BookYol

Concept

Write for the Reader

Writing for the reader means shaping every message for one specific person and what they already know, rather than for yourself, the only reader who already understands everything you meant.

Most unclear messages aren't badly written. They're aimed at the wrong person: the writer. While you draft, the reader in your head knows exactly what you know, including the project history, the acronyms and why the deadline moved. That reader doesn't exist. Everyone else receives a message full of gaps you can't see, because your own knowledge quietly fills them in. Psychologists call this the curse of knowledge, and good grammar doesn't cure it. Readers won't fill the gaps for you. They guess wrong or stop reading. The fix is a decision made before the first sentence: who exactly is reading, and what do they already have? Naming one person, not “the team” or “stakeholders”, shows you which context is missing and which detail is noise. A message works when that person can act on it without writing back to ask what you meant.

A real-life example

Maya, a product lead, emails the finance director: “Q3 rollout slipped on the SSO dependency; need sign-off on the revised budget by Friday.” To Maya, it's complete. The director doesn't know what SSO is, which rollout this is, or what changed in the budget. Rewritten for her: “The login system from our IT vendor arrived six weeks late, so launch moves to November and costs rise by €12,000. Approving by Friday protects the new date.”

How to use it

  1. 1Before you draft, write one name at the top: the actual person who will read this first. If it goes to a group, pick the reader with the least context.
  2. 2Split what that person already knows from what they don't, including the history, the terms and the decision you need from them. Everything on the second list has to appear in the message, or it stays a hole.
  3. 3Reread the draft as that person. Mark every acronym, every “as discussed” and every reference to a conversation they weren't part of. Then explain it or cut it.