Plain English movement and linguistic reform

Jo Allen

Lauren Lusby

Plain English Policy Considerations for KPMG Communications

The Plain English Language (PEL) movement is intended to improve the effectiveness of communications by simplifying them and making them easier to understand by their intended audiences. In modern business and administrative communications, there is a tendency to rely on industry-specific terminology and technical jargon. In many cases, those trends reduce the effectiveness of communications because they undermine comprehensibility by audiences without specific professional or technical training in those areas. Adopting the PEL approach would be beneficial for KPMG because it would greatly improve the effectiveness of communications across the full range of its client spectrum. It would allow KPMG to ensure that it all of its accounting, marketing, consulting, and legal department communications are maximally effective for their intended purpose. If the concept is applied properly, it is expected that PEL will improve productivity, revenue, and client appreciation. Meanwhile, there are virtually no conceivable risks or potential costs or liabilities to adopting PEL beyond the initial training required for its start-up and implementation. Therefore, it is strongly recommended that KPMG adopt PEL on a broad basis.

The Concept and Purpose of the Plain English Language Movement

In principle, the concept of the Plain English Language (PEL) movement is predicated on the observation that many professional industries have developed communication styles that rely too heavily on technical jargon. In many cases, communications generated by professionals are largely incomprehensible to lay audiences without specific professional training or other forms of extensive familiarity with these communications styles. As a result, even the communications initiatives that are expressly intended to be consumed by lay audiences often fail to achieve their primary purpose, simply because they do not lend themselves to ease of comprehension.

The PEL movement provides a practical means of purging professional and government administrative communications of language and styles that detract from their comprehensibility. While the concept is often characterized as a means of simplifying communications, that should not be understood in any pejorative sense. More specifically, the simplification of professional communications should not be confused as necessarily meaning that those communications initiatives must be diluted of their substantive content, reduced in quality, rendered less precise, or "dumbed down" in any way.

To the contrary, plain English provides a preferable means of communicating essential information in a manner that renders it more conducive to understanding by its intended audience. This is especially important in connection with the types of communications that constitute the backbone of KPMG client relations. In that regard, one must consider the extent to which (and manner in which) KPMG clients typically rely on information published and otherwise communicated by the firm.

The Relevance of the Plain English Language Concept to KPMG Client Services

The main focus of KPMG client services are Accounting, Consulting, and Marketing. Furthermore, there are important legal and government regulatory components to all of those essential client services. Among other services for which KPMG clients rely on our services are complex analyses pertaining to areas of taxation, financial and regulatory compliance audits, and legal advisory opinions and recommendations. While these distinct areas are very different in some respects, one of the most important aspects of service that this firm provides is essentially identical in all of them: namely, we assist a lay audience better understand the relevance and potential importance and impact of highly technical matters. In that regard, the PEL approach is precisely consistent with our main function in that area. Conversely, to the extent we allow technical language and industry-specific jargon to dominate our client-focused communications, we are not fully accomplishing our goal for our clients.

Accounting and Related Financial Services

Consider that in the realm of Accounting services areas much of our client communications are intended to provide information and analyses upon which KPMG clients must be able to rely and actually implement business strategies and policy changes based on the information we provide. More particularly, a substantial proportion of our analyses and recommendations in these areas involve understanding the actual relevance and effect of highly complex government regulatory issues. In that regard, we do our clients absolutely no good by providing analyses in language that is as incomprehensible as the language in which government regulations are typically communicated. In addition to paying KPMG for substantive analyses, our clients are also paying us to synthesize our analyses in a manner that reduces any unnecessary barriers to their full comprehension.

Consulting and Legal Services

Similarly, KPMG provides comprehensive consulting services, much of which encompasses very specific legal analyses and recommendations pertaining to understanding and mitigating potential risks based on those analyses. Obviously, every element of analysis and advice that is incomprehensible to clients in these crucial areas diminishes its value. Unfortunately, the legal field has evolved over several centuries to rely very heavily on highly specific language with which laypeople are completely unfamiliar. In fact, cynics have often suggested that this aspect of the legal profession (among others) is actually deliberate because it increases the need for professional services in that field. The PEL concept will allow KPMG to maximize the value of consulting services to clients, especially to the extent those services involve legal matters.

Marketing Services

Generally, marketing services differ from other services provided by KPMG in that the final product is, by its nature, almost always already communicated in plain English. However, the processes involved throughout marketing communications production also frequently rely on industry-specific jargon that inhibits understanding among lay audiences. In that respect, it is detrimental to optimal client relations to continue relying on highly technical terminology. Moreover, because (unlike law and accounting), the marketing field is not (as) highly regarded as a professional field. As a result, clients may have less patience for language and terminology that is perceived as a deliberate attempt at inflating the importance of issues. In fact, it may very well be true that marketing jargon evolved in exactly the same manner as jargon in other fields. Nevertheless, whereas laypeople are patient with legal technical jargon, they are more likely to be annoyed by marketing managers who fail to speak in plain English.