Writing Style and Tone for Business

Quick reference

• 00:04 There's no one size fits all for tone in business writing.
• 00:09 Words, phrases, and even font style can vary and
• 00:12 still be appropriate, depending on the message and its purpose.
• 00:17 So let's bear four things in mind as far as your writing, tone, and
• 00:21 style are concerned.
• 00:23 One, your audience.
• 00:26 Two, the message itself.
• 00:29 Three, your objective.
• 00:32 And four, your method or channel.
• 00:35 That is, who are you writing to?
• 00:40 What's the message about?
• 00:42 Why are you writing it?
• 00:45 And how are you writing it?
• 00:48 Before we get into these, remember that no matter why, how, or
• 00:53 with whom we communicate in the workplace,
• 00:56 we're still expected to maintain professionalism at all times.
• 01:01 Let's look at this email from an HR manager to all employees.
• 01:05 We can easily answer all four questions from this email.
• 01:10 Who are we writing to?
• 01:12 Well, this email is addressed to all employees.
• 01:17 Some organizations have a very formal culture, and for others it's more relaxed.
• 01:22 But when you're writing an email and it's addressed to everyone,
• 01:26 have in mind the person you're least familiar with, and
• 01:29 how you'd like to come across in a friendly way to that person.
• 01:33 That can be a tricky balance.
• 01:35 But in this email, we have some really good examples of language that can help us
• 01:40 to do that, and we'll look at these examples in a bit more detail later.
• 01:44 Let's go to the second question.
• 01:46 What is the message?
• 01:49 We can tell that from the subject line.
• 01:51 It's nice and clear, and it's more preferable to the vague sounding
• 01:56 department memo subject line that we sometimes see in an office emails from HR.
• 02:01 The reason this subject line works is that it helps the audience to attach the right
• 02:06 level of importance to your message.
• 02:09 And it also helps them to be able to find the message easily in the future.
• 02:14 Most people have thousands of emails in their inbox, and
• 02:18 it's really a waste of time to have to open several emails with the same subject
• 02:23 line trying to find just one.
• 02:27 The third question, why was the message written?
• 02:31 Well, here it is, it's to officially communicate the new policy.
• 02:37 So even though it's suggested that employees may have already heard
• 02:41 about the change, it's important to communicate official policies in writing.
• 02:48 And the fourth question, how?
• 02:51 Well, we've established that this is an email.
• 02:54 An email is very enduring,
• 02:55 and since it can be forwarded to others not in the subject line,
• 02:59 that's another reason we need to be extra careful when choosing words for email.
• 03:06 Let's see how the answers to these four questions affect the tone of this email.
• 03:11 We talked earlier about professionalism, which is basically code for
• 03:16 respect, and that must be a part of every message in the workplace, but
• 03:20 especially written ones.
• 03:23 The language of this email is mostly neutral because of who our audience is and
• 03:27 the fact that it is an official message.
• 03:30 So we see phrases like officially communicate,
• 03:34 in light of the above, kindly, best regards.
• 03:38 But most companies today, even the more formal ones, are moving away from
• 03:43 transactional type communication, since they want to embrace a more human element.
• 03:50 So we balance those phrases with, as you may already know, feel free to respond,
• 03:56 which are both still professional, but they're a bit more welcoming and friendly.
• 04:02 You may have also noticed that there's another reason this email was written.
• 04:06 And that was to get people to update their family information on the portal.
• 04:11 This changes the email from just an informational one to a directive,
• 04:17 it's a call to action.
• 04:19 When we have a call to action, it should preferably be stated toward the end of
• 04:23 the message, even if it was already stated at the outset.
• 04:28 And obviously, if the action is time-sensitive,
• 04:32 that should be stated with the date and the time, if necessary.
• 04:37 Now there is another type of message.
• 04:39 Let's say you're communicating good news, like an all-time sales peak.
• 04:44 The answers to those same four questions will dictate our style and tone.
• 04:49 And it would result in a much different message from what we just saw in
• 04:52 the email, even if it's within the same company.
• 04:57 If you're sending that message to an individual,
• 04:59 it makes sense to use their name.
• 05:01 So you might say something like, congrats Courtney, or
• 05:05 if you're sending it to a group, something like, great news team.
• 05:10 Since we've lost the ability to use facial expressions, volume, and
• 05:15 inflection, we need to find a way to do that, that's easily understood.
• 05:20 When we use words like team, we, and us,
• 05:23 that's often preferable to the impersonal, the company, in such situations.
• 05:31 If the message is just an acknowledgement,
• 05:34 we might use a platform like Slack, Microsoft Teams, or Google Chat, and
• 05:38 an exclamation mark, and happy face, or an applause emoji.
• 05:42 These are all completely appropriate and may even be expected.
• 05:46 That's how we put the facial element back into our communication to convey
• 05:51 excitement.
• 05:53 But if you're communicating good news in a more formal notice to an employee,
• 05:59 maybe in recognition of their promotion, it should ideally have a date,
• 06:04 a subject line, and a formal salutation.
• 06:08 And the platform or channel used should be an email or hardcopy letter.

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