HBR Guide to Managing Up and Across (HBR Guide Series)

How to Get Your Colleagues’ Attention

by Amy Gallo

Do you have to personally escort colleagues to your project meetings to make sure they show up? Does every “urgent” e-mail require phone or face-to-face follow-up to get a timely response? Do you have to hound your marketing partners to prioritize your products when they’re launching new campaigns? These key tasks depend on your ability to frame your message—to make crystal clear what you need your colleagues to do, when, and, perhaps most important, why.

When you frame your message effectively, your audience will immediately understand the issue at hand and why it deserves their attention.

Here’s how to frame your message to get the results you want, whether you’re making a presentation, sending ...