The Role of Written Communication

All day, every day, most of us create and use written communication to do our jobs.

In fact, our professional performance directly correlates with our ability to understand and act upon the information that we read.  Therefore, improving written communication can play a key role in the success of a business.

The benefits of good business writing that is clear, concise and accurate are threefold for an organisation.

• Revenue Growth
• Risk Mitigation
• Cost Reduction

Revenue Growth

You can increase conversion rates by creating professional, well-structured proposals and tender responses.  A well written executive summary that conveys your key messages can be the game-changer.  Clear and succinct tender responses make it easy for your clients to understand your offer, while navigation aids and a logical structure make it easier for them to find the information they need.

The benefits of good business writing include getting new products to market faster.  The new product development process can be convoluted, lengthy and not deliver optimal outcomes.  Documenting your existing process using reader-focused process maps and content can highlight blockages, unrealistic requirements and important dependencies.  These can provide a focus for a redesigned process that better meets everyone’s needs.  Detailed new product development project guides make it possible for everyone to use a consistent approach and assist new project managers to understand the entire scope.  A more efficient and more controlled process is essential to increasing the success rate.

Customer retention can also be improved through improved marketing communication that gets to the heart of what your customers need.  This online content may include emails, newsletters and blogs.

Risk Mitigation

Fewer accidents occur when work instructions are simple, up to date and easy to follow.  Staff are more willing to read (and follow) procedures when it is easy to find the information they are looking for.  Clear procedures can reduce errors caused by ambiguous or conflicting content.  Staff working remotely benefit from adequate Work Health and Safety (WHS) guidance and updated compliance information.   

Good business writing skills enhance the ability of both the Board and Senior Management to successfully convey an organisation’s corporate culture and governance structure.  This occurs through clearer policies, guidelines, standards and codes of conduct that people can follow easily and be held accountable for.  Clear communication also helps the Board and senior management effect and monitor operational activity.

You can help support a better-educated workplace by creating more successful and engaging training programs.  This involves writing effective, user-friendly facilitator guides, participant workbooks, PowerPoint presentations, eLearning and video scripts.

Good document management and governance facilitates keeping your procedures up to date.  Generally, this involves having “one source of truth” in a centralised database accessed by everyone.  Metadata and workflow can support regular review timeframes and reviewers appreciate clear and concise documents that are quick to process.

As staff turnover is high in the current climate, it is increasingly vital to capture employees’ knowledge effectively and reduce the loss of organisational learning.  Furthermore, many staff now work remotely, often from home, so the ability to manage, observe and advise colleagues on-the-job is largely diminished.  As a result, it is important to ensure that documents clearly and concisely convey best practice, and easily help employees answer any questions they may have.

Cost Reduction

PRODUCTIVITY IMPROVEMENT

Subject matter expert (SME) productivity is increased when it takes them less time to create written content, freeing them up to do their main jobs.  Engineers, scientists, IT experts and other professionals love what they do and play a major role in the success of many enterprises.  Yet for many, writing is a chore, a necessary evil that takes them away from their job.  Research by Robert E Horn suggests that improving SME’s writing skills can reduce the time they spend on writing by upwards of 50%, while better satisfying their readers’ needs.

Middle manager productivity is improved when they spend less time reading, editing and reworking their team’s documents, particularly reports.  Improving their team’s writing skills can especially help them increase the success of emails, proposals and requests.

Contact centre productivity increases when there are fewer and shorter trouble-shooting calls, fewer questions to supervisors and better information available to answer staff and customer questions.  This occurs through a well written and managed system of knowledge.

Tender team productivity increases when consistency improves and everyone uses a writing standard, preferably supported by suitable templates.  A structured approach supports the development of reusable chunks that can be accessed from a tender library.

EXPENSE REDUCTION

Improving your documentation and written content can reduce staff turnover and the associated costs of recruitment, training and learning of new hires.  Poorly written communication is never a reason given for leaving, however, the flow-on effects of it can result in unhappy staff who are more likely to leave.  These include dealing with irate customers, blowouts in call times and numbers, high error rates and a lack of accountability.  Effective HR documents and higher quality training can empower your employees, increase clarity about roles and responsibilities and clearly communicate the organisation’s goals.

Our clients report reduced staffing needs as a result of employees using more efficient processes.  Research done by the organisation Information Mapping showed that a reduction of 1 minute in average call times at a major company resulted in improvements equivalent to 9 FTE.  Reusable content and better writing skills across an organisation also reduce the need for teams of dedicated writers and editors.

Production error rates decrease when the processes, procedures and work instructions are clear.  Lower error rates mean less rework, fewer discarded products and lower claims.

Another of the benefits of good business writing is reduced storage costs when documents are shorter and there are fewer of them.

Assessing Your Documentation

As you have read, good documentation is essential for your employees to be able to do their jobs efficiently and well. Information that is hard to find, hard to understand or out of date can cause errors, confusion and increased risk.

Download this document quality checklist to see whether your existing documentation is clear and reader-focused or in need of improvement to optimise successful outcomes.

Improve the Writing in Your Organisation

Ultimately, if you are looking to grow your business’ revenue, mitigate its risks or reduce its costs, then improving your written communication is a very effective place to start.

At TechWriter, we specialise in written communication and documentation. It’s all we do.

We train and we consult.  Our approach is based on years of practical experience supported by research into how people read and absorb information.  Our reader-focused methodology makes it easy to decide what information to include, how to manage multiple audiences and how to structure information to optimise successful outcomes.

Contact us to find out how we can help you reap the benefits of good business writing.