by Sue Horner | Jun 28, 2019 | The Red Jacket Diaries blog
One way to help people understood something is get to the point. Don’t bury your information in too much detail, ramble, or hide the action with passive language. While falling down the rabbit hole of internet links one day, I happened upon an article from 2015 that...
by Sue Horner | Jun 20, 2019 | The Red Jacket Diaries blog
Having been on the outside of company employee communication for many years, I’ve recently gone looking for the current “inside” view. The June issue of my newsletter, Wordnerdery, continues a series where I report the results. In this issue, I continue to look at...
by Sue Horner | Jun 13, 2019 | The Red Jacket Diaries blog
When it comes to your workplace communication strategy, don’t expect one channel to rule them all. The best bet for success is an approach that mixes up email, a mobile app, social media, face-to-face, intranet and whatever other channels are available. That was the...
by Sue Horner | Jun 6, 2019 | The Red Jacket Diaries blog
Wayne State University in Detroit aims to bring back words “worthy of retrieval from the linguistic closet.” (What a great line!) Thus its Word Warriors produce a list each year of some of the English language’s “most expressive — yet regrettably neglected — words.”...
by Sue Horner | May 30, 2019 | The Red Jacket Diaries blog
“Solopreneurs” may think we have to clone ourselves to take on more business. We can’t, but that’s the wrong approach anyway. Instead, we should partner with others to create a diverse team with varied skills and experience, which allows us to take on more business...
by Sue Horner | May 22, 2019 | The Red Jacket Diaries blog
Having been on the outside of company employee communication for many years, I’ve recently gone looking for the current “inside” view. The May issue of my newsletter, Wordnerdery, starts a series where I report the results, starting with one perspective on...
by Sue Horner | May 16, 2019 | The Red Jacket Diaries blog
Print can be expensive, so I understand that Costco will no longer send their printed Costco Connection magazine to lower-tier members like me. After all, their stated mission is “to continually provide our members with quality goods and services at the lowest...
by Sue Horner | May 9, 2019 | The Red Jacket Diaries blog
With the data from 350 million internal emails in PoliteMail’s 2018 Benchmark Report, Michael DesRochers has a good idea of what encourages employees to read them. Michael is Managing Director of PoliteMail, which helps companies measure and improve email broadcasts...
by Sue Horner | May 1, 2019 | The Red Jacket Diaries blog
My husband and I have never taken a cruise, but somehow we’re on a mailing list that leads to regular promotions for ocean and river adventures. We also get frequent invitations to events where we can get more details. Finally, we accepted one, and set off to learn...
by Sue Horner | Apr 25, 2019 | The Red Jacket Diaries blog
Do you want to explain something, clear up confusion, make a point or reflect or spark emotion? Reach for what I call expressive language (AKA figurative writing), which is a memorable way of showing rather than telling. For example, Oxford Dictionaries describes...
