The Rule of 3 - packaging arguments into triads

There’s a Latin phrase that states “omne trium perfectum”, which roughly translates to “everything that comes in threes is perfect”. Linguists will immediately think of the literary device of hendiatris. If you pay close attention you will notice how packages of three seem to appear all throughout life:

• Literature: 3 little pigs, 3 musketeers, 3 wise men, three act structures
• Science: Newton's 3 laws of motion, 3 laws of thermodynamics, 3 laws of robotics
• Religion: Heaven, earth and underworld; the father, the son, the holy spirit
• Philosophy: Aristotle's’ three unities; three branches of government
• Phrases: Veni, vidi, vici; Life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness; Liberté, égalité, fraternité; Einigkeit und Recht und Freiheit

You will find that distilling arguments into triads makes your reasoning significantly more captivating. In fact, the most famous practitioner of The Rule of 3 is none other than Steve Jobs. Read this piece and afterwards watch how Jobs first introduced the iPhone in 2007.

Avoiding laundry lists: Hammer home your strongest arguments and make them memorable

The premise of The Rule of 3 is to determine exactly 3 reasons when making an argument. If someone inquires about the reason for doing something, you should lead your response with something along the lines of “We should do this for 3 reasons, which are…”.

When I first heard of this framework I thought the entire idea was ludicrous. Something that sounded good on paper, but impractical and too theoretical in practice. I did not expect the method to work as well as it did. Why is that so?

Most people are drowning in an avalanche of information on a daily basis. They are faced by so much stimuli with the advent of smartphones in the fourth marketing paradigm that the attention span of the modern human has devolved to 8 seconds. That is on par with a goldfish.

Starting an argument in the above fashion catches the other party’s attention and makes you memorable. This will make a difference especially with very busy more senior level decision makers, who are swamped with information and a necessity to make decisions. More importantly, your argument is communicated to the point, structured and logically. A structured argumentative structure is more easily processed and may spawn a soundbite more likely to be remembered.

Also: Choosing the 3 most meaningful assertions challenges you to consolidate arguments and forces you to choose those carrying the most weight. Less is more - you want the strong reasons to stick and to avoid diluting them with scrappy arguments. You want to avoid your weak arguments attaining a halo effect over your strong ones. Arguments are nota pair of scales - piling up the quantity will not tip the balance in your favor. You can consider it an application of the Pareto Principle, which states that 20% of input leads to 80% of results. Quality mattering is especially prevalent when the subject being discussed is important to your counterpart or this person is knowledgable in the area. Quantity can be viewed as a quality signal when your counterpart is not invested in the issue.

Telling a story with rhythm and a pattern - 3 is the start of a pattern

Good rhythm is indispensable when telling a good story. And 3 is the smallest number that can have a rhythm. Think about it: Tap your table twice. That isn’t a rhythm. Tap it thrice. That’s more like it. Three is also the minimum amount needed for a pattern to develop.

Jonathan Crossfield put it best:

“So if three is the minimum number required for rhythm and for pattern, why not four, or five? Brevity. Additional elements, just like additional acts, are unnecessary. Your writing is out to achieve a goal. If three is the minimum number required to achieve that goal, then any other numbers aren’t even worth contemplating.”

Or as Shakespeare put it: ‘Brevity is the soul of wit’.

As exemplified above: Humans are hardwired through life to expect and to better remember triads. Human working memory has its limits, and 3 pieces of information hits the sweet spot. For this reason alone you should try your utmost to avoid laundry lists. Would you be more convinced by a person who goes off on a tangent, listing a high quantity of unstructured arguments of inconsistent quality or the person who seems to have a very clear structure, high quality arguments and a crystal clear bottom line? That is the essence of The Rule of 3.

When convincing someone we are essentially trying to sell a story. I’ve internalized this way of illustrating my reasoning so much that I don’t always have 3 arguments prepared and make them on the fly while articulating my first reason - and has backfired with me blanking on more than one occasion ;). You can always describe potential dangers or next steps as a fallback.

Writing teaches us that “trios are “more humorous, satisfying, or effective in execution of the story and engaging the reader”. Use The Rule of 3 to extricate the main points of your arguments. It simplifies your thinking and makes you sound reasoned, confident and structured.