It’s a mistake to think your readers aren’t forming perceptions of you based on your written messages . . . My favorite in this amusing image about text messages is the first one. It’s no coincidence that readers label someone who doesn’t get to the point until the end the “professor.” Students don’t learn to put the bottom line first until…
It’s a conundrum. Do amateurs struggle to write successfully in the workplace because they have too much or too little knowledge? The answer is “yes.” Here’s what I mean. Amateurs suffer from too much knowledge about their message. In the workplace, it’s commonplace for writers to have more information than their readers. I mean . . . That’s…
In the first two posts defining what I mean by “plain language,” I have focused on two points of the rhetorical triangle: textual elements like style and organization (Part One) and reader outcomes like comprehension and usability (Part Two). Now it’s time to tackle the third, the writer’s purpose. This is arguably the aspect of rhetorical context that…
In Part One of my attempt to explain how I understand plain language, I focused on the elements of a text that must be managed to create a plain language document. Anyone who has known me for long, however, could have predicted that I would talk about the rhetorical context of a high quality document in Part Two. …
Glad to leave my sick bed and return to the land of the living . . . Here’s how this post started. Recently, my 17-year-old son did something dumb on the basketball court during his high school team’s game at a school in another town and earned his fifth foul. (For those with limited knowledge…
You’ve heard me talk about my interest in the obstacles to widespread adoption of plain language before. Over the holidays, I read Joseph Kimble’s Writing for Dollars, Writing to Please. What a terrific compilation of resources for those of us interested in more successful workplace writing! Kimble is a law professor with a long history as…
I like to highlight best practices in writing for the workplace when I see them. Here’s a terrific example. This morning, Judy Knighton posted Listen to your readers! at Write, “a professional services firm that helps government and business organisations create clear, reader-friendly communications” located in New Zealand. I’ve written about audience analysis and posted a video tutorial on…
My name is Eric Longenecker. I am a senior and graduating in December 2012 with a degree in Management Information Systems. I am taking part in Leadership Communications (MGT 422) as a part of my specialization, Management Communication. This is an exam I submitted in response to whether leadership was effective or not in the…
My students have demonstrated they understand how to identify the rhetorical context of management messages at this point. (I hope to have a couple of guest posts based on their first exam in a few days.) Now we start analyzing the linguistic details of communication behavior. Last week, I introduced them to some concepts from linguistic pragmatics…
Anyone who avoids full responsibility after making a mistake counts as an amateur in my book. This past week, my students discussed the purpose and effectiveness of a letter from a publications manager to a group of volunteer editors. The consensus was that it effectively informed readers about the reasons for performance issues in the manager’s area, as well as plans to address them in the…