Things to know: Writing in government

This post is written by Suzanna; Manager, Prioritisation; NSW Government, Australia.

• The problem: Getting to a suitable written product more efficiently.
• Why it matters: To be influential, documents need to be timely, clear, accessible and targeted.
• The solution: Practise, read widely, plan your documents and get it down on the page – you’ll fail faster and save time on rewriting.

There are many types of writing and each is a different skill. Journalism, fiction, academia and government – these fields all have different styles, requirements and conventions. In government, your aim is to be truthful, clear, relevant, apolitical and timely. In Australia, we stand by ‘frank and fearless’ advice. This does not mean ministers must always follow our advice, but that they should be well informed to make their decisions.

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Know your field

Always check if your organisation has templates and style guides. If they do, this is your starting point. There are some parts of government writing that come down to the style of the day or the preference of the current politicians. Some people prefer to read the background and rationale leading up to recommendations, like a story. Others prefer to read the recommendations first and leave all the background as an appendix. Additionally, some organisations have preferences on paragraphs vs dot points, visuals vs tables, or topic headings vs descriptive headings. None of these are right or wrong, but it helps to know what your audience prefers and a template will usually give you that (to some extent).

Know your purpose

You should always know why you are writing something. That might sound obvious, but it’s easy to go on autopilot and stop thinking about these things. Think about your audience and 1) what they want to know, 2) what they need to know. Then make sure that information is available. (I say “available” because you should have it at hand if the information can be obtained, but not everything always makes it into the final document).

Try and learn from the changes that you see being made. Ask for feedback. Ask to see the final version that went to the minister. Don’t be scared to start again.

A piece of advice I love is to meet people where they are. It applies to all sorts of communication and relationship-building, including written advice. In government, you don’t always know your audience well, particularly if you’re writing to senior executives or to ministers. It’s better to assume they don’t know as much as you do on a particular topic. They often have a very broad and strategic understanding, but do not know the details as well as you, who has been living it day to day. There is a balance between showing where your information fits into the bigger picture and giving the right level of detail to help decision-makers.

When your audience is broader, such as the general public or key citizen groups, consider wide-ranging accessibility requirements, such as plain language, visual presentation of information, translations, colour accessibility and so on.

Know your content

**A template may or may not help you with the next step: know your content. Common sections in a brief or report may include:

• Executive summary
• Recommendations
• Background/context
• Options analysis
• Opportunities or expected outcomes
• Risks and mitigations
• Financial impact
• Stakeholder or citizen impacts (e.g. special needs groups)
• Stakeholder views (e.g. peak bodies, community surveys, other government agencies)
• Alignment with government strategy/direction
• Interdependencies
• Comparison with other jurisdictions

With complex information, it is often fine to give a summary in the main document and keep the details in an appendix. For example, you might have an options analysis table, like the one below, where an appendix details the definition of each criterion and the values for each option. At the foot of this article, I provide you with a downloadable template featuring a range of tables you could include in a brief or use for analysis.

🞮 Negative impact on target, Θ Medium or unknown impact on target, **✔ Positive contribution to target, ** **$ **Low cost, **$$ **Medium cost, **$$$ **High cost

When you know which sections you need to include, try to quickly write a few sentences for each section to build a skeleton for your document. The skeleton is often a good stage to ask for feedback to see if you are on the right track with your planned content. The skeleton will help you build out the rest of the document. It is so much easier to build from something than to stare at a blank page. And do not edit as you go. Writing and editing are separate tasks. If you try to make your first draft sound perfect, you will lose the momentum of writing.

Know that it’s not about you

Finally, know that this document is not about you or your efforts. Your words will get changed. Your research will get pushed into appendices or even excluded. Your sections will get restructured. This is life! It is not a reflection on you as a person. Try and learn from the changes that you see being made. Ask for feedback. Ask to see the final version that went to the minister. Don’t be scared to start again if you’re on the wrong track. Know that all the in-depth work you did was not wasted, even if it does not make it into the final document (and it often won’t). You needed to do the work to get to the final piece.

The following downloadable template features example tables you could include in your documents, including a stakeholder views summary, risk summary, roles and responsibilities summary, options analysis and impact summary.

Done reading? Make sure to share your own tips by leaving a comment below ⬇️

(Image credit: Pexels)