Audience

My definition of audience would be the people/person whom you are addressing. You could be addressing them via document or speech. In the context of workplace writing my audience would be my colleagues, fellow business people who have, at least, a base understanding of the subject at hand. My audience can range from executives to IT to phone agents. I adjust my writing based on my audience. If I am writing to a phone agent I might simplify the message and provide examples they can relate to in order to give them context. When writing to IT I will write with more technical examples and verbiage. When writing to leadership and executives I tend to be more formal and very informative.

None of the above examples of how I adjust my writing to my audience would I currently consider challenging, however, if you asked me five years ago I would have said the biggest hurdle is to understand what each audience expects and needs. That was a huge learning curve for me but after working with each group for years I find that I can easily adjust my style to meet the audience needs. You have to get to know and learn your audience in order to address them in a manner that they need and expect. The most difficult audience would be executives as each one has their preferences. Some prefer numbers connected to the information, some prefer just to understand the end goal, some want the details. So while the ‘audience’ is all executives each of them have a preferred style.

Sometimes knowing your audience takes time. While addressing children may be fairly static, addressing colleagues differs based on position. Get to know your audience and don’t be afraid to ask fellow workers their perspective as well.