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- Hate to Write? 3 Ways to Start Enjoying It
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- Six Tips for Writing in Easy Reading Season
- 12 Ways to Plug the Email Productivity Drain
- Two Questions to Ask Before You Start Writing
- 6 Ways to Aim Your Arrow for the Heart
- 6 Ways to Become an Idea Machine
- 3 Reasons Why You Need to Improve Your Writing Skills
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Posts Tagged ‘collaboration’
Those people who drive you crazy with big words and long emails are not my reading my book, Write Like You Talk Only Better. If they were, it would be on all the best-seller lists.
I expect many are not motivated enough to read a book that will smooth the writing process, from routine emails to complex business plans, let alone to practice with the worksheets. But some of the employers I’ve talked to would like that to change now that engagement and collaboration have become serious issues beyond the communication department. That’s why I call my new e-learning program Writing is Serious Business.
To collaborate, their people need to pull out ideas and express them clearly. To engage, they need their writing to bring them closer to people. To look smart, they need to stop making the common mistakes that spell check does not catch. To improve productivity, they need to write faster and tighter.
The 14 five-minute segments each continue with an assignment based on what they’re writing that day. This way, busy people can fit learning into their schedule and immediately understand how it applies.
To track their progress, they are encouraged to run their writing through standard reading ease tests and evaluate their improvement against specific benchmarks. Every time they complete an assignment or show improvement, they can award themselves an iWrite star.
Here’s what Writing is Serious Business entails:
Think first
Who’s talking to who?
What about?
Write like you talk
Hook your reader
Big finish
Just write
Write better
Memorable
Concise
Look smart
The two common flubs
Professional, consistent
Stand out
Tell your story
More Hollywood techniques
More media
Keep improving
After learners have consumed the bite-sized pieces, they can return to the segments they’d like to review. Or they can practice with the worksheets that go with the book.
Some of this could change, for the better, as I’m testing the program with two organizations before the big launch. I’m also working with adult educator Lee Weisser, previously with the Canadian Society for Training and Development.
For more feedback, I’ll post the introduction here soon. Stay tuned.
When people talk about social media, they often refer to its most personal form, Facebook. But yesterday at the Webcom 2010 conference I realized that the profound business purpose of the many forms of social media is collaboration that leads to innovation.
When Walton Smith of consultant Booz Allen Hamilton gave us a glimpse of his knowledge management system, Hello, I realized how I had honed the mindset for working online with other people by updating my Facebook status, following links on Twitter, bookmarking on Delicious, debating on Linkedin groups, voting on Digg, writing this blog and my other online social interaction.
Some of my clients are moving toward tools like Sharepoint and Hello, but not fast enough for me–or their business.
I’ve been sold on collaboration ever since I heard Don Tapscott talk about his book Wikinomics a few years ago. Yesterday, I added his new book, Macrowikinomics, to my reading list. Don is still talking about the profound structural change our society is undergoing, which we’ve been hearing about for more than 30 years in books like Future Shock . While I sometimes feel overwhelmed by all the changes we’ve experienced in those years, more often I wish that the world was turning faster.
Companies struggling to climb out of the recession or seeking to compete more effectively in the shifting sands of world trade really need to grab on to collaborative tools. As Helix founder Dr. Cindy Gordon pointed out, collaboration is fostering innovation at companies like Cisco, IBM and Accenture. Their leaders appreciate the need fresh ideas and critical thinking from everyone in their organization, not just an isolated cadre of C-suiters.
Of course many people will be reluctant to speak up, until they see that their ideas are acknowledged, seriously considered by their peers and often acted on. What’s more, they must trust each other.
I think they also need access at work to Facebook and other social media that foster the collaborative spirit. As Shel Holtz said yesterday, employees need breaks to refresh, especially those who work long hours, deeply concentrate or are tethered to smart phones 24/7. A growing number enjoy Facebook. in the same way that people make personal phone calls or chat around the water cooler.
But there’s more to it. Many of the speakers gave examples of companies using social media to launch products, conduct research or defend themselves from criticism. But the most compelling business reason I heard for web 2.0 is to bring people together to become smarter, stronger organizations through collaboration.