Practical training in writing from someone who knows his stuff!

Need to improve your team’s writing abilities? Require tightly written, clear proposals? Looking for briefing documents written with clarity and precision? Supervise people who cannot change their writing styles to cater for different audiences?

In short, are you spending too much time re-writing the work of others?

Training in writing is an effective, proven way of overcoming these problems. Training for groups of up to 15 is also cost-effective, can be completed in only one day and includes a purpose-written reference and training manual.

Furthermore, courses can be customised for specific requirements – whether that’s preparing website content or writing ministerial briefs.

Julian Edgar can provide that training.  The training is hands-on and practical. The skills gained on the day of training  can be immediately put into effect in the workplace.

Unlike many trainers who have limited real world experience in the fields in which they teach, Julian has wide job experience, including working in the Australian Public Service at Executive Level, contracting to major private companies to provide editing expertise, and working in the commercial media – both in web and print.

Julian’s training in writing occurs primarily in Canberra but courses can be run anywhere in Australia – he has recently facilitated courses in Canberra, Brisbane, Sydney, Melbourne and Adelaide.

Julian can be contacted directly or courses can be arranged through training providers Anne Jenkin and Associates or Acorn Training and Consulting.

Julian also trains at the Australian Public Service Commission in Canberra.

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Writing with clear simplicity

If you are to communicate effectively, you must use writing that has good readability. To put that another way, if people cannot understand what you write, then your writing has failed.

At the time of writing (August 2011), the Australian Federal Government has just sent a pamphlet to all Australians. Called ‘What a carbon price means for you’, it relates to a new government program.

The Introduction to the pamphlet is an excellent example of writing with clear simplicity to create good communication. Read more »

Strongly written arguments

I’ve written previously about structuring documents around Key arguments and Proofs (see here), but on a more general basis, how do you mount arguments that are persuasive and effective?

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Writing action emails

Many emails you write in government or business are ‘action emails’ – those where you are asking someone you supervise to perform a task or tasks.

Said like that it sounds quite straightforward but in fact many of the people I train have problems with this type of email.

What sort of problems then?

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How to remember what you read

In my training courses on reading, the most common question is: “How can I remember what I read?”

Variations include comments like: “I often read a whole page then stop and say to myself, gosh, what have I been reading? Often, I can’t remember!”

So how can you remember what you read? In many cases, it’s a case of unlearning bad habits, habits that have ‘got you through in the past’ but which are unsuited to your current work.

Let’s first take a look at some bad habits. Read more »

Reading with concentration

When reading at work, many people find it hard to concentrate.  

In my reading courses participants often don’t actually say that - instead they’ll say things like “I am easily distracted” or “I can’t remember what I read because I keep thinking of other things”.

So how can you concentrate in your work reading, so gaining the maximum amount of information in the shortest time?

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Don’t sweat the little stuff

In my government writing training sessions I often discuss passages of writing with the group.

For example, I’ll put up a PowerPoint slide that displays a piece of writing, and then we’ll analyse it. The ensuing discussion can incorporate many points that relate to good writing – aspects like sentence length, avoiding redundancies, using clear and simple words, using the active voice and so on.

But what often strikes me about the discussion is that often people have geared their minds to search just for unimportant mistakes in the writing. They miss the big picture, lose the wood for the trees, sweat on the trivial – well, you get the idea. Read more »

Structuring written arguments

….or how to write Minutes and respond to Selection Criteria!

Very often in formal business and government writing it’s required that you present an argument. For example, if you are recommending a course of action, it’s important that you mount a strong argument in support of that outcome. If you are addressing Selection Criteria in a job application, you must develop an argument that supports the notion that you are best for the job!

So what are some simple rules to follow – things you can immediately put into effect without ploughing through a whole book on the subject?

Here they are! Read more »

It’s not cheating!

In the speed reading classes that I facilitate, I get participants to perform a difficult exercise.  

They’re asked to look through a major article in Time magazine, one that they’ve never seen before. I set the stopwatch running and after 60 seconds, I ask them to close the magazine. The participants then have a few moments to write notes before they’re asked to describe to the whole group what the article was about.

Sometimes, as they close the magazine, people will say: “I just looked at the pictures and diagrams. So I cheated.”

That’s not cheating!

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Where in the sentence should I put the important point?

A lot of trainers in writing will tell you the following.

“The reader’s interest is highest at the beginning of the sentence and drops away as they keep reading.”

(This idea is shown by the red arrow in this diagram.)

“Therefore,” they go on, “you should always place the most important point first in the sentence.”

(Shown by the green arrow.)

I completely disagree with this – and in fact it’s quite easy to show why this idea is wrong. Read more »

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