It is often contemplated upon but seldom followed. Though widely accepted, we fail to consider it when putting up a draft. It always helps to be brief, concrete and direct as people who are reading have always something better to do and you or me or anyone else has no right to make them circle the bush for what they are seeking.
I took a course on Business writing this semester as an elective and henceforth sharing something I learnt the hard way:
· Assume that you are talking to someone who is completely unaware of the event/proposal etc; while writing the same. Just think that he/she has returned from an overseas trip and you have 5 minutes to catch them up.
· Don’t put off the crux or the core of the issue for the middle ; start with the Who,what,when,where,how…..
· Show the reader instead of telling him. “Show not tell” __is quite a popular jargon of Professors and is quite basic.
· Use some personal examples to illustrate the idea. If not , a hypothetical example will do but make it as close to real as possible. For example if you were creating an Advert for a LIC MED-policy something like this :
What if, when you are 60 and playing with your grandchild ; you have a renal failure ; your pension wouldn’t be much to cover weekly dialysis would it?[/i]
· Make the paragraphs short.
· Use headings and subheadings, so that people can skip parts they don’t consider relevant to them.
· Use simple concrete words. If you want to write like P.B.Shelley , do it on your own time.
· Emphasize the main idea by use of anecdotes and recursive branching ideas.