Ways to distinguish yourself – #61 Package information for easy consumption

By Rajesh Setty on Wed 16 Nov 2005, 6:00 AM – Leave Comment

I have talked about the topic of simplicity before and the need for simplifying things in general. This is an extension to that topic.

Let me start with an example. Last week I was supposed to pick up two

folks from San Francisco Airport and both of these people sent me their

travel details. Both were coming from India so the itinerary was very

(very) long. One of them had forwarded his itinerary and I had to

search through the whole thing just to find out the flight number and

the arrival time in San Francisco. The other person though had a

different approach. He had forwarded the itinerary but had added a note

in the beginning with the following information

What a difference it made. I just had to print this and keep it with me

for the day of his arrival. I am sure it took a while for this person

to compile all the information but it saved a ton of time for me. The

rest of the travel information was almost irrelevant for me so I didn’t

have to look at that. Time saved again.

Because we are so busy, we take shortcuts and send data and expect the other person to figure it out the real information from within this data. This may work well but imagine if one of your peers is always “Packaging information for easy consumption“, he or she will instantly differentiate and stand-out from the crowd.

How could you design any information that you send out is packaged brilliantly and in a manner that is easy to consume?

Something to think about.

Related Articles:

• DHL and the art of information design
• Ways to distingish yourself – #55 Commoditize your work at regular intervals
• Ways to distinguish yourself #156 – Manage perceptions of you
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