Why Leaders Need to Learn the Skill of Writing
fromthegreennotebook.com
fromthegreennotebook.com
[0] https://www.amazon.com/Miquelrius-Leather-Cover-Graph-Notebo...
On the other hand I highly recommend finding a really good pen to write with.
Personally I use "Pilot Super Grip G F" [0] – a 0.7mm black retractable ballpoint pen and I always keep one in my notebook.
[0] https://www.pilotpen.eu/en/super-grip-g-retractable-fine-tip...
Such a great, succinct description of this problem.
If you have a leader who is a clear and strong communicator via their writing, it turns out that clear and strong writing becomes a highly prized asset in the company, and people who are very good at communicating their thoughts in that way tend to do much better with remote work setups ... Leaders who constantly want to get everybody in a room, hold a meeting or talk though it (emphasis on constantly) ... spread that mindset through the company, and as a result have a culture that's much less accustomed to doing remote well ... just my anecdotal observation
There is no need to learn it, it will happen on its own. If you want to be good, you will write and you will become interested in being better at it.
Which begs the question, why aren't leaders already good at writing? Answer me that mister :)
[1] https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/20821371-the-sense-of-st...
1. If you want people to read what you wrote and give you feedback, conciseness is important. We have a general rule of thumb that it takes people 30 minutes to read 4-6 pages of terse material, and it takes roughly an hour to then discuss it. As a result, pretty much all our docs are 6 pages (in the main body; appendixes might be added but are written in a way so that the doc stands on its own without them).
2. For many forms of (non-fiction) communication, the inverted pyramid is a helpful way to structure your thoughts. People are most likely to read the beginning of something, When we read the whole thing, we're more likely to pay more attention to the beginning. It's important then to get the most important information in the beginning, with supporting details as you go.
3. Know the audience, and focus on why the audience should care. If it's not clear why the audience would care, try rephrasing or restructuring to focus on the part they actually would care about.
4. Do lots of iterations. Get feedback from others. You can also iterate on your writing yourself: I find that when I write something and come back to it later, I'm better at finding issues. In order to do a lot of iterations, that means you need to plan out your time. In my company, we often kick-off the doc writing process with a "working backwards" schedule: we're presenting to such-and-such VP on Day X, so we have to have a rough draft of the whole doc on Day Y, so we have to have drafts of individual pieces by Day Z.
5. Be aware of what kind of thing your writing. I'd say 75% of my writing, my audience is myself: I'm writing in order to work through thoughts. I approach that differently when I'm writing something for review by teammates, which I again approach differently from a doc written for other groups.
6. Maybe a bit controversial in some circles, but: Strunk and White (https://www.amazon.com/Elements-Style-Fourth-William-Strunk/...). It's a short book, and even if you don't do everything in it, the focus on clarity and succinctness is still useful.
It's good to use appendices when there's a lot of background (whether technical/history/etc.) that really isn't important to the central thrust of the document. Also, even at 6 pages, I'd probably recommend some sort of executive summary.
https://medium.com/lessons-from-mckinsey/the-pyramid-princip...
Quote:
1. Start with the answer first.
2. Group and summarize your supporting arguments.
3. Logically order your supporting ideas.
The author also proposes combining this with the Rule of 3 -- not more than 3 items (arguments, ideas, bullets) in a group. I've used these techniques in real life and can vouch for their effectiveness.
Abstract: Briefly describe why the audience cares, what you did, and what the results were so that they know whether they should read more or move on to something else.
Intro: Same as abstract but in more depth and with an emphasis on helping the reader decide if the meat of the paper is worthwhile for them.
Nearly every other section: Specifics vary by field, but there will generally be an argument from foundations as you describe, and elements which don't fit naturally in the flow of that argument are given their own headers (certain experimental details, foundational algorithmic appendices, ...)
This contrasts with the style GP talks about (also used in the US military, referred to as "Bottom Line Up Front" or "BLUF"). The first thing is the conclusion/actionable part with enough detail to start acting without needing to read the rest, and often zero justification (more a statement of fact or a directive: we will do X starting on Monday). Most of the rest contains things like analysis of alternatives or rationales, useful for some of the people to use but not essential for most to read.
Some academic papers (taken as a whole) are similar to this, but it's not universal.
Thanks for the note on BLUF: I didn't know it was a thing. [1]
Even if a piece of writing isn't BLUF, we can read it as if it were BLUF. In grad school we were taught that the most efficient way to skim journal papers was to read in this order: (1) abstract; (2) conclusion; (3) if still promising, skim parts in the middle.
For my qualifiers I had to pound in excess of 100 somewhat dense papers in 3 weeks on a subject outside of my specialty. I would never have made it if I had read each paper in its printed order.
- Abstract
- intro
- (lit review)
- methods
- results
- (discussion)
- conclusion
- references
- (appendices)
I would say this ordering doesn't quite map to the pyramid principle and nor should it. Academic writing prioritizes explanation whereas business writing prioritizes decision-making. They serve different purposes. If we were to hypothetically rewrite an academic paper using the pyramid principle, it might look like this:
- Combined abstract + conclusion (1-3 points)
- Results (1-3 points)
- Discussion (1-3 points)
- Everything else goes into the appendix.
where he talks about tips and tricks for journalling and how it makes you a better writer.
People who invest time in refining a doc before the main meeting tend to get better results in the meeting. It’s not subtle and the acts of asking for help and helping each other out seem to forge mutual reliance and a sense of being on the same team (plus the company gets a better doc and meeting).
I mindmap instead of write to manage complex idea nodes. (ithoughts for the win!)