Manage Your Writing

This week: Make a non-outline

The great twentieth-century philosopher Winnie the Pooh defined organizing as "what you do before you do something, so that when you do it, it's not all mixed up."

That's good advice for us writers. But too many of us carry bad memories of teacher-required formal outlining, with its arcane uses of letters and numbers. The solution: write a "non-outline." It's what executive Donald Walton was referring to when he wrote

Even if I'm writing something as brief as a one-page letter, I like to jot down some sort of outline. It may consist of no more than three or four words or phrases: the essence of thought I want to get across and the order in which I intend to build my message.

This week, before you start some piece of writing, try writing a non-outline. Jot down your three or four main points. If you decide they're not in the right order, renumber them.

If you read the Winnie the Pooh's definition again, you'll see why a non-outline will do your readers a great service.

This week: Eliminate COIK

Some technical writers and editors use an acronym, COIK, that stands for "Clear Only If Known." You'll sometimes find that an editor has scribbled "COIK" beside a passage that will be perfectly clear to any reader who already shares the writer's knowledge (and thus doesn't need to read the passage in the first place) but not at all clear to a reader who doesn't share that knowledge.

If the COIK material consists of just a technical term here and there, it can be corrected at the revising stage. However, eliminating COIK material often involves substantial rewriting. For this reason and others, therefore, it's more efficient to avoid COIK material "up front," by making consideration of your audience's knowledge an important part of your planning stage.

This week, before you begin writing each document, think clearly about what your readers already know, and what they don't.

This week: Find facts first

Executive Donald Walton, in his book Are You Communicating, says,

The biggest mistake you can make in a report, letter, proposal, or other important message (and it's made all the time) is to write without first getting and correctly analyzing all the facts. It's the one unforgivable mistake. Your boss or customer can overlook a slip in grammar, but not bad advice that results when factual preparation is sloppy and incomplete.

This week, pay special attention to getting your facts together before you start drafting

This week: Tell a story

Stories have always been important in forming communities and organizations. As The Cluetrain Manifesto reminds us, "Stories play a large part in the success of organizations. With stories, we teach, pass along knowledge of our craft to colleagues, and create a sense of shared mission."

This week find a place, somewhere in the writing you do, to tell a story.

This week: Pay attention to results

"There is one thing worse than not communicating," said educational theorist Edgar Dale. "It is thinking you have communicated when you have not."

This week, pay special attention to the results of your speaking and writing. Notice when you're understood and when you're not. Identify at least one communication strategy that works especially well for you.