ABSTRACT

Before you reach for a pen or limber up your keyboarding fingers, take a step back and think: is this message one that will benefit from the media advantages of writing? Am I the one who should be writing this, or might it be more effective if written by (or at least signed by) someone else? Is this a good time to distribute this written message? These questions may sound simplistic and their answers may be obvious, but many a written missive has missed its target or generated an unexpected reaction because its writer didn’t take the time to think it through. This chapter gives you guidelines for systematically considering media, source, and timing issues using the second step in the Straight Talk Writing Model.