THE PRINCIPAL BELIEFS
Imagine if the news was automatically written by robots. No witty one-liners, no commentary, just the facts.
You wouldn’t read it, trust me.
The best writers have the ability to curate the right information to connect with their readers. And this skill is far more valuable than automating inputs to generate summaries.
We believe the care you put into curating facts and words for long-form writing is as important as the way you approach writing bite-size updates to keep your whole team on the same page.
From
communicating task completion and inputs
To
communicating progress, confidence, and why
From
sifting through all the updates
To
getting only the updates I need
From
stakeholders expecting end-to-end traceability
To
frequent communication and building trusting relationships
Write an update people will actually read
Keep it high-level
Constrain weekly updates to a brief 1-3 bullets on key progress, newly uncovered risks or major blockers
Disclose progressively
Enable followers to dig deeper by linking to relevant context and more details directly from your update
Use a variety of content
Captivate your audience with updates that include videos, emojis, polls or whatever it takes to get the feedback you need
Drive action
Use your updates to mobilize your supporters with clear asks
Related research
2.0 RITUAL – CURATE, DON’T AUTOMATE
Write a weekly status update
Research shows that successful, healthy relationships communicate openly and frequently, and this holds true for teams, too.
By committing to a weekly status update, your entire team will benefit by being synchronized in communication cadence and format, and optimized for agility. This helps teams feel empowered to take risks with fast feedback loops, and course correct early and often.
Even if the world may not feel predictable, communication should be. Eliminate one stressor of inter-team relationships by committing to writing updates every Friday so that every related team starts their week with the context they need.
Explore all the Loop techniques
1.0 Open up your work in progress
1.1 Create reference-able handles
1.2 Open up comments & questions (avoid 1:1 messages)
1.3 Distribute updates in channels where teams live
2.0 Curate, don't automate
2.1 Character constrain your updates
2.2 Update async, spar in real time
2.3 Balance qualitative + quantitative
3.0 Common vocabulary over common tooling
3.1 Define your project’s what, why & how
3.2 Agree on “what is a project” and phases
3.3 Define your status markers (On Track (green), At Risk (yellow), Off Track (red))
4.0 Show that you are paying attention
4.1 Level your feedback in line with phase/fidelity
4.2 Create a read receipts mechanism
4.3 Follow relevant projects & celebrate wins together