Communication is a prerequisite to any endeavor involving more than one human being. Written correspondence at work can include everything from emails to contracts. It is a core part of the workforce in many sectors and is the technical avenue to stay in touch, solidify, and collaborate business agreements. In the modern world, communicating through writing is essential and becomes ever more so as we participate in what is now commonly called the information age.
Written communication involves any type of interaction that makes use of the written word. Developing written communication skills requires attention to detail and practicality. If we speak about developing the skills of written communication, we generally talk about improving clarity. The manner we write will express a straightforward, accurate, and important message. If not, the correspondence will lose its grounds.
The most popular method of business communication is written communication. People may show skill in written communication by writing messages that are simple, succinct, and error-free. It is essential for small business owners and managers to develop effective written communication skills and to encourage the same in all employees. Employers appreciate this ability as much as oral communication and continually pursue applicants with superior written communication skills.
In professional environments, there are five main elements that compose great written communication skills. They are:
- Clarity – Clarity helps our reader understand what we are saying or, at least, understand enough to know what more clarity they need to ask. Clarity comes from writing in plain language and sticking to accurate, concrete facts.
- Conciseness – It is necessary to arrive quickly and efficiently at our level. Include only the required details to communicate our point. Concise writing helps preserve consistency by avoiding excessively complex sentence structures or unnecessary details. This gives our writing more confidence, too.
- Tone – Tone is the “sound” of our prose. Our language in business writing should be one of professionalism combined with varying degrees of formality and amicability. Even when sharing bad news, such as pointing out mistakes, avoids allegations or words which may make the reader feel singled out.
- Active voice – Active voice is usually more available to readers and easier to understand than passive speech. Active voice helps improve a sentence flow and encourages the reader to travel at a quicker speed through our writing. Complex, passive voice has a place in other types of writing but in professional communication, it slows down the reader.
- Grammar and punctuation – How much attention we pay to proper grammar and punctuation would rely on the formality of the writing. Nonetheless, grammar and punctuation are relevant even in informal writing to ensure our point gets across. The careful use of commas, articles, prepositions, verb tense, and other simple grammar, the above sentence will be hard to understand.
The need to develop good writing skills is barely highlighted by the actual fact that within the modern era, it’s not uncommon to possess business relationships with customers and suppliers that are established and maintained exclusively through the employment of written communications. Writing classes are good thanks to improve our writing, but there are opportunities for improvement in our daily activities additionally. The key to communication, of course, is to convey meaning in as accurate and concise a fashion as possible. People don’t read business memoranda for the pleasure of reading.
When we speak about improving our communication, we might want to boost our sort of communication. People don’t read business memoranda for the pleasure of reading. They are doing so as to receive instructions or information upon which to base decisions or take action. Many people would really like to write down a copy for organizations that sell products/services or we would like to sell our services or products to our customers.
Therefore, highly literary prose is not desirable in business writing. Often, excessively structured prose may be detrimental by looking stand-off or simply wordy. A too casual writing style may also convey an unintentional message, namely that the sender doesn’t take the subject matter seriously or not. A straightforward, courteous tone is sometimes the most effective choice but one that will not come naturally without practice.
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