Posted: 11th May 2015
Our personality is our distinct personal character. We may be funny, serious, precise, laid back, irreverent, quirky, fastidious, sensible, bossy or reticent, warm, friendly, cool and calculated. We may hesitate to bring these traits into our writing because we fear we may look unprofessional. Much of the writing we are taught to do in school or college tends towards removing these personality traits so that we produce work that is ‘objective’ or ‘professional’. An informal style is often discouraged. Can you remember letter writing exercises that encouraged you to produce work like this?
Would you ever go up to someone in person and speak like that? It sounds as if the person writing it is a grouchy, pedantic fuss pot. The language is formal, stilted and slightly archaic.
People who aren’t very confident about writing sometimes feel that using more formal language will make them look more intelligent. This is misguided in business writing.
Just as we might put on a power suit to give us confidence, sometimes we adopt corporate language to make us seem more important or knowledgeable than we are. If you are a management consultant you might be forgiven for doing this, but for most other businesses, corporate language is a barrier to communication rather than a help. What do I mean by corporate language?
The aforesaid objective of the XPNT project is to review and assess the output of the research undertaken by the ABC company, which analysed responses from 6500 participants in the sample. The sample represents consumers in the targeted regional area, which was judged to have the greatest capacity for increased purchases of foods in this sector.
This kind of writing does have a place, but it doesn’t attract and engage customers. Again, any individual personality has been squeezed out of it.
In business people ultimately do business with other people. People buy from people they like. If you have a small business, even if you dream of one day having a large business, you can improve response rates to your business publicity material by injecting some personality into it.
Your personality – your character traits we mentioned – are likely to be key to your success. If you are a graphic designer, being laid back and irreverent is going to be an asset. If you are a physiotherapist, a bit of bossiness doesn’t go amiss (bossy people are attracted to physio!). If you are producing and selling food, a warm and friendly personality will go down well.
One of the simplest ways to get started is to speak about the topic you want to write about. Ideally get a friend or colleague to ask you questions about the subject and record the conversation (this can be done with e.g. the iPhone or you can buy a low cost recording device. Then get the recording transcribed (there are plenty of transcription services out there if you don’t want to do this yourself).
Once you’ve got the conversation written down, you can take out the ‘ums’ and ‘aaahs’ and you will have a piece of writing that not only shows your personality but also conveys your passion and enthusiasm.
Another obvious way is to write more. Find time to write a blog or some articles, it will give you an opportunity to practice your writing and find your own style.
Another device is to write as if you were writing to an aunt or uncle. Choosing that type of relative will avoid the over familiarity you might use with a friend or partner but still has the required warmth and informality. Try it, it will change the way you write.
Twitter is a micro blogging platform where each entry can only be 148 characters long. Using Twitter can really help you develop your personal writing voice. It’s free to sign up. Go and lurk there for a while and see how Twitter is used. The discipline of framing your thoughts in so few characters forces you to focus on the essence of what you want to say.
Consistency is important, so if you begin to bring more personality to your business writing in one area e.g. your website, then make that change across all your material. If you are very formal in your letters but informal on your website, you will confuse your readers.
Everywhere – from a 60 second pitch in a networking meeting to the posters on your farmers’ market stall. Developing a personal voice in business is linked to confidence. The more confident you feel about yourself and your business, the more you can step away from overly an ‘corporate’ or ‘formal’ style and the more you can engage at a human level.
Remember that people buy from people. If you have a big personality don’t hide it away behind corporate speak. If your personality takes a little coaxing to come out, try recording your conversations. You’ll hear your enthusiasm build.
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