When I was teaching, a typical lesson might involve introducing a concept, then having students work through problems while I circulated to help. When someone got stuck, I'd work with them one-on-one. But if a second student needed help with the same thing, I'd often stop the whole class to discuss it – because I knew they were unlikely to be the only ones. I think the same pattern recognition is valuable in management: if I've given the same advice twice, it's time to write it down.
Stopping the whole class wasn't just about efficiency. Yes, it saved me from repeating the same explanation, but it also created an opportunity for deeper understanding. What makes this a mistake? Why doesn’t this method work? How could we have anticipated this issue in the original discussion?
As a manager, I obviously don't stop the whole office for a group discussion whenever I notice a pattern – especially as I’m not in the same office as my reports! But when I find myself giving the same piece of advice more than once, I try to write up my thinking. The immediate benefit is similar to the teaching case – saving time by avoiding repeated explanations. But I think it’s also helpful for people to see that something is a common enough challenge that it's worth documenting.
Writing down advice pushes me to examine it more carefully than I do in conversation. Just as dissecting a mistake with my class led to deeper insights, putting ideas into writing forces me to think about my own thinking. What exactly am I trying to say? Why do I think this is important? Are there cases where this advice wouldn't apply? This reflection often reveals gaps in my reasoning or important caveats I hadn't considered. Getting feedback on or responses to my writing helps too.
Fittingly, this post itself emerged from following this advice. Yesterday, I told someone I'm mentoring about the value of noticing repeated explanations and writing them down. It wasn't the first time I'd given this advice, and I realised I hadn't followed my own principle – I hadn't written it down. Now I have.