Look these people in the eye and tell them they've got it wrong
I love achievers who set themselves high standards. But here's why you need to stand up to them. And with all writers, don't ask whether you should deliver tough feedback – ask how you do it
My heroes are the chef Marco Pierre White (top left), the novelist Ernest Hemingway (bottom left) and the politician Margaret Thatcher (right – naturally). None of whom could be called cuddly. And in this blog, I’d like to write about cuddles: do we need them, should we give them and why, sometimes, they’re just not what you need?
I am a believer in being better; in being the best at whatever you do. (Not in ‘be best’, as Melania Trump says, because that is bad grammar and we’re a writing school.) And these people are my heroes because they believed in that, too. They believed in it so much that they were prepared to be self-critical: sincere and unflinching in their search for betterment. But they also understood the need for constructive criticism from outsiders.
Marco Pierre White learnt his craft in the kitchen of Le Gavroche under the tutelage of the Roux brothers. Albert and Michel Roux were famously fastidious but could also be nice, mischievous and fun. Their criticism was always direct; but the brigade of chefs always knew the brothers were on their side. Ever since striking out on his own, Marco Pierre White has always worn a striped butcher’s apron in his Michelin three-star kitchen rather than MPW monogrammed chef’s whites. He likes to remind himself daily that we are always apprentices, always learning.
Margaret Thatcher rarely conceded an argument. But when her advertising agency, Saatchi & Saatchi told her her voice was too shrill and came over dreadfully on TV, she accepted it – and their expertise. She allowed herself to go through voice training.
Saatchis themselves were famously tough and uncompromising. Founder Maurice Saatchi’s book about the agency is called Brutal Simplicity of Thought. But like the Roux brothers, they combined professional toughness with empathy and tact. Their point-man on the Conservative Party account, Tim Bell, was a man so charming, envious rivals said, that dogs would cross the street to be stroked by him.
This may hurt a bit
In order to improve, we need to be prepared to both critique ourselves and be critiqued by others.
Criticism may not be agreeable, but it is necessary. It fulfils the same function as pain in the human body. It calls attention to an unhealthy state of things.
– Winston Churchill
The issue then, is not whether criticism is valuable (it is), but how to make it palatable to hear.
Not everyone wants to be a Hemingway, a politician or the literary equivalent of a Michelin three-star chef. Most of us here just want to be better writers. But we do all want our written words to shine, or at least have lustre.
If you want a career as a hack, or a cook, or a copywriter you accept the hard knocks. But most of the people we train are not professional writers. They are not setting themselves the goal of winning Best Internal Memo RE Content Management Systems 2021. They’re not after the glittering prizes: they’re just trying to communicate a bit better. There are probably lots of other ways they'd prefer to spend their time than having us tear into their abstract nouns.
Which is why it’s really important to make criticism an entertaining as well as informative experience. It’s a fine line to tread.
Recently, we ran a programme for a tech company. This company prides itself on its values, one of which is to be human. That means that it treats everyone – staff, suppliers, customers and other stakeholders – like a person not a number.
We were asked to use one of their internal policy documents as an example to show how those values could be built into their writing style. The opening paragraph stated that this policy had been written ‘in accordance with our human values’.
‘In accordance with…?’ We pointed out that this made it sound like the policy had been written by a rather aloof lawyer, or a robot. I read the piece out in a robotic voice to help them understand how it would be read by an employee. This didn’t help at all. I hurt their feelings. It had been meant lightheartedly but was taken as mimicry.
Our lesson was still correct. If you want to sound human, drop the ‘in accordance withs…’ – and any phrase you wouldn’t use down the pub or over a coffee. But I learned my lesson too. By all means criticise the words, but be mindful that a real person with real feelings wrote them.
The trouble with most of us is that we'd rather be ruined by praise than saved by criticism.
– Norman Vincent Peale
There is an old saying that ‘you catch more flies with honey than with vinegar’.
They’re a bit binary, those old sayings, aren’t they? Sweet words are more effective than acid ones at helping people to change. Effective training and teaching have to encourage.
But sweet words and cuddles alone won’t cut it. We’ll call it out when a document is peppered with requirements to align our priorities going forward and a relentless focus on a platform-agnostic brand ecosphere. We’ll be fair to the people who write these things: 99 times out a 100, it’s because someone, somewhere has told them ‘that’s how we write around here’. But we also need to be fair to the reader – and to the English language.
Getting the balance right is difficult. But that’s our goal, and an awesome responsibility we take seriously. But if you get it right, you create a phalanx of people who see their time in your hands as something important; something which made a difference to their career.
If you would like to learn how to become a better writer, contact us at Forthwrite. We teach businesses and individuals how to write quicker, more succinctly and more effectively – with less time wasted on cluttered words and confused thinking. As an editor, journalist and adman we know how much valuable time gets squandered – so learn to write less and mean more with us. Click here for details on ‘How to write productively’ and other courses.