human touch to a story. But to craft your message so that you bring the most value — to the story itself and for your own branding purposes — you need to understand what kind of source you are.

This video by Michele Weldon, an assistant professor at Northwestern University’s Medill School, breaks it down. You might bring the facts and figures that form the structure of the story. You might bring the ‘big picture’ point of view that provides context. You might bring a personal point of view or meaning that makes the story relevant to readers.  Be prepared to bring all three.

When you’re framing a message for a media interview, you want to sound smart and in the know.

But do you want to sound like a cliche in the making?

Probably not. That’s why it’s wise to avoid buzzwords, even those swarming around your profession. As reported in May in the Wall St. Journal, people use buzzwords not to show what they know, but to signal to others already in their circle that they’re hip to what’s new.

Not sure if a term you are thinking of using is a buzzword or a universally understood term? Use the grandma filter: Would your grandma know what you are talking about? If not, dejargonize your message with plain, simple language that everyone can understand — even those in your clique.

When you’re framing a message for a media interview, you want to sound smart and in the know.

But do you want to sound like a cliche in the making?

Probably not. That’s why it’s wise to avoid buzzwords, even those swarming around your profession. As reported in May in the Wall St. Journal, people use buzzwords not to show what they know, but to signal to others already in their circle that they’re hip to what’s new.

Not sure if a term you are thinking of using is a buzzword or a universally understood term? Use the grandma filter: Would your grandma know what you are talking about? If not, dejargonize your message with plain, simple language that everyone can understand — even those in your clique.