CHAPTER 7 WRITING EMAILS, MEMOS, AND LETTERS

Selecting the Appropriate Media

Consider your audience, purpose, and context to select the appropriate media for messages.

Use email as a primary correspondence medium.

Choose texting and use chat programs for simple messages and brief exchanges.

Use printed and attached formal memos for workplaces without easy access to email.

Choose business letters for formal correspondence outside an organization.

Using Professional Style and Tone

Focus on a positive relationship and professional image.

Choose a writing style appropriate to the topic and audience.

Use goodwill and the you viewpoint.

Structuring Effective Messages

Use the direct pattern for goodwill and positive messages:

Main point or good news

Explanation of details or facts

Goodwill closing

Use the indirect pattern for some negative messages:

Context (or buffer)

Explanation or details

Bad news or negative message

Goodwill closing

Organize your ideas into an opening, a body, and a closing.

Developing Clarity and Emphasis

Develop thoughts adequately to be clear for the reader.

Use lists for emphasizing main points without overusing them.

Consider headings for long messages to segment subtopics.

Write a subject line that is complete and helpful, yet concise.

Managing Your Email and Protocol

Follow your organizations confidentiality policies.

Use an appropriate and clear writing style that conveys a professional image.

Maintain professionalism in your messages.

Consider the format and design needs of email messages.

Create an appropriate salutation, closing, and signature block.

Manage your email by prioritizing, using folders, and reviewing messages.

Observe business protocol for ranking recipients and copying messages.

Sending Text and Chat Messages

Use text messaging for simple messages for those coworkers in nontraditional workplaces.

Keep text messages brief and include only appropriate attachments.

Use instant messaging and chat messaging for real-time exchanges between participants.

Use only abbreviations your recipients understand.

Maintain accurate and current contact lists.

Designing Print and Attached Memos

Use an appropriate organizational format.

Determine if the memo should be printed or attached to a cover email.

Include a continuing page header, if needed.

Designing Business Letters

Determine if a letter printed on organizational letterhead is appropriate.

Follow the letter format appropriate to the context or required by your employer.

Prepare a heading or use printed letterhead.

Provide an inside address, an appropriate salutation, a body, and a complimentary close.

Add your signature block and end notations below the complimentary close.

Include a continuing page header, if needed.

Designing Business Letters

Determine if a letter printed on organizational letterhead is appropriate.

Follow the letter format appropriate to the context or required by your employer.

Prepare a heading or use printed letterhead.

Provide an inside address, an appropriate salutation, a body, and a complimentary close.

Add your signature block and end notations below the complimentary close.

Include a continuing page header, if needed.

Meeting the Deadline: The Time-Sensitive Message

Make sure that you understand the assignment.

Gather pertinent background information.

Organize your major points into a sequence that makes sense.

Write the draft quickly, covering only one subject in each paragraph.

Polish the draft focus on content and organization before revising at the sentence and word level.

• Your overall reaction to what you read in the chapter 7
• Any experience or connections you have with the focus of the chapter
• Your main takeaway from the chapter