The other day, I glanced at a social media ad promoting a webinar that would provide attendees “piece of mind.” Tax season recently ended and I’m pretty sure my mind is (mostly) in one piece! Corny jokes aside, reading that message reminded me of the importance of proofreading and concise communication. Email messaging has become the main communication form for many professionals, especially as remote work becomes a permanent option. It is more important than ever to make sure your emails are clear and concise.
Writing from the foundations
In writing, it helps to think of it as a building process rather than one driven by spontaneous “a-ha” moments. So start from the foundations. Before you start to write, ask yourself who is your audience? Your support staff? A client? Start tailoring your email to the appropriate audience. Don’t put them in the “To:” box yet. If you intend to write a detailed email, try jotting down an outline of main points on an empty word document page, then build the details from the outline, and finally transfer it all to your email and link those points together with words. It’ll help keep your email on track and not turn into a rambling wall of text.
Review & Send Off
Once you’ve built your email draft, it’s time to refine it through review and edits! The old saying “good writing comes from re-writing” remains true. Re-read what you’ve written so far to yourself, aloud if possible, and think if it makes sense. Bring in another pair of eyes and ask a co-worker to read it over, if appropriate. After revisions, give it another re-read and whittle down any ambiguities or odd word choices. Once you feel what you have written is the best it can be, go ahead and hit that send button.
Common Errors to Avoid
- Be wary of workplace jargon. It may help in quick messages within your team, but that habit may spill into emails to your clients or 3rd parties, leading to miscommunication.
- Don’t try to bury your audience with thesaurus-picked words, you’ll lose your audience’s attention quickly. Remember to keep it simple.
- On that note, make sure the words that you use are real words. In my earlier years, a co-worker once replied to a supervisor’s idea as “atriguing”
- Don’t rely on spellcheck. Words like “they’re”, “their”, “piece”, and other often misused words can go undetected, so re-reading your email before sending is essential.
“Good writing comes from good reading”
A former professor of mine would often say this while explaining why we had to read a heavy stack of books for a writing class. The goal was that by reading those books, we would understand good examples of writing and incorporate them into our own styles. Similarly, reading good examples of emails and other communication in your workplace can help you develop your “voice” that will help your email communication.
If you’ve been following our posts for a while, you’re probably familiar with MiklosCPA’s focus on sharing accounting and tax-related articles put into simple, accessible bites of knowledge for our readers and clients. Once in a while though, it’s nice to touch upon other relevant subjects which our readers may find useful. If you’d like to know more how MiklosCPA can help your business, let’s have a chat. Also follow us on our social media pages for more future articles and other useful tax tidbits.