Recently, Jesse Hernandez and William Walters wrote to employees asking for their help and participation in a bold new initiative. The challenge before us, they said, is to make continuous improvement everyone’s most important job, because quality is fundamental for a competitive future.

That goal suits Global Banking better than any company I know. We are a company of some 50,000-plus men and women who are proud of the work we do and the contributions we make. We believe intensely that our service must be more than good, it must be the best. And we are willing, even anxious, to improve ourselves and our work in order to improve our service.

The concept behind the initiative is both fundamental and powerful:
By our all working together, communicating better, and focusing on continuously improving our processes, we can produce greater value for our customers, a greater challenge to our competitors, and greater satisfaction for ourselves in a job well done.

In its most basic form this is an extremely individual challenge, and we can all begin immediately to find ways to improve how we do our jobs. But there will also be more formal efforts, large and small, to bring us closer together as a team. Throughout the company, new efforts will be set up to help us focus on improving the way we work.

Maintaining Global’s worldwide leadership requires your best efforts. The , including more involvement as you help us pinpoint and solve problems, greater likelihood of long-range job security, pride in personal accomplishment, teamwork leading to more responsibility and control, greater opportunity to rise in the organization based on ability, and more meaningful work.

Here at Field Service, we will assemble a team of employees from all levels to help examine our needs, develop a plan, establish goals and a schedule, define roles for other teams within the division, and set up training. We will then initiate the effort gradually, on a program-by-program basis, refining our plans along the way. Please read the attached booklet to learn more. Any ideas you have for improvements can be noted on pages 4 – 6 in the space provided.

Also look for a preliminary GCL (Global Customer Loyalty) rollout schedule and description from your manager by November 1, 2005. Field Service is also taking steps to provide superior service by responding more quickly and thoroughly to our customers’ needs, writing to our customers in ways that make them feel serviced and listened to, giving customer-service representatives intensive telephone training, and implementing employee incentive programs.

I look forward to working with you to build an exciting new initiative of quality and teamwork at Global Banking–one that will keep us the pride of our customers and the envy of our competition.

Thanks for your full participation.

Notes

No visual design to guide the reader

With no headlines labeling content, the reader must read every word of the long, dense text. If both parties need to discuss the message, it will be awkward to refer to information.

Lacks persuasive grabber

There’s nothing in the beginning of the message to draw in the readers. They might ignore the message because they don’t see its importance immediately.

Opening not reader focused

The opening announces a new initiative to improve the company, but doesn’t explain the benefit to the readers.

Boring subject line

“Quality and Continuous Improvement” doesn’t engage the readers or explain why the message is important. The subject line should explain the message’s purpose.

No specific examples

Examples explaining how the company could work together better would give the readers concrete goals to pursue.

Payoffs buried

The payoffs to the readers should stand out so they can immediately see what they will gain from the new initiative.

Unclear plan

Readers could be confused about their next steps because the plan is not explained clearly. That could result in wasteful back-and-forth communication for clarification.

Date lost in text

The date doesn’t stand out, so readers are likely to miss it entirely. They could be confused about the initiative’s timeline.

Hidden action request

Action steps are listed near the very end and are less likely to be read. Even if the reader gets that far, his attention has probably declined after the first couple of paragraphs.

Key points at the end

Important information about Field Service’s actions is likely to be missed when it’s located at the bottom of the message. These points should be made earlier.