Clarity and consistency. Two vital characteristics of good communication. So how clear and consistent is your communication?

I’ve spent quite a lot of time on motorways this week, which has given me an opportunity to appreciate (again) the clarity and consistency of our road signs in the UK.

You may not have responsibility for helping millions of UK road users find their way around the country. But you probably do want to guide people in a certain direction – towards your company and your products and services? So there are lessons for any organisation to learn from our signage system!

The system – designed by Jock Kinneir and Margaret Calvert – was introduced in 1965. It was based on motorway signage that had been designed by the same team and tested in the late fifties.

Although it’s almost 60 years old, I think there are two lessons we can learn from it:

Clarity
The typeface is bold and the layout is simple. So the signs are easy to read (a basic requirement for a sign – but how often is that not the case!).

Consistency
The design of the signs is the same wherever you go in the UK – same typeface, same layout. So even if you’re somewhere new and unknown, the signage offers some familiarity.

And the colours are consistent too:
• Motorways – Blue and white
• A Roads – Green and white
• B roads – Black and white

This combination – clarity and consistency – builds trust. We follow signs with confidence that we’ll get to the specified destination.

So think about your communication – online or in print. If you give users clarity and consistency, they are far more likely to get to the right destination.