VAI/f-stop Photography Photo VERTICON keynoter Mike Allen stresses simple communications By Mark Huber People talk too long about too much. That was the message from VERTICON keynoter Mike Allen Wednesday morning. “We tend to overtalk,” he said. Allen is the cofounder of digital news hub Axios, launched in 2017 and known for its “smart brevity” style of concise reporting that attracts more than 31 million visits to its site monthly. Axios was sold to Cox Enterprises in 2022 in a deal valuing the company at $525 million. Allen praised VAI’s new safety campaign It’s OK to STAY as an excellent example of smart brevity. Allen attributes the success of Axios to being “smarter, faster, and about what matters.” The key: “Have one thing to sell or discuss, not three, four, or five.” Presenting multiple points, Allen added, generally means the entire message gets lost in the weeds. “Most people don’t listen to most of what you have to say. Twenty seconds is the time the average person looks at a story,” he noted. “Readers are hungry for what they can learn in the shortest possible time.” Allen said the proliferation of information sources in the digital age makes “sharpness and clarity” even more important. So does the increasing velocity of society and business. “What used to take a team three weeks to do, one person can now do in 37 minutes.” Talking too much isn’t just annoying or ineffective, Allen continued, it’s bad business: “Brevity is confidence. Don’t communicate in a dense or foggy way. Foggy communication is downstream from foggy strategy.” It also makes the receiver of the message do the work, while an effective message makes its main point immediately and clearly—and then stops. “Once you’ve said your thing, just stop,” he said. Smart brevity is more than a communication tool, Allen noted. It’s a life strategy. He advised his audience to remove extraneous things from their work or personal life and focus on “what you enjoy the most and what you are uniquely good at. “Confront and delete what you don’t like and stop doing things that no longer work. Confront, delete, and simplify. Discover what is your superpower and do 50% more with 50% less.” Mark Huber is an aviation journalist with more than two decades of experience in the vertical flight industry.
