Writing Like A Businessperson Is Important If You Are A Healthcare Professional

Changes in modern healthcare have made the field more like a business than it had been in the past. As part of this change, people with a business background have entered healthcare. Businesspeople  bring with them their own language and style of communicating. This includes a style of writing that most of us in healthcare are not familiar with from our training. Most of us in traditional healthcare roles have little to no experience with this kind of communication. For the traditional healthcare professional, skills like writing a business email or putting together a smooth presentation are unnecessary – at best  these are extras, not essentials. However, this lack of experience can put your average healthcare professional at a disadvantage in the modern setting, especially for those who want to expand their careers into the nonclinical aspects of modern healthcare. 

To navigate the landscape of modern healthcare well, healthcare professionals should learn to communicate in the language of business. A healthcare professional who is not capable in business communications can lose credibility in the nonclinical setting. In a nonclinical setting, people often judge each other by how well they communicate as much as by what they are communicating.  To avoid losing credibility in this setting, healthcare professionals should expand their skills to include how to communicate well in writing.   

One example is the simple, but vital concept of understanding who your audience is. You should customize your communications for different audiences, even if you are communicating the same core message. In a modern healthcare setting, your audiences may have a wide range - for example your audiences could be a nursing student, a pharmacist, an office manager, a hospital attorney, and a hospital’s chief operating officer.  Each one of these audiences will likely have a different use for, a different level of understanding of, and a different level of experience with your ideas. You should address each one accordingly.  

To learn more about ways to refine your business writing as a healthcare professional, please check out my book: A Business Writing Toolkit For Healthcare Professionals

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