The Many Benefits Of Good Business Writing

Few people are good at business writing. Unfortunately, almost everyone needs to write something occasionally, even if it is not part of their job description. Unlike unrecorded oral communication, your grammatical blunders can be plainly seen by anyone, even after the correspondence has long been considered obsolete. And since you had the luxury of time to edit your writing, errors are less likely to be forgiven.

Others may have assistants to whom they can delegate the writing. However, capable staff is hard to find and those that are skilful in writing are very expensive. Because you will still be the one ultimately responsible for errors once you sign the letter, you must have at least some knowledge of its correctness.

Poor writing may be interpreted wrongly with disastrous results. The quality of your writing may also be seen as a reflection of the quality of your thinking. It is obvious that improvement in this aspect is critical to any person’s career. To get you started, here a few basic writing tips:

Mention all the needed information. Have all the right information the reader may need. Never assume the recipient knows who you are and what you are talking about. Remember to answer the questions of who, what, when, where, why and how if they are relevant.

Keep it short and simple. Writing is difficult enough without having to use unusual words that many people do not understand. The time of using big words to impress your reader has long since passed. People will get the message better if it is concise and to the point.

Use templates of common business letters. To save time, the use of templates or swipe files is necessary. While almost everyone uses templates, people often waste too much time looking for a suitable file. The best practice here is to compile plenty of samples of what you may use even before you need them.

Be careful in spelling names, titles and gender. A mistake in spelling the name, title or gender of the recipient declares to the reader that either you care little about him/her or that you are grossly negligent.

Double check your work. Never neglect to recheck your writing. Check for fact, spelling and grammatical errors.

Practice daily. Even learning about one new thing about effective business writing a day would go a long way towards improving your writing capabilities. To make your study more productive, focus on studying the actual type of writing you will need.

A decent knowledge of business writing is one of the most useful skills for professionals and entrepreneurs. The time you spend to upgrade your know-how in this matter is one of your best investments.

To learn more about business writing, BusinessCoach, Inc., a leading business seminar provider, conducts an excellent seminar on this entitled Effective Business Writing. Contact (02) 727-5628, (02) 727-8860, (0915) 205-0133 or visit www.businesscoachphil.com for details.

Click here to view details of the seminar: Effective Business Writing »

*Originally published by the Manila Bulletin. C-4, Sunday, July 29, 2012. Written by Ruben Anlacan, Jr. (President, BusinessCoach, Inc.) All rights reserved. May not be reproduced or copied without express written permission of the copyright holders.