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Providing a Framework for the Question A quick, spontaneous page or two, written without reference to any sort of self-censorship, will help a writer sort through conflicting issues or constituencies. This initial "treatment" serves some of the same constructive purpose as talking through a subject with an objective listener. When you read it over, you find, especially in your own resistance to spontaneity, those unresolved issues that may create confusion. You will also discover ideas or examples that reveal your own interest in the subject. This is particularly important when a question delivered to the writer under pressure is accepted as an ultimatum. Experienced writers shape questions so that the process of answering them will bring out their best energies. An initial treatment can give you a sense of the scope, scale, and style of the whole project, and a usable framework for generating the provisional thesis and because-clauses. Within the piece of writing, this framework, communicated explicitly to your reader, becomes a road map to your argument. Within the organization, this framework can become a new way of looking at the question.
Engaging Your Readers If you talk through a writing assignment with your intended reader, you may discover that he or she has been unable to frame the question adequately. Especially under pressure, people often don't know what they really want to know, or they have an imprecise conception of what writing can and cannot do to clarify or solve a problem. Successful managers and supervisors in organizations have the tenacity and experience to stick with projects from inception to implementation. But while they may understand that policies or products arise from false starts, dead ends, redefinitions, and endless revisions, they may not be aware that writing is the same sort of process. The QUICK WRITING PROCESS writer who has prepared and planned a writing project is in an excellent position to help the intended reader redefine his or her question. Such conversations enable writers and their readers to discover things they did not know about the issue, and about the way each sees the issue. They also discover how the project is important--its context. These discoveries sharpen the question and shape the design for the answer. As more and more people get a realistic sense of the value of authentic writing, and of how it is accomplished, they learn to frame questions more effectively, improving communication throughout the organization. QUICK WRITING PROCESS enables you to write well, on time; but under the pressures of organizational life, you have to engage others actively in the writing process, particularly those people who ask (or pay) you to write for them. A Community of Readers Where there is poor communication, there is not likely to be a habit of constructive feedback, of give and take about a piece of writing. Without the expectation of feedback, there is little impetus to improve writing. Writers in feedback-poor organizations withdraw from taking risks; eventually, thinking itself comes to be seen as a risk. Constructive Feedback Constructive feedback is different from "criticism." A person giving feedback is not expected to be an expert on style, or grammar, or even punctuation. He or she is simply expected to tell you how your writing "works." The importance of this distinction is worth exploring. A high school guidance counsellor was amazed when students brought in perfect drafts of their college application essays the day after they had discussed the rough drafts with him. "I don't get that kind of dedication out of my creative writing class," he said. I asked him to explain the difference between his teaching and his counselling. "I told them how their essays sounded, what I thought they had left out. I didn't mention grammar or spelling until the end. The important thing was for them to say what they really wanted to say because that's what the colleges are looking for." Student and counsellor could work together without the authoritarian pressure of the classroom on a genuine piece of writing that was worth the effort to improve. But in the process, the counsellor discovered the distinction between feedback and criticism. People criticize writing when they tell the writer what he or she has done wrong, what rules or conventions have been broken. A critic speaks as an authority, holding up an abstract although subjective (and perhaps inappropriate) ideal. But constructive feedback depends on listening for meaning, for interruptions in the flow of energy and in the clarity of the writer's voice. Criticism is an act performed by the critic without much regard for what comes after. Feedback, on the other hand, is a gift from the reader to the writer, with the intention of helping improve the writing process and product. Such an exchange is possible in an organizational setting, but it is hard to establish an atmosphere that permits it. Few people see themselves as good writers. Even fewer see themselves as knowledgeable about writing. They are eager to disqualify themselves as constructive readers. But feedback depends only on a reader's willingness to help the writer see his or her work from a fresh perspective. In a community of people willing to help each other with writing, feedback helps define the question, resolve a writing block, improve a roughly final draft, or polish the final copy. In such an atmosphere, too, group writing projects derive the benefits of different perspectives and skills. There is no surer way to improve writing in an organization than to create this atmosphere of constructive feedback. People come to expect it, and then to depend on it as a natural part of their writing process. In such an environment, energy and creativity flourish. Authentic Writing in Organizations I began Chapter 13 with the question: "What could be more exciting for a writer than discovering ideas and words that help people make decisions or take actions?" The few people who have this opportunity on a grand scale are usually well supported by staff and protected from pressure by hierarchy. But on a smaller scale, in our own daily opportunities to communicate, we can transform the task of writing what people may want to hear (which is usually far less than they need to know or we need to say), into a process of empowering ourselves and others to ask, to learn, and to say more. Organizational writing is harder to do well than most other kinds of writing. In addition to the ordinary work of preparing, planning, generating, and producing, you have to educate your reader about writing. You have to hold the line against any sort of pressure from the environment that impedes thinking, and then try to reach a specific audience. You need to develop your own voice, your own writing process in the midst of arbitrary or self-defeating pressures for homogenization and routinization. And you have to do the best you can with your own writing to inspire and invigorate the reading and writing of others. You may have to say "no" sometimes. You may have to acknowledge what you don't know, or haven't had time to find out. You may have to learn how some people mean what they say. You will have to help people understand what you have to say. Your work will then present an alternative to the common expectation of thin, dull, predictable writing, and your capacity to discuss ideas, talk through problems, and work with other people will reflect a more practical, more humane organizational style. QUICK WRITING PROCESS and the Uniform Writing Code Every piece of writing says something about its subject and about the possibility of authentic communication. Conscious writing that is carefully prepared, skillfully planned, freely generated, and energetically produced opens the channel for communication. If, in addition, you help clarify unrealistic expectations that either diminish or overwhelm the writing process and product, persuade others to discuss what good writing means, and apply steady pressure for constructive feedback, then you will contribute solidly to improving the environment.The more people talk about the writing they do in organizations, the more likely they are to overcome the self-defeating limitations of the uniform writing code. No one should be let off the hook. Good writing is hard work, made all the harder in an environment in which people are allowed to plead ignorance, or say they haven't the time, or that it isn't their job. Good writing requires good readers. Moreover, involving readers in this search for meaning is humanizing work. Part of the excitement in writing for others is this opportunity for authentic contact.Writing well under pressure in an organization means reuniting thoughts and words. It is a risky and difficult job. The goal may not always be the comfort of the reader. The capacity to write well is easily taken hostage under the pressure of a classroom, a profession, an organization, or a culture. People can be persuaded that they have no right to speak, that they should wait until they have the proper credentials, or that they ought to say only what others want to hear. They can be made to fear teachers, peers, supervisors, or colleagues. But what does "free speech" mean if we give only certain people the right to speak? |
