Written communication matters

Written communication is one of the communication skills in BABOK (Section 9.4) and is a form of non-verbal communication. Communication is one of the core characteristics of the professional BA in my view.

If nothing else, business analysts must excel at communication. BAs bring together stakeholders in a meeting of minds to arrive at shared understandings of motivations, goals, vision, outcomes, benefits and value of change. BAs must be masters of written, verbal and non-verbal communication to bring stakeholders on that journey. Yes, this means grammar and punctuation is crucial.

I cannot overstate this enough – communication is essential to the profession of business analysis.

Written communication matters because usually you have one chance to communicate in the written form. Writing persists, a record of your written communication effectiveness – whether woeful or wonderful.

Characteristics of written communication

Written communication is notable for:

• permanent record
• well-suited to documentation and other slow-moving material
• uniform message (at least from the writer’s perspective)
• usually a more formal mechanism than verbal communication
• does not have to be a traditional document – can also be blog posts, wiki pages, instant chat and other forms
• well-established norms apply that when not used appropriately can affect the quality of the writing and the clarity of the message
• some meaning may be lost through the absence of non-verbal communication cues such as facial expression and verbal tone

The 5 Cs of great written communication

There are many variations on this model, but I like this particular version consisting of:

• Clear: Your writing must communicate with clarity. Will the reader know what it is you are trying to convey?
• Concise: Less is more when it comes to writing.
• Concrete: The content is factual and tangible (rather than abstract). The reader should be in no doubt as to your message.
• Correct: The content is accurate and written with correct spelling, grammar and style.
• Complete: The communication contains all the information that the reader needs.

You will have seen other versions of the 5 Cs (including things like courtesy, consideration and compelling), but this version works for me.

Style guide

A style guide is every business analyst’s friend when it comes to writing. Large corporates or government agencies will have a style guide as they understand how crucial it is for writers to write following a uniform style.

At its simplest, a style guide defines a consistent way of writing for an organisation to improve clarity of communication. When starting a role at an organisation, one of the first things a BA should do is identify if there is a style guide and start familiarising yourself with it. If your organisation doesn’t have a style guide, offer to create one! It makes a good companion for the brand guide that every organisation will have. A fantastic resource for style guides is the Australian Government Style Manual.

A style guide can be whatever you want it to be, but will typically cover items such as:

• grammar
• punctuation
• capitalisation
• hyphenation
• apostrophes

Rather than write out an entire style guide in this blog post, let’s have a look at some common traps.

• Spelling: Choose a language or dictionary and stick with it. If writing in Australia, then choose English (Australia) as your language. You will need to change the default language of your Microsoft Office options, templates and autocorrect options to avoid having perfectly correct Australian spellings marked as errors – organise, colour, metre and so on.
• Homophones: Words that sound the same with different spellings and meanings. Examples include principle/principal, affect/effect, compliment/complement, you’re/your.
• Apostrophes: Generally used to indicate possession, not plurals. So frequently are apostrophes misused that there’s a disparaging term, the grocer’s apostrophe.
• Wordiness: Lengthy words and too many words doesn’t add weight to your writing, it confuses the meaning and makes your material difficult to read.
• Capitalisation: Another case of less is more. In general, use a capital letter only for the start of a sentence, the first word of a heading or for proper nouns. In other words, a philosophy of ‘minimal capitalisation’ makes your content easier to read and understand. Excessive use of capital letters makes content ‘heavy’ and slow-going.

Getting better at writing

If writing is not your thing, don’t panic! Like most things, good writing can be learnt.

Start by doing. Practice, practice, practice. Volunteer to write at work – even if it’s not your thing, yet.

Then, ask people whose writing you respect for feedback on your writing. Explain what you are trying to achieve, and I’m sure you’ll find peers willing to help.

Make sure you nail the fundamentals. It doesn’t matter how brilliant your ideas are, if you are confusing the reader with spelling mistakes and poor grammar you have lost the battle.

Get inspired by other writers. Read writing that you admire. You will pick up subtleties of good writing and be comfortable applying them to your own writing.

Read about good writing. There is no shortage of material available covering the theory of writing such as making an argument, presenting options, performing analysis or asking for help.

5 ways to get better at writing

• Practice
• Ask for feedback
• Nail the fundamentals (spelling, grammar, punctuation)
• Read good writing
• Study the theory

Good luck on your writing journey!