I hate anything that occupies more space than it is worth. I hate to see a load of bandboxes go along the street, and I hate to see a parcel of big words without anything in them.

Bulk without content is irritating wherever it turns up, and language is where it hides best. A long word chosen over a short one, a paragraph that circles before it lands, a report that is mostly throat-clearing: all of it takes up room it has not earned and makes the reader do work that should have been done by the writer. Size is often mistaken for substance, which is why it gets used.

Take something you wrote recently and cut a quarter of it without losing anything. Notice which words were carrying meaning and which were carrying air. Then say the short version out loud in your next meeting.