ProSpeak: A Not-So-Common Understanding of Fundraising and Common Sense

And I have to pay you for this?
The value of common sense is counterintuitive. Have you ever heard a comment like this? "We heard a fascinating presentation yesterday from the most brilliant man — most of us didn't understand a word he was saying." An audience that cannot follow its speaker's meaning may, naively, be dazzled by what appears to be a superior understanding of the world. However, good communications, good teaching and good consulting all rely on one central ability — the ability to present information to people in a way that they fully understand. A person who confounds his audience with his brilliance, whether he is truly brilliant or actually a rambling fool, fails to transform whatever uncommon sense he might have into the audience's common sense.