It Would Be Great if Things Were Simple . . .

Alan: your post reminds me of what I learned about the writings of Hippocrates and his students. The Corpus contains 58 volumes, and much of the content surrounds ethics. On the one hand, that seems remarkable given the technology-induced ethical complexities we face in medicine today, compared to the time the Corpus was written. On the other hand, it's not difficult to imagine how the myriad ethical issues the ancients confronted about life, death, and the treatment of disease required such extensive documentation and analysis.

Similarly, laws and regulations cover only a small portion of the rules of conduct people must consider for a commercial transaction. It doesn't surprise me at all that the document you referenced was 70 pages long. The other documents you mentioned--influential writings, all--don't serve the same mission, so it's hard to compare their merit on word count.

--AR

Short, Simple and to the Point

I believe Graham is spot on.

From “Churchill on Leadership” by Steven F. Hayward:

He complained regularly that reports and memoranda were too verbose:

“This paper, he complained in cabinet one day, “by its very length defends itself against the risk of being read.”

He also stated that “It is sheer laziness not compressing thought into a reasonable space.”

In my opinion, a 70-page document does indeed “defend itself against the risk of being read.” If the purpose of the document is to help employees understand how they should be treating customers, suppliers, and each other then it needs to be much shorter. If the purpose of the document is for legal reasons, then 70-pages are probably only enough for the introduction.

Alan See

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