Happy New Year! 🎉

Like most years, I purged my house of clutter after Christmas in a frenzy. Cupboards emptied.  Shelves streamlined. Chaos calmed.

(My children and pets went into hiding in case they, too, were shoved into a black sack marked ‘charity’.)

And it’s a great time for a purge in other areas too.

My colleague and ex-military man, Andrew Pullman, recently told me about a common acronym in the army: CLAP.  It’s used in training to help officers communicate effectively with their troops, and it stands for:

Clear

Loud

As an order

Pause

Simple and memorable.  

And whilst we may not want to bark orders in our business communication, there’s a lot we can take from this pared-back approach. Especially with our emails.  

Clear – get to the point and get rid of any word salad (staying in the military theme, a client of mine calls this his ‘scorched earth’ approach to editing)

Loud – make sure your key message stands out and is easy to skim read (we rarely read every word online)

As an order – end with your call-to-action, ideally in one sentence – what one thing do you want your reader to do next?  (But remember to make your tone appropriate for your audience – no-one wants to feel like they’re being told off)

Pause – give the sensation of breathing room with short paragraphs and plenty of white space in your email. 

So – what are you going to purge next?  

I’d love to know!