The Red Jacket Diaries blog

Sue Horner is a freelance writer in Oakville, Ontario, who blogs about writing, newsletters, communications and running an independent business in The Red Jacket Diaries blog.

Say what you mean

(I posted this earlier today, but a hard drive failure on the server hosting my site washed it away. So apologies if it shows up twice. To make up, I’ve added two bonus errors!) We all make mistakes, but in this business, you need to work hard to keep the error...
Straw to gold in 5 steps

Straw to gold in 5 steps

Last week, I was juggling several different articles for two different employee publications. One somewhat daunting piece started off with three interviews, four people to quote and three pages of notes. I had 1,500 words to boil down into 500, a process I like to...

Overcoming the solo proprieter blues

Being a solo communicator can be lonely. Les Potter, ABC, communications guru and visiting instructor at Towson University, once blogged about the loneliness of the solo communicator and the importance of regular social interaction with fellow professionals. He quoted...

The scream

If I have to write about another “enterprise-wide end-to-end process” or “methodology,” I may scream. The good thing is, in a home office, there are few in earshot to hear the noise. You’ll be glad to know I am working hard to not include...

Joining the scrum

Is this a new HR term? I’m talking about “scrum” as a way of describing a manager (sorry, “leader,” as this particular client now calls the management level)/employee communications session. The old use of scrum relates to rugby....

Splitting hairs

So IABC has renamed their annual international conference. It’s now going to be called the “world conference,” to “better reflect the organization’s global reach and mission.” Um, sounds like pretty much the same thing to...