To Whom It May Concern Is your correspondence wasting others' time?

Are you phoning when you should be e-mailing something? Would anovernight package be better than a 25-page fax? Ask yourself thesesix questions to determine if you're making the best use ofyour time and your clients' while corresponding.

1. Are you simplifying everything you write? When atwo-paragraph e-mail will do, stop there. Brevity is the key toeffective communication, so be concise and get to the pointimmediately. Think in terms of an inverted pyramid. The first levelhas the "meat" of the correspondence; subsequentparagraphs are less important. If your correspondence is clutteredwith unnecessary words, future missives may be ignored or givenlower priority.

2. Do you know the recipient's communicationpreference? One of my clients asked all her vendors to sendinformation to her by standard mail rather than by fax because shefigured she wouldn't have to take action immediately. Instead,she could wait a few days before she had to do something with thematerials they sent. Before you e-mail, fax or send informationovernight, ask the recipient how he or she would like theinformation transmitted. (Personally, I find e-mail the mostefficient way to communicate. I no longer waste time playing phonetag, rarely run to the post office, and can send a message any timeday or night and know that it will arrive almost instantly.)