Tone of what?

Over many decades now, the tone of voice used in business has altered to become increasingly informal. This of course is a reflection of general trends in business life and relationships, in how people address each other, and attitudes to authority. Unless we recognise these trends and respond to them in an appropriate way our style will seem dated to our audiences.

Paula La Rocque, one of the USA’s leading writing coaches says, “Accuracy aside, simplicity, clarity and brevity are the most important criteria for all writing.” I would endorse her approach and argue that clear, simple and direct informational writing can provide the bedrock for good communications skills.

The definition of a “tone of voice” or a personality for the writing often starts by identifying a couple of adjectives – engaging, passionate, fresh, professional, friendly are all favourites. This is fine as far as it goes, but actually we have to go further.

The style or tone that we are after is also defined by register (the level of formality), word choice and syntax. In addition, the purpose of the writing, the audience and medium used for communicating, all contribute to the tone.

While brand guidelines often define a tone – up to a point – organisations can find this a difficult aspect of branding to implement, and sometimes progress can be haphazard.

The tactics for implementing tone are actually grounded back in the whole area of audience awareness. We have to be ready to have a conversation with our audience – which means there are at least two people involved.

This entry was posted on 17th September 2009