Your path to excellence: Brisbane professional writing courses
Want to be an excellent communicator like it says in your CV? Then read on for information about our Brisbane writing courses.
In this blog, we explain:
- what our writing courses cover
- what types of workshops we offer
- how easy it is to apply for our courses.
What do our professional writing courses cover?
Generally, our courses cover 3 pillars of plain language:
- document structure
- document design
- word choice.
How you structure a document has a huge impact on how easily and quickly your audience can read it. Queensland has already shown its commitment to structuring in plain language. In 1993, when plain language was still new to Australia, the Queensland government passed the Industrial Relations Reform Bill.
This bill legislated that tribunal decisions must be ‘structured in a way that is as easy to understand as the subject matter allows’. Our courses show you how to prioritise the information your audience most needs to know and structure your documents so that they’re easy to understand.
You may think that document design is just for the graphic design department, but it doesn’t have to be. In our workshops, we cover small design changes that make your documents more accessible and easier for everyone to use.
For example, we recommend including plenty of white space and breaking up chunks of text with bulleted lists. This prevents your readers from feeling overwhelmed by blocks of text before they’ve even started reading your report.
Did you know that about 44% of Australians struggle to read everyday documents? We’ll help you find the best words to communicate with both colleagues and the public.
Our courses will show you how to swap complex, multi-syllable words for everyday alternatives. For example, instead of writing ‘approximately’ you can use ‘about’ instead. This simple swap will help people with low literacy understand you and speed up communication with your colleagues.
What types of writing workshops do we offer?
If you write for work, we have a workshop for you!
For corporations, we offer workshops about:
- board paper writing
- legal writing
- policy and procedure writing
- report, decision, audit writing
- letter and email writing
- media, communications and web writing.
Turn writing at work into writing that works with our ISO-aligned plain language system.
- briefing and correspondence writing
- ministerial and policy writing
- policy writing
- local government writing.
How easy is it to apply for our Brisbane writing courses?
Applying for one of our courses is as easy as 1, 2, 3!
- Think about the type of documents you write most and what communication issues you experience.
- Decide how much time you have to spend in workshops that participants consistently rate highly.
- Contact our friendly team. They’ll help you find the right workshop to fit your needs.
We have workshops to suit your needs and schedule. We can hold a face-to-face session at your workplace, or for remote teams, try our state-of-the-art online learning platform.
Join other Queensland organisations that have started their journeys to plain language with us, such as:
- Queensland Health
- Caxton Legal Centre
- Royal Commission into Violence, Abuse, Neglect and Exploitation of People with Disability.
If you’d like a free resource to support your journey, check out the Australian Style Guide. This is the definitive guide for the most common style questions for professionals in Australia.
