The importance of explaining well: writing for humans, not for algorithms

The more complex the world becomes, the more obvious something very simple feels to me: being able to explain things well is still a huge advantage.

Not because it makes you look smarter. But because it saves time, reduces friction, and avoids misunderstandings.

And, ironically, in the age of algorithms and language models, explaining well has become a deeply human craft again.

Explaining is not about impressing

For years, we’ve confused explaining with showing how much we know.

Long sentences. Technical terms. Layers of complexity that weren’t always necessary.

But explaining well isn’t about that.

Explaining well means understanding something so thoroughly that you can make it simple without betraying it.

And that’s harder than sounding sophisticated.

A clear text is an interface

I like to think of texts as interfaces.

A good interface goes unnoticed. It doesn’t force you to think about it. It lets you move forward without friction.

Writing works the same way.

When a text is well explained, the reader doesn’t stop to decode it. They just keep going.

That applies to a blog post, an email, technical documentation, or a conversation.

Writing for humans doesn’t mean writing “simple”

Clarity is often confused with oversimplification.

But writing for humans doesn’t mean dumbing things down. It means organising them.

Choosing what comes first. What needs context. What can wait.

A clear text isn’t shallow. It’s respectful.

The mistake of writing for the algorithm

I’ve seen many texts get ruined by trying too hard to please a machine.

Forced repetition. Artificial structures. Sentences no one would ever say out loud.

The result is usually the same: the algorithm doesn’t fully trust it, and the human doesn’t enjoy it.

When you write for people first, systems tend to adapt better than we expect.

AI doesn’t remove this craft — it makes it more visible

Language models are getting better and better at writing. That doesn’t make the ability to explain irrelevant.

Quite the opposite.

When everyone can generate text, the difference lies in judgement: what to ask for, what to discard, how to organise, and what to say in your own words.

Clarity can’t be fully automated.

Explaining well is a form of care

Explaining well means caring for the other person’s time. Their attention. Their energy.

It means not forcing them to reread. Not making them interpret. Not hiding what matters behind noise —and by noise I don’t mean a well-placed anecdote, a small wink, or a timely smile, if it helps understanding or makes the core idea stick.

In fact, quite often it works the other way around.

We’ve all understood something complex in an instant thanks to a seemingly silly example, a domestic comparison, or a tiny story: a napkin, an improvised sketch, someone saying “imagine this works like…”

The joke wasn’t the point. The mental relief that followed was.

That’s why I still believe writing for humans isn’t a technique. It’s a stance.

And in an increasingly noisy world, it remains one of the most valuable ones.