Improving the Quality of Writing in the Workplace

Abstract

Despite the increased emphasis on teaching writing skills in both preprofessional courses and in-house seminars, practicing professionals still have difficulty conveying their ideas clearly and concisely to others in writing. To identify ways in which managers can develop and reinforce sound writing practices in the workplace, the practices used by a school district's central office were analyzed. The findings suggest that managers can improve the quality of writing in the workplace by creating an open communication environment and by developing a corporate culture that establishes sound writing practices as the norm. Establishing such a norm requires skill development, leadership commitment, modeling behavior, feedback, and recognition and reward. Managers can also improve quality by reducing the quantity of the writing both they and their subordinates do. The findings suggest that a top-down process of training may be more effective than the bottom-up system currently used for training in writing.