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    Write to Influence
    Write to Influence
    Write to Influence
    Ebook103 pages1 hour

    Write to Influence

    By Michel Theriault

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    About this ebook

    Writing is about more than conveying information. It’s about influencing someone to follow directions, agree with your position, take action or approve your business case.

    Take what you think you know about writing in your job and turn it on its head. You probably thought it was about being clear and concise so the recipient would understand it. If so, you’d be wrong.

    If you want to be successful, you need to think about your writing differently – What it’s really about is influencing others. You probably learned in high school or college English classes all about how to write, but they rarely focus on how to communicate, much less influence with your communications.

    Business communications in college is often more about formatting letters, the traditional headings to use’ formal structure, numbering, using appendices, numbering, creating technical documents and more. What it doesn’t prepare you for is how to use your business writing to influence others, a key skill to being successful manager and climbing the corporate ladder.

    And, it’s not a lot of help in the high tech, fast paced communications world we live in today.

    According to Wikipaedia, communication is simply about conveying information. In fact, the important part of communication isn’t just about conveying information, it’s making sure the information you convey delivers the results you need by influencing the reader.

    Think about what you write in your job. Do you write procedures? If so, you shouldn’t simply want people to understand them, you want them to follow them. That’s influence. If you write business cases, you don’t want to lay out a clear, logical argument; you want the reader to give you approval – that’s influence. If you write letters and emails, it isn’t about being readable, with good grammar and accurate spelling. If you think about it, you are always trying to get someone to do something, whether it’s agree with you, approve something, or do what you want.

    Few managers are well equipped for this shift in what writing mean, partly because of what we’ve been taught in school about writing and the way communication has been defined for us in the past.

    The first step is to know what you want, then craft your written communication not only to convey information, you need to make sure it influence others.

    This book gives you the techniques you need to change your writing from simply conveying information to influencing others.

    This is the first book in the Quick Guide for Managers Series.

    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherMichel Theriault
    Release dateOct 27, 2012
    ISBN9780981337463
    Write to Influence
    Author

    Michel Theriault

    Michel provides advisory and consulting services in strategic and management issues after many years in corporate and service related fields both as a client and as a supplier.He is a published book author, a speaker at industry conferences and writes for industry magazines.His clients are busy managers at all level who benefit from his ability to help them develop strategies, business cases and implementation plans for problems they want to solve or business areas they want to improve. Michel draws from a wide range of experience to help solve problems, improve services and reduce costs using best practices. His clients appreciate his outside view that isn’t clouded with the status quo or with a vested interest to defend.Michel has been profiled in magazines and newspapers as well as interviewed for various articles.A sought after speaker, he delivers seminars at conferences and provides training and workshops internationally in addition to consulting for clients.

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      Book preview

      Write to Influence - Michel Theriault

      Write to Influence

      Quick Guide #1

      From the Quick Guides for Managers series

      By Michel Theriault

      Published By WoodStone Press

      Smashwords Edition

      www.woodstonepress.com

      Toronto, Canada

      Copyright 2012 by Michel Theriault.

      Smashwords Edition ISBN 978-0-9813374-6-3

      Print Edition ISBN 978-0-9813374-4-9 (available at most online retailers)

      Published 2012 by WoodStone Press, Smashwords Edition.

      This version of Write to Influence - Quick Guides For Managers has been released in electronic format for free as an introduction to the series. It has been adapted for electronic layout and re-formatted for Smashwords.

      You are welcome to share it with your friends and colleagues. This book may be reproduced, copied and distributed for non-commercial purposes, provided the book remains in its complete original electronic form. If you enjoyed this book, please return to Smashwords.com to discover other works by this author. Thank you for your support.

      This book provides general information on the subject. The reader understands that neither the publisher nor the author are providing specific professional services related to your unique situation or specific requirements, which may differ. It is your responsibility to ensure the information is relevant to your specific situation and apply it appropriately. Neither the author nor publisher shall be liable or responsible to any person or entity with respect to any loss or damage caused, or alleged to be caused, directly or indirectly by using the information in this book.

      Table of Contents

      Introduction

      Part 1 – Foundations

      Write To Influence

      Techniques That Influence

      Looks Matter

      The Mechanics Of Writing

      The Power System For Writing

      Part 2 - Application

      Writing Memos, Letters And Postings

      Writing E-Mails

      Writing Business Cases

      Writing Articles Or Newsletters

      Writing Procedures

      Connect With The Author

      Introduction

      Managers need to influence others through their written communications on a daily basis.

      The reality is that no matter how good you are at your job and how much you know about doing it well, those who communicate their management prowess through the written word and influence others will be more successful than those who don’t—or can’t.

      Their organizations will also be more successful, a fact that bodes well for the organization as well as your managerial development and promotion.

      In sum, to reach your full management potential, you must be able to communicate well via the written word and achieve results by influencing with those words.

      This book is the first step.

      Michel Theriault

      Part 1 - Foundations

      As a manager, you probably write every day. Whether it's a report, a memo or e-mails, the need to communicate via writing is a constant of the business world.

      Many managers know their writing could be better. They communicate by writing because they have to influence someone—but they have little time to analyze whether their written communications does the job it needs to do. That’s unfortunate. In reality, business managers do not need to be great writers. But they do need to be great communicators and influencers to have a positive impact on results.

      Unfortunately, most of the contemporary manager’s exposure to business writing in high school, college or university probably focused on the structure and mechanics of the writing process, not influence.

      This focus on structure and mechanics versus message and influence effectively devalues the quality of a communications piece. As long the as the structure is sound and there isn’t any spelling or grammatical errors, the piece works, right? Wrong. This approach misrepresents what communicating is meant to achieve. It treats the effectiveness of a communications piece as an extra instead of the main purpose.

      In fairness, structure and mechanics are particularly important in business communications. Well-constructed communications that follow accepted guidelines for headings, spacing and numbering systems, for example, are graphic signals of the professional care taken to put a document together. Similarly, appropriate grammar and spelling also indicate that a document is to be taken seriously.

      In sum, attention to structural and mechanical details demonstrates that a document was assembled with care because the writer wants its content to be taken seriously. That document, in other words, is designed to influence its readers. That gives a strategic function to your written communications because every single thing you communicate is truly meant to influence others.

      Once structure and mechanics are mastered, this concept of writing to influence is an area most managers should target for improvement. Consider the number of times you’ve written an e-mail and received only part of the response you want. Let’s say the receiver answered only some of the questions you posed or misunderstood certain points. Others may respond by peppering you with questions or denying your requests outright.

      Too many non-influential managers deem some action a step in the right direction. Others might lick their proverbial wounds and then, incredulously, will forward back essentially the same e-mail (expecting different results). The strategic manager seeks influence and wants his communication to generate the compliance and understanding he needs to take a particular action.

      This book helps managers develop a working strategy to improve their written communications.

      Write to Influence

      Don’t just communicate, influence with your writing.

      The skill of writing is to create a context in which other people can think. ~

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