💡Bad Writing is costing you $530,000/year

Hey—It’s Mohammad.

It’s 7:03 pm. The ticking clock of 60 minutes lingers in the background. Which is ironic considering how many companies think learning to write well isn’t worth their time.

Read Time: 3.4 minutes

Miscommunication costs a 100-employee company $530,000/yr.

An average 100 employee business spends about 17 hours a week clearing up miscommunication. The math comes out to be $26,000 per employee.

Bad emails, memos, notes, or meetings leads to missed deadlines, poor projects, and muddied client trust. On top of it, miscommunication kills innovation and employee retention.

What kills most companies isn’t competition or poor products, it’s miscommunication.

Slack & Teams hurt more than help.

Every time I get a Teams message, it’s like getting a text message on my phone. I have to reply now and lose focus. Then being pinged by emails or meetings pulls focus even more. Oddly enough, email & newsletters are the preferred method by many employees to obtain information.

If businesses continue with poor communication, it leads to:

• Missed performance goals

• Delayed or failed projects

• Low morale

• Lost sales

No one can’t afford poor communication—businesses or employees.

How can we improve Business Communication?

You improve communication through clearer writing.

But we need to embody better communication ourselves first.

People don’t follow top-down orders well but if they see others embodying qualities, they will follow suit. Some companies invest in communication software and training, but here’s a cheaper way.

Focus on 1 form of communication: Email.

Write better emails and make them emails people want to read.

A simple framework to follow is the Minto Framework.

Put the most important information at the top. Then get more detailed below it.

If you’re CC’ing multiple people, add section titles saying, “program managers read ahead”. Be clear on who should read the information. Everyone else can read if they want to. This method makes it easier for people to get the information quickly.

On top of the Minto Pyramid make sure to format your emails well.

Don’t write a wall of text.

Break up your writing into paragraphs & sentences.

Keep it to 1 idea per sentence & 1 idea per paragraph.

These small changes will improve your emails.

Here’s an Overall Strategy for Improving your Business Communication:

Strategy Sections are arranged in 3 steps:

1. The Diagnosis: What’s the root problem?

2. The Compass: What’s the true north to follow?

3. The Action Plan: What are the tactics to solve the problem?

The Diagnosis: Most communication problems are about unspoken standards. Identify what the unspoken standards are.

The Compass: How can I make the recipient’s job easier?

The Action Plan: Before implementing a company-wide change, start with yourself.

• Write emails with clear headings of who needs to pay attention to which part.

• Format your emails for readability.

• Use the Minto Pyramid

Hope this is helpful.

If you need help integrating this strategy or improving your writing skills, book a call here: https://tidycal.com/mohammadukhan135/45-min-1-1-strategy-session 

See you next Saturday— Mohammad

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