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"I love being a writer," quipped novelist Peter Devries, "What
I can't stand is the paper work."
When it comes to writing memos, most business people would agree. Mounting
evidence shows that memos may be small, but they give big headaches to everyone
from secretaries to corporate officers. They are hard to write quickly and clearly,
are like "War and Peace" to read, require Miss Marple to figure out,
and, if written in the wrong tone of voice, can make the nicest people sound
heartless.
In the office as well as out, your personality is often judged by how you write.
Muddled memos can cost you dearly in career advancement. Communication skills
are a top priority for business leadership -- often more important than financial,
marketing and technical know-how. To keep getting raises and promotions, experts
like Van Skiver and Booher say you need to literally write your own ticket.
Here's how:
- What is a memo? What it's
not is a school essay. A memo is a written document that stays inside the
company; if it goes outside, it's a letter. A memo is also short. Most experts
say two pages should be tops -- after which a memo starts to turn into a report.
If you can boil down even a two-page memo to two paragraphs that take up only
a half page and still convey the same facts, you get an A+ in business. Equally
important, memos are written to get someone to do or understand something--be
it to spend money, meet a deadline, constructively criticize, or say yes or
no.
- Get Personal. Use words like
I, you, and we. It's a lot more human to say, "I would like you to do
this." To get action, write in the active, not the passive, voice.
- Be conversational. Write the
way you talk. "Use contractions," says Holly Church, a business
consultant who trains Fortune 500 executives. "You probably say 'I'm
happy' more often than you say 'I am happy.'"
- Don't show off. Avoid scholarly
words, technical jargon, and just plain gibberish like "as per your request"
when you simply mean "Here's what you wanted. "Or how about this:
"R & D wants your input because temporal considerations are of primary
importance." Translation: "Our research people need your answer
today."
- Avoid "smothered" words.
Van Skiver explains that these are simple root words with fancy endings
tacked on to puff them up. Favorites are "tion," "ance,"
"ent," "ment," "ize" and "ility."
For example: "The continuation of our issuance of incentives is dependent
upon the prioritization by employees of company objectives." Loosely
translated: "If you want to keep getting incentives, meet company goals."
- If you're not sure, check.
"If there's an error in the memo, it will probably be in names, dates,
or numbers," cautions Booher, and such mistakes may cost you dearly.
One of Booher's clients, an oil company, was sued by the families of two employees
killed in an on-site accident. A specialist on the scene said that the company
was to blame, but when the specialist described the incident on paper, he
got the date wrong. This cast doubt on his credibility regarding everything
he said he had witnessed, and the upshot was the company settled out of court.
- Don't be trite. One hackneyed
expression Booher sees regularly is, "We're sorry for any inconvenience
this may have caused you," which "just sends people up the wall,"
she says.
"Nothing could be more insincere."
"Please don't hesitate to call" is another phrase that gets no results
and turns people off. A more sincere ending is, "If you need help, I'm
available. Give me a call."
- Visualize the reader. Memos
are usually written from the writer's point of view, not the reader's. Yet
the reader usually has to do something when receiving a memo, and, not being
a psychic, he is often not sure what it is. Experts suggest you pretend you're
having a face-to-face discussion or a telephone conversation with the memo
recipient.
- Make the bottom line the top line.
Memos often begin with a statement of a problem, proceed to discuss why the
problem exists, suggest a course of action, and conclude with something wishy-washy,
like "I would like to hear from you soon." The action you want the
reader to take should be spelled out in the first line (or at least the first
paragraph).
- Don't give too many whys.
It's necessary to explain why you want something done, but don't overdo it.
One expert cautions that a reader can probably only absorb no more than six
or seven reasons at once. If you must cite more whys, put them on a separate
sheet of paper, and staple the sheets together. This way, the basic memo message
doesn't get lost in a sea of details.
- Keep paragraphs short.
Limit each paragraph to five lines or less. Put each reason in a separate
paragraph rather than bunching them up in a forbidding 20-line block of type.
- Close with a call to action.
Many memos don't close with anything, leaving the reader hanging. If you want
a response by Friday at 3 p.m., say so.
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