Writing Briefing Notes

This one-day course teaches participants how to write effective briefing notes for use in corporations or government agencies. Participants will learn how to write concise and comprehensive documents that summarize complex source materials.

If your organization uses specific templates or models for briefing notes, we can incorporate those into our standard instructional materials.

Participants are also encouraged to bring sample documents to class for review and critique.

This seminar is designed for executive assistants, project leaders, managers, and anyone responsible for writing issue, action, or status summarizations that provide briefings.

Topics include:

Introduction

  • What is a briefing?
  • How to write a briefing

Briefing Notes Preparation

  • Preparation checklist
  • Information and idea gathering checklist
  • Briefing organization checklist
  • Briefing arrangements checklist
  • Briefing presentation checklist

The Body

  • What is your thesis?
  • Organizational Techniques for Different Types of Briefings
    • Informative briefing
    • Persuasive briefing
    • Arousing briefing
    • Entertaining briefing
  • Supporting statements
  • Supporting claims
  • Transition statements
    • Examples of transition statements
    • Examples of transition words

The Introduction

  • Five ways to begin a briefing
  • Introduction checklist
  • Opening statement

The Conclusion

  • Conclusion checklist

Practicing your Briefing

  • Eight tips
  • Practicing checklist

Special Briefings

  • Impromptu briefings checklist
  • Award acceptance checklist

Improving all of your Briefings

  • Nine ways to improve clarity in your briefing
  • Fifteen tips to add sparkle to any briefing
  • Nine rhetorical techniques for more memorable and persuasive briefings

Using Humor

  • Eight ways to use humor in briefings
  • Six rules on using humor in briefings
  • Five great tricks for using humor

Internet Resources for Writers

Seminar Tips:

Use the following resources to assist you in writing briefing notes:

Dictionaries

www.oed.com
The online version of the seminal dictionary of the English language, the Oxford English Dictionary

dictionary.reference.com/translate/text.html
Excellent and fast translation dictionary

nhd.heinle.com
Contains over 40,000 entries and is based on the best selling Newbury House Dictionary of American English; provides simple and clear definitions, and a wealth of sample sentences, idioms, and a wide array of cultural facts and figures

Dictionary and Thesaurus Combinations

www.m-w.com/home.htm
Web site by Merriam-Webster that features a dictionary and thesaurus

www.wordsmyth.net
American English dictionary and thesaurus contains 50,000 headwords, and very precisely defined and hyperlinked synonyms

www.cogsci.princeton.edu/~wn
An online lexical reference system whose design is inspired by current psycholinguistic theories of human lexical memory; English nouns, verbs, adjectives and adverbs organized into synonym sets, each representing one underlying lexical concept

References and Writing Help

www.bartleby.com/141/index.html
William Strunk's 1918 classic, The Elements of Style

webster.commnet.edu/HP/pages/darling/grammar.htm
Contains scores of digital handouts on grammar and English usage, over 170 computer-graded quizzes, recommendations on writing - from basic problems in subject-verb agreement and the use of articles to exercises in parallel structures and help with argumentative essays, and a way to submit questions about grammar and writing

www.theslot.com
A newspaper editor's thorough and opinionated look at grammar and style questions.

Research

www.google.com
The best starting place for Internet research

www.ceoexpress.com
A great collection of resources for all types of business research

Software

www.angelfire.com/ny/writesoftware
Links to writing software in every imaginable category

To Schedule this Training

For groups of three or more participants

Cypress Media Group presents this seminar as an on-site offering at your work location or at an off-site location of your choice. We can customize this training program to suit your precise training needs.

For economic reasons, this seminar is only offered to groups of roughly three or more people with the same training needs. If you have a group with similar training needs, please call us at 770-640-9918 or e-mail info@cypressmedia.net to discuss your interest.

For fewer than three participants

We do not offer this course as an open enrollment public offering for individuals. If you have fewer than three participants who are interested in this course, the cost will be the same as for a larger group. Please call us at 770-640-9918 or e-mail info@cypressmedia.net to discuss your interest. Individuals may also want to consider the following online training options:

Online learning options for individuals

Select each link below to review information on online learning offerings related to the topics on this page. If you are interested in purchasing the tutorial, select 'Go to checkout' - the tutorials you reviewed will be in your basket.

Writing Software Available

We recommend that writers use the StyleWriter editing software. StyleWriter will show you how to edit your writing like a pro. You can order a 30-day trial of this remarkable program on the Software for Writers CD. You'll also get four free programs for writers, including a great Dictionary and Thesaurus and six free writing guides on the CD. Click for more information.