3 Industries That Most Need Business Writing Training Workshops
Would you understand what this writer meant in response to your query to a software company?
The Desktop Bios is a little different from F10 to get into the BIOS screen, for laptops… hit the BLUE button to get into the BIOS screen, then F1. Storage/Storage Option/SATA emulation to IDE mode. Storage/Boot order/Under Legacy boot sources, highlight USB Hard drive and bump it up one line. Security/System Security/Data Execution Prevention… change to “disable.” Advanced/power on options/ change “after power loss… change to “on.” F10 to save changes.
That gem is from a real e-mail I have received.
Nurturing client relationships is a special challenge in software/tech services, finance, and biotech because of the “in-language” each uses. If you’re a leader in one of these companies, business writing training workshops can serve you the way those busy ice sweepers do in the sport of curling, constantly sweeping the ice before the gliding stones. You need to smooth every inch of the distance between your talent’s writing and clients’ understanding.
Your rewards: better interface with clients, faster review efficiency, and shortened feedback time.
Let’s talk about each industry—and some solutions each of them could use.
Financial industry: you eat complex technical information for breakfast
The challenge: You speak finance/banking, but unless your CFO is a remarkable communicator, your talent probably does not have great communications modeling to follow. Imagine, then, how customers respond when proposals and presentations are statistics-heavy, vague on the meaning of the data, and peppered with terms that only financial leaders use.
The solution: In a targeted business writing training workshop, your talent can learn the power of using relatable examples and reader-centered writing. They will learn that their readers are looking for insight, not arcane, formal “insider” language. Insight often comes in the form of a simile or metaphor: think of the term “housing bubble.” “Bubble” gave us the picture: a soap bubble filling with air and optimism, but vulnerable to complete collapse when the surface tension broke.
Your special challenge is that your talent writes across all time zones, every day, to people with a range of cultural and language backgrounds. In a business writing training workshop, they can learn how to generate “Aha” moments among all their readers, no matter how complex the issue.
Software/tech services: you have more acronyms than the Pentagon
The challenge: Stumbling over unfamiliar jargon or acronyms can make your audience stop reading. No one wants to admit they’re confused by software or tech terms, but it happens to laypeople all the time. Your field is expanding, and the rest of us cannot keep up with the insider language shifts.
The solution: Your talent can learn to be reader-centered. For example, is the map of a complex process anything like a hiking trail through challenging terrain? Use that to tell us how your software simplifies the process. We can imagine hiking, which becomes the mental bridge to comprehending your message.
We need the big picture. How will our work lives be different if we engage your services? An excellent business writing training workshop can help your writers focused on readers and not get lost in the jargony weeds. Just ask anyone who has attended our Creating Powerful Presentations™ or Reader-Centered Technical Writing™ workshops.
Biotech industry: You often need to invent new words for what you do
You have enormous impact on 21st-century life. To have impact on customers, though, you need e-mails and other written communications that they can understand.
The challenge: Biotech has a highly specialized vocabulary, but you must explain what you do without needing to provide a glossary. To take action, your customers will need a streamlined summary of unfolding events and possibilities in your field of knowledge.
The solution: Do you remember the reference to the ice sweepers in the sport of curling from my opening? That is an example of using a strong visual image to explain a complex process. Your writers can learn to do that. We can teach them. Those brooms used in curling alter the state of the ice in front of the gliding stones. It’s a good analogy for what clear, reader-centered writing can do.
If you are in one of these three industries, you have particular needs for high-quality, high-impact, fast and clear writing. We can get you there with tailored business writing training workshops. Alter the state of the ice. Get everything that impedes understanding out of the way so you can connect with your clients.
