Episode 30
The Last Word Rule (Why Smart People Over-Explain Themselves)
You know the moment. Someone asks what you do, you give them one true sentence, and then you keep talking anyway. That's not generosity. That's control.
What This Episode Is Really About
Jess unpacks a pattern she caught herself in at a networking event. Asked what she does, she answered fully in one sentence: I'm a speaker and a coach. True, complete, done. And then she kept going, circling through I Love Coaching, Big Ideas Made Simple, and every other thread attached to her name, until she landed right back on the two words she'd already said, just wrapped in more syllables.
The instinct behind it wasn't about helping the listener understand. It was about managing what they'd think before they had the chance to think it. If you stop at one sentence, the other person gets to react to that sentence, and only that sentence. Adding more is a way of pre-approving every angle of their opinion before they've formed one. Jess connects this directly to her ADHD, where a single sentence has been misunderstood before, making the instinct to over-contextualize feel protective even when it isn't needed anymore.
She also flips the lens to the receiving end: an event website so full of flowery language that she couldn't tell what she'd actually get from attending, so she opted out. Same failure as over-explaining, aimed the opposite direction. Too many words chasing one point, or pretty words with no point at all. Either way, the listener walks away without the one clean thing they needed.
In This Episode
- Why over-explaining is a control move disguised as generosity
- The real story: what happened when Jess was asked "what do you do" at an event
- How ADHD can make the instinct to add context feel protective, and why it runs on autopilot past where it's needed
- The flip side: what happens when a message never lands on anything solid (the flowery event website story)
- The Last Word Rule, a new framework for ending your answer at the first true sentence
- The written test: what your commas, colons, and parentheses are actually telling you
- The verbal test: the silent question to ask yourself before you answer, especially for verbal processors
- How Made to Stick by Chip Heath applies the same principle to ideas, not just introductions
- This week's two-part challenge for practicing both tests for real
The Big Idea
The Last Word Rule says to end your answer at the first complete, true sentence, because everything you add after that usually isn't information, it's audience management. Jess breaks it into a written test built on punctuation and a verbal test built on pausing to ask what's actually being asked, both aimed at the same target: catching the urge to keep talking before it runs on autopilot.
Memorable Lines from This Episode
"I didn't need to add all that information."
"That's not clarity, it's managing somebody else's first impression of you before they've even been given the space to have one."
"End your answer at the first complete true sentence. Everything you add after that probably isn't information, it's audience management."
"You don't need more words to be better understood. You need the discipline to say the right thing clearly and simply."
Resources
Book: Made to Stick by Chip & Dan Heath — https://amzn.to/4zNV729
BEAT Method Guide: beat.bigideasmadesimple.com
Your One Thing This Week
Run both tests for real. First, the written test: pull up something you're about to send, an email, a proposal, a post, and count the commas and parentheticals. Pick the sentence doing the most extra work and cut it to its true, complete version. Second, the verbal test: next time someone asks you a question you'd normally answer with three sentences, answer it with one and let the silence sit. Don't fill it with "but" or "and." Just notice the urge, and don't follow it.
Connect with Jess
If this one landed, come find me at BigIdeasMadeSimple.com. That is where the newsletter lives, where everything I am building is taking shape, and where you can connect directly. One idea in your inbox every week, nothing else. And if you know someone who answers "what do you do" with a paragraph when one sentence would do, send them this one. The right idea at the right time changes everything.
Follow Jess: @thejesswebber on Instagram, YouTube, LinkedIn, and Facebook
Key Themes
- Over-explaining as a bid for control, not generosity
- The Last Word Rule framework
- Written test: extra punctuation as a trust signal
- Verbal test: silently sorting what's actually being asked
- ADHD and the instinct to over-contextualize
- Made to Stick and message stickiness
- Say less, mean more
Transcript
Hey there, I'm Jess Webber, and welcome back to Big Ideas Made Simple.
Speaker:Before we get into this episode,
Speaker:I have to say the obvious thing out loud.
Speaker:I postponed shooting this episode last week,
Speaker:because the premise of it was focused on clear communication.
Speaker:And if you listen to the last episode,
Speaker:you'll notice that I physically could not communicate in the slightest.
Speaker:there's a joke somewhere in there,
Speaker:probably, about practicing what I preach,
Speaker:and I'm not even gonna pretend that.
Speaker:I didn't put that in there. But I was so sick and my voice was not cooperating.
Speaker:And the recording of an episode saying less would have meant
Speaker:me wheezing through four extra sentences just to explain why I sounded like that.
Speaker:So that's why you got the short and sweet concept on resting.
Speaker:And now this concept that I was thinking about,
Speaker:the last word rule, applies to podcast scheduling too.
Speaker:So here's where I want to kick off this episode.
Speaker:I attend a lot of events. And when I go to these,
Speaker:I notice that a lot of people,
Speaker:when you're first meeting them,
Speaker:will ask the question we all get asked because it's the gateway into conversation.
Speaker:Hey, who are you? What do you do?
Speaker:And I have habitually been working on cutting back how much I say there.
Speaker:And so more recently, I've adopted I'm Jess Webber.
Speaker:And if they ask what I'm doing,
Speaker:I say I'm a speaker and a coach.
Speaker:It's true, it's a complete sentence,
Speaker:and I've answered their question without the habitual ADHD diatribe with
Speaker:parentheses, you know, filling in context behind it.
Speaker:But in the past, I would catch myself doing that exact behavior.
Speaker:Instead of saying, hey, I'm just I'm a speaker and a coach,
Speaker:I would give them the litany of things that I'm attached to right now.
Speaker:I ~ help run I Love Coaching and am the curriculum architect
Speaker:and author of the blueprint that they use each week in the membership.
Speaker:Or I would tell them about Big Ideas Made Simple,
Speaker:which is the entity that I've created that houses everything for myself.
Speaker:Which is podcasts, speaking, training,
Speaker:coaching, courses, whatever, right?
Speaker:And somewhere in there, I would circle around the idea of being a speaker
Speaker:and a coach, those two words that I led with,
Speaker:but I would say it in far more syllables.
Speaker:And I didn't need to add all that information.
Speaker:I would notice the longer I talked,
Speaker:the more people's eyes would kind of glaze over,
Speaker:or they'd be trying to like connect all the dots.
Speaker:And
Speaker:So I realized how powerful it is to say less and to say
Speaker:it simply and clearly. And that's what I wanted to talk about this episode.
Speaker:So let's get into it. Remember,
Speaker:this show does exist to connect you with knowledge,
Speaker:tools, or resources that could change your life.
Speaker:And oftentimes those are buried under three extra sentences that you didn't need
Speaker:to say.
Speaker:my goal is to hand you those tools to help you find the answer and then give
Speaker:you the action item or the discipline to stop right there.
Speaker:for a long time, I told myself a story about why I behaved this
Speaker:way in these rooms. I felt like
Speaker:the over-explaining was generosity,
Speaker:essentially.
Speaker:I was giving people context so they could understand,
Speaker:they could relate, they could see the full picture of my multifaceted
Speaker:and multi passionate, multi hyphenated self.
Speaker:And I think naturally it sounds reasonable,
Speaker:but it wasn't really beneficial for them.
Speaker:And I would bet that it's probably the same for you.
Speaker:If you are somebody who is running multiple businesses or attached
Speaker:to multiple business.
Speaker:identities essentially, you have multiple threads going even.
Speaker:There is power in understanding what needs to be said and what needs
Speaker:to be held back and potentially introduced or left unsaid.
Speaker:So the the thing that I've come to kind of think about
Speaker:or understand here is I think the reason that I kept talking after I'm
Speaker:a speaker and a coach
Speaker:wasn't because they were asking for it.
Speaker:It wasn't their lack of understanding what those words meant.
Speaker:It was my desire to control the situation.
Speaker:So if I stopped at a sentence and gave them the space to react to the sentence,
Speaker:they might file me away as just a coach or just a speaker.
Speaker:They might not know that the podcast exists or that I love to travel
Speaker:and create training opportunities for groups.
Speaker:Or
Speaker:All of the you know experience that I have from education,
Speaker:from real estate franchising, all of these things.
Speaker:And and so I felt like the verbal vomit was
Speaker:to give them more, to give them space to find something to attach to.
Speaker:And I felt like the line of speaker and coach was incomplete.
Speaker:So I kept adding to it,
Speaker:not for the sake of information,
Speaker:but
Speaker:To make sure that they didn't form an opinion about me that
Speaker:I hadn't pre-approved from every single angle.
Speaker:And now in hindsight, I realize that's not clarity,
Speaker:it's managing somebody else's first impression of you before they've even been given
Speaker:the space to have one. And I think,
Speaker:you know, honestly, that instinct for me comes because of,
Speaker:like I mentioned previously, the ADHD,
Speaker:the need to.
Speaker:Feel like we have to contextualize because we know that a singular sentence
Speaker:can often get misunderstood without the additional context.
Speaker:I've watched people walk away from me with a completely wrong idea because
Speaker:I felt like I didn't give them enough information.
Speaker:And so the habit of stacking on context has been
Speaker:a conditioned behavior that's developed over time.
Speaker:It makes sense in my brain.
Speaker:And the problem is though that it runs on autopilot in spaces that it's not needed.
Speaker:So it it spills over into other places that never asked for it.
Speaker:And I think it costs us the opportunity of a clean first impression in
Speaker:a lot of places, which is the thing that you're trying to protect
Speaker:in the first place. Now, I mean,
Speaker:on the flip side of this too, I do think it's useful.
Speaker:I mean, I got
Speaker:Invited to an event a while back.
Speaker:And before I decided to go, I looked at the website,
Speaker:right? It was beautiful, lots of language,
Speaker:lots of feeling. And by the time I finished reading,
Speaker:I genuinely couldn't tell you what I would actually get out of attending.
Speaker:Nothing on that page told me what I needed to know about the value of
Speaker:the event and the decision either way for myself.
Speaker:And so I opted out of it.
Speaker:Not because the event was bad,
Speaker:but because the messaging on that page never landed on anything solid enough
Speaker:for me to act on. So it's a different version,
Speaker:same failure, but different direction.
Speaker:My problem was too many words chasing the same point.
Speaker:That website's problem was pretty words with no point.
Speaker:And I think that they're either way.
Speaker:We have to be really careful that the person on the other end receiving
Speaker:the language comes away with one clean thing that they need.
Speaker:And so I use this ~ quote in the world of I Love Coaching and with
Speaker:my clients a lot. And I first heard it attributed to Coco Chanel.
Speaker:And she said, you know, before you leave the house,
Speaker:look in the mirror and take off one accessory because less is always more.
Speaker:And so
Speaker:I have been working intentionally on doing that with my mouth.
Speaker:My brain is still allowed to go a million miles a minute,
Speaker:but instead of saying more, I am trying to say less and
Speaker:be more strategic with the words that I choose and where I place them.
Speaker:And so when you can create a mechanism for yourself
Speaker:and be conscientious of what you're saying.
Speaker:It allows you to practice the last word rule.
Speaker:And that's this. End your answer at the first complete true sentence.
Speaker:Everything you add after that probably isn't information,
Speaker:it's audience management. And so there's two tests here.
Speaker:You can use it in the speaking space or the writing space because they do show
Speaker:up a little bit differently. But the written test is the easier one to catch.
Speaker:If you need a comma, a colon, a semicolon,
Speaker:parentheses, or even an a dreaded m-dash,
Speaker:then you've probably already gone past what you need to.
Speaker:You've gone past the last word.
Speaker:So you're not clarifying that at that point.
Speaker:You're bracing the sentence so it can't be misread,
Speaker:which usually means that you're not trusting the language you chose
Speaker:at the beginning to stand on its own in the first place.
Speaker:So I want you to do this. Go back to an email,
Speaker:a text message, a social media post,
Speaker:I don't care what it is. Go count your commas,
Speaker:your parentheses, whatever additional punctuation you use besides
Speaker:the conclusion of the sentence.
Speaker:Every single one of those items marks a spot where you might not have trusted
Speaker:the language you are using to do the job that it was intended to do.
Speaker:The verbal test, on the other hand,
Speaker:is a little bit harder, especially for those of us who like to verbally process,
Speaker:who think by talking rather than think before talking.
Speaker:And so this is the space that I know that I am still working on.
Speaker:But here's the move: before you answer,
Speaker:don't ask a clarifying question back because that comes across as deflection.
Speaker:But instead ask yourself silently.
Speaker:In the second before you open your mouth and do it,
Speaker:what are they actually asking me right now?
Speaker:So if they say, What do you do?
Speaker:and it's a stranger at an event versus somebody who is a somebody that might
Speaker:be a potential client or a peer or something like that,
Speaker:those same four qu words in the same question are two completely different things.
Speaker:The one wants a category, a label,
Speaker:a thing to hang its hat on for you.
Speaker:The other wants a reason to trust you.
Speaker:Be wary and be intentional with answering what is actually asked.
Speaker:And here's the tell that you've blown past that last word.
Speaker:It's not a thought, it's the urge,
Speaker:it's the but, the and, the well,
Speaker:technically.
Speaker:The second your mouth reaches for a but or an and,
Speaker:that's not you adding more truth.
Speaker:That is you managing after you've already said your truth.
Speaker:It was sitting there in a complete sentence before,
Speaker:and you didn't need to add to it.
Speaker:And I know this sounds simple,
Speaker:but I'm gonna tell you from experience,
Speaker:it's way harder than it actually sounds.
Speaker:I tend to feel like I am on some epic communication journey trying to drop
Speaker:a ring in a volcano, and all I need to do is practice intentional pausing.
Speaker:This makes me think of a concept in the book Made to Stick by Chip Heath.
Speaker:And I actually I had the privilege and honor of hearing him speak once,
Speaker:though unfortunately I had no way to get the copy that I had brought with me signed.
Speaker:But I still appreciated his message.
Speaker:Here's the premise. Ideas that survive contact with a room are not always like
Speaker:the most sophisticated ones. They're the ones stripped down
Speaker:to something that somebody else can repeat back without your help,
Speaker:without looking at their notes.
Speaker:It is something that is so solid and so true that
Speaker:you don't need hardly anything to help you or like support that idea.
Speaker:So the idea is made to stick, and that's the entire premise of the book.
Speaker:That is the same piece that I am pushing here with this last word rule,
Speaker:just aimed at your introduction versus Chip Heath's aiming
Speaker:at ideas. If your messaging, your language needs a follow-up appearance to land,
Speaker:then it wasn't doing well and it was just being propped up.
Speaker:So
Speaker:I'll challenge you this week, spend a little bit of time running the test,
Speaker:running the filter for real. First,
Speaker:do that written test. Go look at something you're about to send,
Speaker:or audit something you've already sent.
Speaker:Email, proposal, post, I don't care what it is,
Speaker:but go look at the parentheses,
Speaker:the commas, the punctuation, and pick a place where you can trim it down.
Speaker:Think about Coco Chanel.
Speaker:Less is more, simple is best, and figure out where you can do this.
Speaker:Secondly, when you're speaking to somebody,
Speaker:go ahead and try it verbally. So if somebody asks you a question,
Speaker:the norm the kind that you usually verbally vomit on,
Speaker:try answering it with just one sentence and let the silence sit there.
Speaker:Don't feel the need to fill it,
Speaker:and don't fill it with ands or buts or also's.
Speaker:It's not about brevity. It's just catching that reflex that's built
Speaker:in for somebody who probably has a very fast,
Speaker:high-thinking, high-achieving brain.
Speaker:And so I want to push you this week because again,
Speaker:like I said, the irony is not lost on me that it's about communication right when
Speaker:I lose my voice. But you don't need more words to be better understood.
Speaker:You need
Speaker:The discipline to say the right thing clearly and simply.
Speaker:And so if this is something that you felt you needed to hear,
Speaker:the deeper version of it works inside of the framework that I teach in
Speaker:one of my keynotes, the beat method.
Speaker:And it's something that I use heavily for myself as a filter.
Speaker:And you're always welcome to grab the guide for that
Speaker:at beat.bigideasmade simple.com.
Speaker:Now
Speaker:If you already have that and you're already in my email list
Speaker:and following along with this podcast,
Speaker:amazing. If you aren't yet, I would love you to follow on whatever platform you're
Speaker:listening on because it just helps get this message into the lives
Speaker:of more humans who may need it.
Speaker:So thank you so much for listening
Speaker:and being intentionally present while I share something that
Speaker:I am constantly practicing myself.
Speaker:And if
Speaker:This is something you needed to hear,
Speaker:shoot me a message on Instagram or Facebook,
Speaker:LinkedIn, whatever, and let me know.
Speaker:Because I am always looking for more ideas and more concepts that can help serve
Speaker:the greater good. This has been Big Ideas May Simple.
Speaker:And this week. Say less, mean more,
Speaker:and I'll see you next time. Thanks for listening.
