ABSTRACT
Communication refers to sharing information. It is about making connections and creating understanding. When people want to communicate to an audience, the first thing they must do is to define their goal. After defining their goal, the next step is to identify their audience. Research shows that human working memory is capable of handling only three to five items at one time, so people focus the message on a few core ideas. People consolidate information into three to five chunks and group related items together. Giving their audience a conceptual framework of some kind allows the audience to process information by chunking. People break the material into sections, break large sections into subsections, and use headings to make sections visible. The best communicators have one quality in common: an empathy for their audiences. Using plain language also forces people to understand the content themselves before they can express it. Visual communication can use photographs, drawings, digital graphics, or other illustrations.
