Methods of Teaching Business Communication provides unique insights into how to teach your business communication or business writing course more easily and successfully.

Teach Your Students What to Do When Colleagues Don’t Read Anything They Write. Here Are 8 Ways to Change That.

"Long emails and dense, difficult to decipher memos mean modern office communication goes ignored more often than it’s understood. For over a decade, I taught college students how to communicate in professional settings. Every class began with a single, all-consuming thesis: “Nobody will ever want to read anything you write at work. Period.”

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How Jeff Bezos Turned Narrative into Amazon’s Competitive Advantage

"Bezos is Amazon's chief writing evangelist, and his advocacy for the art of long-form writing as a motivational tool and idea-generation technique has been ordering how people think and work at Amazon for the last two decades—most importantly, in how the company creates new ideas, how it shares them, and how it gets support for them from the wider world."

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Proofreading Checklist to Avoid “Oops!” Messages

"Below is my email proofreading checklist. Use it as a tool whenever your email contains details that must be correct."

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Writer’s Tool Kits: Just-in-Time Aids to Effective Writing

"In my area of specialization, better business writing, I often hear that people are doing a poor job of writing something. Maybe they can’t write good contracts or grant proposals or call reports."

"Well, the interesting thing is that right now I can’t write good contracts, grant proposals, or call reports either, and I teach writing.

"I know how to write well. I would be bored and frustrated if I were sent to more training. No, if writing any of those pieces were one of my key job responsibilities, there would be something lacking in my environment.

"What would be lacking are models and job aids. I don’t have a model contract, grant proposal, etc., to use as an example. Neither do I have any guidelines on how to write them. Nor do I have a series of steps to follow, a checklist, a template, or a resource person to call with questions. What I need is a writer’s tool kit."

Read the full article by Lynn Gaertner-Johnston (photo, left) ...

How to Write Mighty Thank-You Notes

"Beyond the professional rewards and social approval of writing thank-yous, sending thank-yous makes everyone smile: you, the writer, for having expressed your gratitude, and the recipient for being remembered and appreciated. Thank-yous help people feel valued."

"Below are tips to help you write mighty thank-yous that bring smiles to all. If you have others, please share them in the comments."

Read the full article by Lynn Gaertner-Johnston (photo, left) ...

The Human Side of Business Writing

"People need to hear from us often. They need thank-you messages for their hard work, creativity, and generosity. They enjoy congratulations for their achievements. They appreciate messages of condolence when illness or death touches their lives. This article shows how to write those messages."

Read the full article by Lynn Gaertner-Johnston (photo, left) ...
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