 but it all could have come tumbling down in the stern and unyielding face of just one lecturer ros petelin like most kids who gravitated toward the arts in school id been feted as a bit of a writer i wrote installments of unreasonably sappy romance novels late at night and distributed copies to peers on the train the next morning i won an academic scholarship for my writing although nearly lost it many times for my maths it was left to ros now an associate professor in the school of english media studies and art history at uq and a well respected writer in business communication to tear my self made kingdom down word by word until i could rebuild it on more solid foundations heres what i now know to be true about writing effective business words thanks ros i hope youre grading more kindly these days trick 1 talk like your audience if youre writing for your business forget formal words and dot allow fear of failure or grammar to stop you writing instead a trick ive long used in business writing is to hear a typical customers voice in my head and then to write like they talk like acting the craft of writing involves immersing yourself in the character in this case the character is your customer and by sounding like them youre more likely to draw them in trick 2 wirmi i have ros and her fondness for us author linda flowers to thank for wirmi the acronym what i really mean i is extraordinarily helpful in bringing clarity to business writing and is a tool i still use daily you can use wirmi as a catchphrase at any point of your writing when youre trying to work out exactly what you want to say and when youve written something and you need to ensure it says what you want clearly and well if youre not comfortable with writing and plenty of people would rather line up for a root canal than write an essay this is a great way to check youre on track trick 3 so nice you read it thrice finally if youre satisfied that what youve written is the best you can do read it through once more and then put it down after a few hours or a few days if you have the time pick it up and critically read it again make a few adjustments delete a few words then hide it again on the third go after another break pretend youre the customer and read it aloud to yourself as though youre seeing it for the first time if you have no more changes to make to it is good to go but chances are youll think of a few why at least three reads professional writers and editors know better than anyone that great writing comes from multiple drafts not a single session of inspiration taking a break in between drafts although hard to do in a busy work day can be the key to achieving great results 