Management Rules: 50 New Rules for Managers

CHAPTER 33

HOW TO WRITE

As with reading, so with writing. Writing for business is different from writing for pleasure. And that does not mean filling documents with jargon in the hope of impressing people. Good writing is a sign of good thinking, so it pays to write well.

You do not need to be Shakespeare to write a good report. You need to follow five simple rules of editing:

1. Write for the reader. Work out why you are writing something and what your reader needs to know. This will help focus your document and reduce its size.

2. Tell a story. Ideally your document will be based on one simple idea. Often this can take the form of “here is ...