Writing Tips

• When writing consider the recipients. What do they know already? What can you tell them?
• Outline your memos and letters before beginning to write.
• When writing reports, summarize key points or conclusions on the first page and document them with more information on subsequent pages.
• Write like you speak to make your writing as readable as possible.
• Learn the writing style of your organization and follow it. Don’t use flowery language (many adjectives and verbs) when inappropriate.
• Have your secretary or assistant edit and proofread your correspondence for sentence structure and grammatical errors.
• Keep dictionary thesaurus on hand to check spelling and word usage.
• Use variety of sentence structures—simple, complex, and compound—to add interest to your writing.
• When writing for a non-ethical audience, have a non-technical person identify jargon. Then either eliminate it or include a glossary defining the terms.
• Use charts and tables wherever possible to present numerical information.
• Use “action verbs” to add punch to your message.
• Eliminate weak words like “very,” “interesting,” “often,” and other bland adjectives or adverbs.
• Keep paragraphs short. Make sure the content of a paragraph revolves around only one thought—the topic sentence.
• If you do a large amount of routine correspondence, standardize it as much as possible.
• If procrastination is a problem, start writing a rough draft early so you have time to reverse it at least once.
• When allocating blocks of time for writing, set aside periods of one to one-and-a-half hours, rather than trying to do it in segments of 5 to 15 minutes.
• Develop a flash card system to work in your own common misspellings.
• Dictate correspondence, memos, and so forth, to save time.
• Seek immediate and specific feedback on reports you write.
• Take a second or third look at your memos before sending them.
• Use a grammar checking software program on your computer to identify errors you frequently make, and use that feedback to focus your efforts to improve your writing.

My Consultancy–Asif J. Mir – Management Consultant–transforms organizations where people have the freedom to be creative, a place that brings out the best in everybody–an open, fair place where people have a sense that what they do matters. For details please visit www.asifjmir.com, and my Lectures.

Constitution of Service Sector

Service sector comprises following services:

Lodging Services

Hotels, rooming houses, and other lodging places

Sporting and recreation camps

Trailering parks and camp sites for transients

Personal Services

Laundries

Childcare

Linen supply

Shoe repair

Diaper service

Funeral homes

Carpet cleaning

Tax preparation

Photographic studios

Beauty shops

Health clubs

Business Services

Accounting

Exterminating

Agencies

Employment agencies

Collection agencies

Computer programming

Commercial photography

R&D labs

Commercial art

Secretarial services

Management services

Window cleaning

Public relations

Consulting

Detective agencies

Equipment rental

Interior design

Automotive Repair Services and Garages

Auto rental

Tire retreading

Truck rental

Exhaust system shops

Parking lots

Car washes

Paint shops

Transmission repair

Motion Picture Industry

Production

Theaters

Distribution

Drive-ins

Amusement and Recreation Services

Dance halls

Race tracks

Orchestras

Golf courses

Pool halls

Amusement parks

Carnivals

Fairs

Ice-skating rinks

Botanical gardens

Circuses

Swimming pools

Health Services

Physicians

Nursery care

Dentists

Medical labs

Chiropractors

Dental labs

Legal Services

Educational Services

Libraries

Correspondence schools

Schools

Data processing schools

Social Services

Child care

Family services

Job training

Non-commercial Museums, Art Galleries, and Botanical & Zoological Gardens

Selected Membership Organizations

Business associations

Civic associations

Financial Services

Banking

Investment firms

Insurance

Real estate agencies

Miscellaneous Repair Services

Radio and television

Welding

Watch

Sharpening

Reuphoistery

Septic tank cleaning

Architectural

Surveying

Engineering

Utilities

My Consultancy–Asif J. Mir – Management Consultant–transforms organizations where people have the freedom to be creative, a place that brings out the best in everybody–an open, fair place where people have a sense that what they do matters. For details please visit www.asifjmir.com, and my Lectures.

Public Relations (PR)

Public Relations is the management function that evaluates public attitudes, identifies the policies and procedures of an individual or an organization with the public interest, and executes a program of action to earn public understanding and acceptance. In other words a good public relations program has three steps:

1. Listen to the public: Public relations starts with good marketing research (evaluates public attitudes).
2. Develops policies and procedures that are in the public interest: One does not earn understanding by bombarding the public with propaganda; one earns understanding by having programs and practices in the public interest.
3. Inform people of the fact that you are being responsive to their needs: It is not enough to simply have programs that are in the public interest. You have to tell the public about those programs so that they know you are being responsive.

Publicity is one of the major functions of the public relations department. Publicity is any information about an individual, a product, or an organization that is distributed to the public through the media and that is not paid for, or controlled by, the sponsor.

Other activities include:

• Establishing contact with civic groups, consumer organizations, and other concerned citizens to learn their views of the organization, to answer their questions, and to provide information (or education).
• Opening lines of communication with customers, suppliers, distributors, retailers, stockholders, government agencies, educators, and community leaders.
• Conducting studies to find the economic, environmental, and social consequences of organizational practices and to learn how to make a more positive contribution to customers, stakeholders, and society.
• Providing any assistance needed to adjust the goals, policies, practices, personnel policies, products, and programs of the organization to meet the needs of changing markets.
• Assisting all members of the firm in developing effective programs of consumer information and education.
• Sending speakers to schools, clubs, and other such groups to maintain an open dialogue with students and other socially active members of society.
• Creating incentives for employees to participate in public-affairs activities such as raising funds for charitable groups.
• Answering consumer and other complaints promptly and correcting whatever it was that caused the complint.
• Training employees or volunteers to provide prompt, friendly, courteous, and helpful service to anyone who contacts the organization in person, by phone, or written correspondence.
• Demonstrating to society the organization is listening, reacting, adjusting, and progressing in its attempt to satisfy its diverse publics.
• Opening two-way communications with employees to generate favorable employee opinion and to motivate employees to speak well of the organization to others.

This is an incomplete description of all the activities and responsibilities of the PR people, but it at least gives some feeling for what they do.

My Consultancy–Asif J. Mir – Management Consultant–transforms organizations where people have the freedom to be creative, a place that brings out the best in everybody–an open, fair place where people have a sense that what they do matters. For details please visit www.asifjmir.com, and my Lectures.

 

Adopt Open Communication

To build trust and solid working relationships with employees and others in the organization, it’s important to be seen as someone who is committed to sharing information with others and who goes beyond communicating only what is necessary. Developing a climate in which you and your team are open with information—information exchanges between you and your people, between departments or divisions, and between team members—is critical in order to function effectively.

• Find out what your employees want to know.
• Encourage your staff to keep one another informed and share information.
• Establish a departmental bulletin board to keep people up-to-date on both personal and professional items of interest.
• Hold periodic staff meetyings to share information about recent developments in the organization.
• In staff meetings, encourage two-way communication, solicit agenda items from employees, and allow employees time to raise issues.
• For the purpose of informal communication, hold monthly breakfast meetings that have no agenda.
• Keep your manager and employees up-to-date by submitting a monthly activity report for your area.
• Alert your manager to possible implications of events occurring either inside or outside of the organization. Don’t assume that your manager is aware of these implications.
• Don’t “shoot the messenger” of bad news.
• Ask your manager which key people you should keep informed.
• List the key organizational people upon whom your success depends, and make a special effort to keep them informed.
• Copy your manager on all correspondence to managers in the organization at his or her level or higher level.
• Ask your manager about any perceived “surprises” in your area and then look for ways to avoid recurrences.
• Don’t gloss over anything that goes wrong in your area. Report the situation as accurately as possible.
• Talk with peers or people in other departments about “communication breakdowns.” Devise ways to avoid them.
• Always double check all written communications before mailing; also ask yourself, “Who else should know about this?”
• Use the “informal organization” as a way of keeping others informed. Wander around, have coffee with people, ask them questions, and so on.
• At the end of every day, ask yourself of what occurred that should be reported to other people.
• Return phone calls promptly.
• Make a point of updating the appropriate people even when nothing new has developed.
• Ask your secretary to suggest who should be copied on documents you produce.
• Appoint a “recorder” for the meetings you conduct and have the minutes distributed to the appropriate people.
• Promptly respond to notes, letters, and other requests so people know what you are doing about their communications.
• If they are available, use electronic aide (voice mail, email) to pass along information that doesn’t require face-to-face exchange when you cannot do so in person or in writing.

My Consultancy–Asif J. Mir – Management Consultant–transforms organizations where people have the freedom to be creative, a place that brings out the best in everybody–an open, fair place where people have a sense that what they do matters. For details please visit www.asifjmir.com, Line of Sight