Here we continue with some tips on written communication. You can find Part 1 here.

It’s all Chinese to me
Photo: bibicall
Flickr.com

Sloppily written communication reflects poorly on the writer. Unfortunately, grammar is poorly taught in schools in this modern age, and students are forced to remedy this later in life. Make no mistake, the elegance and economy of your written word marks you as a person of intelligence and competence. Think about what you want to write, cut out the clutter and get your message across simply and sweetly.

That brings us to the next point:

6. Proof-read your message before sending it out. That means avoid grammatical and spelling errors. The mark of a professional is a well-crafted, brief and clear communication without errors.

Do not write: I wanna get ur answer on this matter like yesterday!

Rather put it this way: I would like your feedback on this as soon as possible.

Former professor of English at Cambridge, F.L. Lucas (1894-1967), had this to say about writing English:

“As the police put it, anything you say may be used as evidence against you. If handwriting reveals character, writing reveals it still more. You cannot fool all your judges all the time. . . . Most style is not honest enough. Easy to say, but hard to practice. A writer may take to long words, as young men to beards – to impress. But long words, like long beards, are often the badge of charlatans. Or a writer may cultivate the obscure, to seem profound. But even carefully muddied puddles are soon fathomed. Or he may cultivate eccentricity, to seem original. But really original people do not have to think about being original–they can no more help it than they can help breathing. They do not need to dye their hair green.”

Photo: SelfMadeCelo

Most companies will tell you that 80% of their business comes from 20% of their customers.

This is the 80-20 rule, also known as Pareto’s Law,  named after Italian economist Vilfredo Pareto, who observed in 1906 that 80% of the land in Italy was owned by 20% of the population, and that 20% of the pea pods in his garden contained 80% of the peas (Wikipedia).

That being the case, how companies communicate to their existing customers is crucial to their financial success. (How they communicate to people who are not yet customers is an entirely different subject that we will cover later.) Most companies publish newsletters or magazines for distribution to their existing customers, showcasing their product changes, upgrades, staff re-shuffles and the like.

The job of the headline writer is to capture the essence of the story in a few words.

The headline sells the story.

Some people are brilliant at it. Years ago I wrote a story for a newspaper about how car rental company Hertz was planning to grab market share from its rival Avis.

The headline writer came up with this:

Hitting Avis where it Hertz

Irreverent, yes, but also funny. I doubt Avis were pleased, but our job was not to pander to the sensibilities of companies in the public eye.

Here are some thoughts I penned some time back about the waning art of written communication (more later)….

Photo: flickr.com
Paperback Writer by Marxchivist

How often have you met someone who seemed intelligent and articulate in conversation, but who in writing couldn’t string a coherent sentence together?

The truth is that we judge people by the quality of their written communication. Email has made it possible to access a vast number of people in no time at all. Bash out a message and you can send it off to thousands of readers. If it is badly written, poorly constructed and littered with grammatical and spelling errors, your credibility is damaged, even if slightly. It shows lack of care or poor schooling.

On the other hand, send out a message that is brief, simple, elegantly crafted and devoid of errors – and you will be taken seriously. Your star will shine.

Those who aspire to senior office in any organisation had better know how to write – and to write well.