What makes good written communication?
Written communication may be the only experience a member has with you. The letter or email is a personal statement about you and the situation you are dealing with. Remember, the member has entrusted you with his or her retirement benefits – do you want them to see you as:
The letter or email needs to be structured like a sandwich.Always keep the purpose of the letter or email in mind.
| A CONUNDRUM? So which is it – yours faithfully or yours sincerely?Named addressee i.e. Dear Mr X, Mrs Y etc. ends with "yours sincerely”.Dear Sir/Madam/To whom it may concern etc. ends with "yours faithfully” as you don’t know the name of the person you are writing to.Emails are slightly less formal and generally end with "Best wishes”, "Regards” or "Kind regards”.Using words like, "cool” or "okay” are colloquialisms and not professional. THE OPENING PARAGRAPH This is to let the reader know what the letter us about, for example, following receipt of a letter, or further to a telephone conversation.It should be clear from the outset what the letter is regarding. THE BODY Information provided should be kept brief, simple and concise.The content should be structured into subject paragraphs. If it can’t be read and understood in less than 20 seconds, it has limited chance of being digested!We know that pension matters are complicated and compliance information is lengthy so put the main points and actions in first, then provide the details, and possibly summarise actions again at the end. There are 3 principles to incorporate:1. Ethos – the integrity of the letter – grammatically correct. 2. Pathos – the emotional effect on the reader. 3. Logos – the relevance and strength of the content. THE CLOSING PARAGRAPH What do you want the member to do after reading the letter?As with speaking to someone, written communications also need to give the reader some feeling of conclusion as they finish it. The final paragraph should be limited to about four sentences.Any required actions should be clearly stated.So in terms of the structure of the communication, a simple approach would be:
Correct spelling, grammar and punctuation enhance the effect of the finished document and convey professionalism.Punctuation fills writing with silent intonation, it adds clarity and precision so the reader knows when to pause or stop or see where certain parts of a sentence have emphasis.A comma can change the whole context and meaning of a sentence.Poor grammar sets the wrong tone and suggests the writer cannot communicate effectively and doesn’t really care about the subject matter.EXAMPLE A great leader said to a thief, "I tell you this day you shall be with me in paradise.”"I tell you this day, you shall be with me in paradise.” A comma inserted after "day” suggests the leader is telling the thief today that he will join him in paradise at some unspecified time in the future."I tell you, this day you shall be with me in paradise.” Change where the comma is placed and the meaning changes. Now the leader is saying the thief will join him on that same day in paradise! The Importance of Clear Communication A computer program’s specification read, in part,"The exception information will be in the XYZ file, too.”The programmer took this to mean "another place” i.e. the exception information appears in the XYZ file, as well as being held somewhere else.He assumed, therefore, that the exception information was duplicated somewhere else, so he saw no need for his program to preserve it.Nothing was implied about this information being duplicated elsewhere, and indeed it wasn’t duplicated. As a result, valuable and unrecoverable information was lost.The writer actually meant, "Another type of information that appears in the XYZ file is the exception information.”Before the different interpretations were discovered, the cost of the lost information had mounted to about $500,000.A rather a large bill for one carelessly placed "too”. |
