For any company that communicates with its stakeholders via written documents, grammar and style hold nearly as much substance as the content of the communication. Cannings Purple’s Investor Insight team explain.
For any company that communicates with its stakeholders via written documents, grammar and style hold nearly as much substance as the content of the communication.
Who hasnt read a letter email or report written by a company that spends a lot of time talking about one particular issue that doesnt flow with the rest of the document and then goes on to talk about something else resulting in long winded paragraphs that seem to go nowhere.
OR SHOUTY EMAILS WRITTEN IN UPPER CASE THAT ARE MEANT TO IMPLY SOMETHING IMPORTANT BUT OFTEN DONT.
While most of us will read past the missing apostrophe or misused your/you’re, our brains still process this information as being not quite right and release cortisol as a hormone to control stress.
According to Dr. William Barr, associate professor in the Departments of Neurology and Psychiatry at NYU Langone Medical Center, high levels of cortisol and adrenaline release can have both short term and long term effects on our brain.
In the short term, reading bad grammar and having to fight the urge to throw your laptop out the window will result in less content being absorbed by the brain.
Over the longer term, while bad grammar is unlikely to be the only culprit, high levels of cortisol can result in the hippocampus shrinking, which reduces our ability to retain memories.
No one intentionally sets out to cause stress to their stakeholders in their corporate communications. However, putting time and thought into the style and grammar of your document may turn your message into meaningful communication.
