I read a lot of children’s books these days and respect the efforts and deliberate visual intent made to communicate meaning, emotion and readability for a variety of cognitive levels. Clear, simple, friendly concepts should be communicated for adults too, who need to learn important skills and concepts to operate in the world we live in.
The difference between a children’s bedtime story and a quarterly earnings report or agency’s big pitch PowerPoint presentation is small. The tactics nearly identical. Style is where they differ. The basic processes, values, and ideas ascribed to children’s stories are often told in clear straightforward structure. Adults can process and interpret more nuanced and complexed narrative and communication styles, but they need not when it comes to understanding the fundamentals. Clarity and simplicity of communication is always a goal, but equally clear and simple should be the ground rules of our mandate.