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Tables of Contents for The Complete Idiot's Almanac of Business Letters and Memos
Chapter/Section Title
Page #
Page Count
Part 1: The Business of Business Writing
1
24
1 A Memo Is Just a Memo--or Is It?
3
6
The Characteristics of Greatness
4
2
Grab the Reader's Attention
4
1
Make a Recommendation or Ask for Action
4
1
Support Your Position
5
1
Mention Next Steps and Deadlines
5
1
Strive for Greatness
6
1
The Importance of Written Communication Skills
6
1
What People Mean by "Communication Skills"
6
2
Put Mutual Interests First
7
1
Make the Message Clear
7
1
Show Sensitivity to Others' Feelings
8
1
The Reader Is King
8
1
The Least You Need to Know
8
1
2 What's This Supposed to Mean?!
9
6
What's Your Problem and What Can You Do?
10
1
Problem: "I Hate to Write"
10
1
What Can You Do?
10
1
Problem: "I Was Never Good in English"
11
1
What Can You Do?
11
1
Problem: "I Have No Time"
11
1
What Can You Do?
11
1
Problem: "I Have No `Style'"
12
1
What Can You Do?
12
1
Problem: "I Don't Write Well and Others Do It Better"
12
1
What Can You Do?
12
1
Assessing Your Business Writing Skills
13
1
Where We Go from Here
14
1
The Least You Need to Know
14
1
3 The Right Tool for the Writing Situation
15
10
What's the Difference Between Letters and Memos?
15
1
Letters: Professional, Yet Personal
16
2
Memos: A Bit More Official
18
4
Using the "CC" to Get Action
19
1
Memos to the File: A Record-Keeping Tool
19
1
Handwritten Notes: Very Personal, Very Proper
22
1
E-Mail: Fast, but Loose
23
1
When to Write
23
1
When to Use a Letter and When to Use a Memo
23
1
The Least You Need to Know
24
1
Part 2: Writing: It's Easier Than You Think (So Please Relax)
25
66
4 Three Easy Steps to Eloquence
27
6
Step One: Plan (Decide What to Say)
28
1
How Planning Helps You
28
1
Step Two: Draft (Say It)
28
1
Step Three: Edit (Improve the Way You Said It)
29
1
The Benefits of Three Steps
29
2
Run Around the Block
30
1
Overcoming Resistance to the Three-Step Process
31
1
Budgeting Your Writing Time
31
1
Break It Into Thirds
32
1
As Easy as One-Two-Three
32
1
The Least You Need to Know
32
1
5 Step One-Know Where You're Going and Who You're Taking with You
33
12
An Exercise in Pointlessness
33
2
What's the Problem?
35
1
To Make a Point, You Must Have a Point
36
2
Reader Analysis
38
1
How Can I Help the Reader?
38
1
How to Establish Credibility
39
1
Do Your Homework
39
1
Getting Ideas and Getting Them Organized
40
1
Generating Ideas
40
2
The Brainstorming Technique
40
1
Creating a Brainstorm
41
1
Try It Now!
41
1
Question Yourself
42
1
Getting Organized
42
1
Sequencing: First the Good News, then the Bad News
43
1
Plan Your Work and Work Your Plan
44
1
The Least You Need to Know
44
1
6 Step Two--Get Those Fingers Moving
45
8
How Do I Follow a Plan?
45
1
One Idea Per Paragraph
46
1
The Topic of Topic Sentences
46
2
What's So Terrific About Topic Sentences?
48
1
Building Paragraphs, Sentence by Sentence
48
2
Keep Writing
48
1
A Few Words on Sentence Length
49
1
How Long Is Too Long?
49
1
What About Paragraph Length?
50
1
Paragraph Length Guidelines
50
1
Putting the Reader in the Picture
50
2
Say "You"
51
1
"Well, Jim..."
51
1
The Secret to Writing Quickly
52
1
The Least You Need to Know
52
1
7 Step Three--Fast Fixes and Quick Repairs
53
10
Leave It Alone
53
1
Finding What Needs Fixing
54
4
He Used a Plan--What Happened?
56
1
Fixing Poor Organization
56
1
Fixing Vagueness and Lack of Clarity
57
1
Fixing Wordiness
57
1
Put Your Writing on a Diet
58
2
Cut Down on Bothersome Phrases
59
1
Eliminate Redundancy
59
1
Compress Modifying Statements
59
1
Editing the Easy Way
60
1
The Least You Need to Know
61
2
8 What About Format?
63
10
Great First Impressions
63
3
Formatting Tools that Work
66
1
How Long Is Too Long?
67
2
How to Shorten Long Memos
68
1
Using Attachments
68
1
Other Formatting Tools
69
2
Charts
69
1
Boxes and Callouts
70
1
Form the Good Format Habit
71
1
The Least You Need to Know
71
2
9 Where the %&@# Do the Commas Go?
73
8
What's It All About?
73
1
What Will People Think?
74
1
Comma, Comma, Comma
74
1
Colons: When Should You Use Them?
75
1
Don't Fear the Semicolon; Instead, Learn to Use It
75
1
The Apostrophe's Uses
76
1
I Say, "Learn How to Use Quotation Marks."
77
1
The Hyphen Is a First-Rate Helper
77
1
Dashes--How Dashing!
78
1
Parentheses Work Together (and Travel in Pairs)
78
1
Wow! The Exclamation Mark
79
1
That's About It (Period)?
79
1
The Least You Need to Know
79
2
10 When They're Looking Over Your Shoulder
81
10
Situations When You Write for Others
81
2
Writing for Bosses
82
1
Writing for a Committee
82
1
Specific Problems in Writing for Others
83
1
Six Steps to Writing It Right for Others
83
6
Understand the Goal and the Message
83
1
Analyze the Audience
84
1
Get Ideas--and Agreement--on Paper
84
2
Write Alone
86
1
Get and Enter All Edits
86
2
Get Final Sign-Off
88
1
Six Steps to Sanity
89
1
Editing Someone Else's Work
89
1
The Least You Need to Know
90
1
Part 3: Taming the Wild and Wooly Memo
91
46
11 Put Your Personality on Paper
93
12
What Is Style?
93
2
Shouldn't We Write Just the Way We Talk?
95
1
Choosing the Right Style
95
1
Let's Get Stylish
96
6
Your Approach to the Material
96
1
How You Address the Reader
97
1
Word Choice and Sentence Structure
98
2
Using Active Voice
100
1
Changing Passive Voice to Active Voice
101
1
When to Use Passive Voice
102
1
Don't Be Tone-Deaf
102
1
Say It with Style
103
1
The Least You Need to Know
103
2
12 Nail Down the Basics
105
14
Grammar Matters
105
1
The Parts of Speech
106
1
Fixing the Most Common Errors
107
4
Dangling Modifiers
108
1
The Fixes
108
1
Lack of Parallelism
108
1
The Fixes
109
1
Faulty Comparison
109
1
The Fixes
109
1
Unclear Pronoun Reference
109
1
The Fixes
110
1
Incorrect Pronoun Case
110
1
The Fixes
110
1
Common Mistakes in Word Usage
111
6
Affect and Effect
111
1
All, Each
111
1
As
111
1
As Such
111
1
Assure, Ensure, Insure
112
1
Bad, Badly
112
1
Can and May
112
1
Cannot
112
1
Continual and Continuous
112
1
Center Around
112
1
Compare with, Compare to
113
1
Complement, Compliment
113
1
Data
113
1
Decades
113
1
Discrete, Discreet
113
1
e.g and i.e
114
1
Etc.
114
1
Fewer, Less
114
1
Former, Latter
114
1
Good, Well
115
1
Imply, Infer
115
1
Irregardless
115
1
Its, It's
115
1
Lay, Lie
115
1
Numbers
115
1
Principal, Principle
116
1
Reason Is Because
116
1
Regards, Regard
116
1
Seasons
116
1
Stationary, Stationery
117
1
Time
117
1
Their, They're
117
1
Very
117
1
Your, You're
117
1
Avoiding Jargon and Buzzwords
117
2
The Best Source for More Help
118
1
The Least You Need to Know
118
1
13 How It Looks Is How You Look
119
18
Neatness Counts
119
1
The Professional Look
120
1
Getting Rid of Mistakes
120
2
Choosing the Right Format
122
13
Accepted Closings
125
4
Page Numbers for Letters and Memos
129
1
Marginal Thinking
129
1
Customary Layout of Extra Information
130
3
Letterhead and Stationery
133
1
Print Quality
134
1
Looking Good
135
1
The Least You Need to Know
135
2
Part 4: What Should I Write and When Should I Write It?
137
150
14 Asking for Action So People Will Act
139
10
What Do You Want Done?
139
1
Simple Requests
140
4
Complex Requests
144
1
How to Be Persuasive
144
2
Using Threats
146
2
Follow-Up Strategies for Requests
148
1
An Outline for Requests
148
1
The Least You Need to Know
148
1
15 Announcements That Get the Word Out
149
14
What's New?
149
1
Good Timing
150
1
People Come, People Go, People Get Promoted
151
1
When Someone Joins the Organization
151
1
When Someone Leaves
151
1
When Someone Is Promoted
153
2
Announcing Organizational Changes
155
2
Announcements for Special Events
157
1
Recurrent Scheduled Events
157
1
Announcing Structural Changes
157
2
Announcements Regarding News Events
159
2
An Outline for Announcements
161
1
The Least You Need to Know
161
2
16 Writing Up Poor Performance
163
10
When Should You Write a Reprimand?
164
1
The Role of the Human Resources Department
164
1
Focus on the Problem
165
2
Begin Planning Early
165
2
An Outline for a Reprimand
167
1
The Letter Itself: Loud and Clear
168
2
Using the Outline
168
1
What's Next?
170
2
The Final Warning
170
1
Termination Letters
170
2
Document, Document, Document
172
1
The Least You Need to Know
172
1
17 Sales Letters: Your License to Print Money
173
10
The Challenge: Getting Attention
174
1
A Word About Mailing Lists
174
1
Two Ways to Write a Letter
175
2
Short and Sweet Sales Letters
175
2
What's at Work in This Letter?
177
1
Features and Benefits: The Difference and Why It Matters
177
2
More Examples of Good Sales Letters
179
3
Increasing Your Response Rate
182
1
The Least You Need to Know
182
1
18 Writing to Get Media Attention
183
14
Why Try to Get Publicity?
183
1
Query Letters That Get Attention
184
1
What Editors Need
185
1
How to Target Publications
185
1
How to Develop Story and Article Ideas
186
1
Outline for a Great Query Letter
187
3
Press Releases
190
1
Press Releases That Get Attention
190
1
Outline for a Press Release
191
1
Making Your Own News
193
2
Do's and Don'ts When Writing to the Media
195
1
The Least You Need to Know
195
2
19 Decent Proposals (and Letters of Agreement)
197
14
Is It Worth the Paper It's Printed On?
198
1
How to Write an Attractive Proposal
198
1
Ask Questions
199
1
Outline for a Proposal
200
1
Sample Letter Proposals
200
1
How a Proposal Works
203
4
A Letter of Agreement
207
2
What Do You Propose?
209
1
The Least You Need to Know
209
2
20 Shine, Don't Whine: Complaints and Collection Letters
211
16
When Things Go Wrong
211
1
Rules for Effective Complaining
212
2
Propose a Specific Solution
212
1
Keep the Moral High Ground
212
1
Complain to the Right Person
213
1
Keep Good Records of All Contacts
213
1
Be Persistent
213
1
When to Write
214
1
Analyzing the Reader
214
1
Outline for a Letter of Complaint
214
7
A Sample Letter of Complaint
215
1
Another Letter of Complaint
215
3
An Opener and a Follow-Up
218
3
Collection Letters
221
4
Credit 101
221
1
The Collection Process
221
1
Sample Collection Letters
222
3
Collection Do's and Don'ts
225
1
The Least You Need to Know
226
1
21 So Sorry: Rejections, Apologies, and Answers to Complaints
227
16
Acknowledgment Letters
228
1
Acknowledging a Resume
228
1
Acknowledging an Individual Request
228
2
Acknowledging a Proposal Conditionally
230
2
Rejection Letters: A Matter of Timing
232
1
High-Volume Rejection Letters
232
1
Rules for Rejection
233
1
Letters of Rejection
234
3
Keep Rejection Short and Sweet
237
1
The Sorrow and the Pity
237
1
Letters of Apology
237
2
Do's and Don'ts of Apologizing
239
1
Answering Customer Complaints
239
2
The Least You Need to Know
241
2
22 Cover Letters That Open Doors
243
16
Breaking Out of the In-Box
243
1
Four Rules for Cover Letters
244
1
A Cover Letter Can't Compensate for a Poor Resume
244
1
Be Personal, Write Well, and Demonstrate Interest
244
1
Keep It Short and to the Point
245
1
Zero Errors Is the Goal
245
1
An Outline for Cover Letters
246
1
Sample Cover Letters
246
2
A Few Words on Timing
248
1
How to Make a Cover Letter Stand Out
248
1
Write Something Self-Revealing
249
1
Show Genuine Interest in the Company
249
1
Use the Right Kind of Humor
250
1
The Wrong Kind of Humor
251
1
Two Job-Search Approaches: Wholesale and Custom
251
1
The Wholesale Search: Paper the World
252
1
Sample Letters for the Wholesale Search
252
3
The Custom Search: Research, Then Write
255
1
Sample Letters for the Custom Search
255
2
Letters That Work Get You Interviews
257
1
The Least You Need to Know
257
2
23 Networking with Thank-You Notes and "Flower Mail"
259
14
An Update on the Art of Networking
259
1
The Role of Writing
260
1
The Thank-You Note
260
1
Thank-You Letters After Job Interviews and Client Meetings
262
1
Thank You for the Interview
263
3
Thank You for the Meeting
266
3
All About "Flower Mail"
269
3
Finding Reasons to Write
270
2
Do's and Don'ts of Thank-You Letters and "Flower Mail"
272
1
The Least You Need to Know
272
1
24 Writing Letters of Recommendation
273
14
Who Is Asking and Why?
274
1
What About Negative References?
274
1
How Do I Refuse to Give a Reference?
275
1
What If They Didn't Ask?
275
1
Help, I Need a Reference
275
5
Employment References
275
1
Blanket Recommendations
276
4
Character References
280
2
Recommended Style for References and Recommendations
282
1
Academic References
282
2
Letters of Introduction
284
2
Final Recommendations About References
286
1
The Least You Need to Know
286
1
Part 5: Now What Do I Do with It?
287
20
25 Getting the Message Out
289
10
So Many Options, So Little Time
289
1
What Drives the Delivery Decision?
290
2
Urgency and Time-Sensitivity
290
1
Length of the Document
291
1
Number of Copies You Must Send
291
1
Hard Copy
291
1
Appearance and "Production Values"
291
1
Choosing the Right Delivery System
292
4
Electronic Mail
292
1
Faxes
293
1
Interoffice Mail
293
1
First-Class U.S. Mail
293
2
Priority Mail Service from the U.S. Postal Service
295
1
Overnight Delivery Service
295
1
Messenger or Courier
295
1
Appearances Count
296
1
Cost/Benefit Analysis
296
1
The Least You Need to Know
297
2
26 Winning the Paper Chase
299
8
Remember What You Wrote?
299
1
Types of Files
300
3
Archives
301
1
Historical Files
302
1
Working Files
303
1
Tickler Files
303
1
Get Good Files
303
1
The Care and Feeding of Files
304
1
Running Your Calendar
304
1
Get Organized
305
1
The Least You Need to Know
305
2
Part 6: Screen Writing: Letters, Memos, E-Mail, and Your Computer
307
2
27 Your PC Is Your Private Printing Press
309
10
How to Get More from Your PC
309
1
Three Productivity Boosters
310
1
Using Templates to Stop Reinventing the Wheel
310
3
Creating Your Own Templates
313
1
Save Time with Styles
313
1
Mail Merge Magic
314
1
Other Useful Features for Letter and Memo Writers
315
1
Spelling Checker
315
1
AutoCorrect Feature
315
1
Automatic Envelope and Label Feature
316
1
The Care and Feeding of Electronic Files
316
1
Power Up
317
1
The Least You Need to Know
317
2
28 Electrifying E-Mail!
319
Elementary E-Mail
319
3
The Pros and Cons of E-Mail
321
1
E-Mail Is Not Secure
322
1
When to Use E-Mail
322
1
E-Mail in Action
323
2
Writing E-Mail Messages
325
2
Don't Get Sloppy!
326
1
Do's and Don'ts of E-Mail Style
326
1
Smileys
327
1
Attaching a Letter or Memo to an E-Mail
327
1
Faster, Faster
328
1
The Least You Need to Know
328
Index
309