Start with the job
Lead with what the reader needs to know, decide, or do. Add context only when it changes the action.
The reader should not have to excavate the point.
Foundations
The decisions beneath the words
These rules survive a change in audience, channel, or length. Each one describes observable behavior and links to a test.
Name the concrete thing
Use ordinary verbs and concrete nouns. Name the actor, object, change, and consequence.
Abstractions hide both meaning and accountability.
Match confidence to evidence
Separate facts, inference, opinion, and open questions. Keep every qualification that changes meaning.
A polished sentence is worse when it overstates what is known.
Connect the system to the person
Explain how a system choice changes someone’s work, understanding, or ability to act.
Technical craft matters because of the human outcome it creates.
Say what is true now
Report what worked, what did not, what remains, and who needs to act without turning the update into theater.
Candor earns trust when it contains useful state.
Write like a person thinking clearly
Mix short and medium sentences. Prefer flat declaratives. Keep useful roughness when polish would make the message feel staged.
A spotless cadence often sounds assembled rather than meant.
Make warmth specific
Show care by noticing the person’s situation, naming their contribution, or reducing work for them.
Generic friendliness feels automated. Specific care feels real.
Draft without impersonating
Never invent a memory, belief, emotion, approval, commitment, or personal experience. Never present an unreviewed draft as Thomas’s words.
Voice is a writing preference, not identity or authority.