Suppose you were good with words. Suppose when you decided to speak, the message you delivered—and the way you delivered it—successfully connected with your intended audience. What would that mean for your career prospects? What would that mean for your comfort level in social situations? And perhaps most importantly, what would that mean for your satisfaction with the personal relationships you value the most?

This book is designed to help you find out. Based on an award-winning course and workshop series at the University of Michigan taken by students training to enter a wide range of fields—law, business, medicine, social work, public policy, design, engineering, and many more—it removes the guesswork from figuring out how to communicate clearly and compellingly. All of us have ideas that are worth sharing. Why not learn how to convey yours in a way that people will appreciate, enjoy, and remember?

An All-American soccer player in college who holds both a PhD in English and a JD, Professor Patrick Barry joined the University of Michigan Law School after clerking for two federal judges and working in legal clinics devoted to combatting human trafficking and reforming the foster care system. He is the author of several books on advocacy—including Good with Words: Writing and Editing, The Syntax of Sports, and Notes on Nuance—and regularly puts on workshops for law firms, state governments, and nonprofit organizations. He also teaches at the University of Chicago Law School and has developed a series of online courses for the educational platform Coursera.