Improve Your Communication Skills, 2nd Edition

• designing the document; 
• writing a first draft; 
• editing the draft. 
( c) 2011 Kogan Page L imited, All Rights Reserved.

---

138 Improve your Communication Skills
Try to keep the stages separate. If you can take breaks between 
them, so much the better. It can also be useful to ask a colleague 
for help at each stage. 
In this chapter, we look at these three stages and explore the 
key issues in each. Many of the techniques will already be 
familiar to you. The idea of delivering a single message, SPQR 
(situation–problem–question–response) and using a pyramid 
structure for organising information, all have a place in writing 
well. 
Designing the document 
We can break planning a document into five stages: 
• goal orientation; 
• readership analysis; 
• creating a message; 
• organising information; 
• constructing an outline. 
Goal orientation 
Start by identifying the purpose of your document. Distinguish 
between the document’s purpose and its subject. Whatever
you are writing about, you must be clear what you want to 
achieve. 
Make your purpose as specific as possible. Take care not to 
create a purpose that is inappropriate. For example, documents 
cannot analyse or evaluate. These are thinking processes. The 
document will display the product of your thinking. It can’t do 
the thinking! 
( c) 2011 Kogan Page L imited, All Rights Reserved.

---

139 Putting it in Writing
What do you want the reader to do as a result of reading the 
document? Functional documents demand action and deliver 
information to help achieve it. Identify the action you want the 
reader to take and you will be better placed to provide the 
information that will help them take it.