Today, when I was coming on my way back home after grocery shopping, I witnessed a small jam on the main road near the supermarket. People were blowing their horns impatiently and acting like a flock. Because all of them were in a hurry and most of them were already late for their work. This cluttered situation instantly reminded me of Shirley Taylor's TED Talk video, which I had seen the previous night.

In case you don't know who Shirley Taylor is, she is a very successful author in the modern business writing domain. She has written 15 successful books, including an international bestseller that has sold over half a million copies worldwide and has been translated into 17 languages.

She was telling how much we have evolved in the last 100 years and changed our way of communicating with each other. Letters turned into emails, and typewriters were replaced by laptops and mobiles. And clearly, we will all agree with this, just as the greeting and gestures were different 30 years down the line. However, something still remains unchanged.

Then she stated the wonderful fact that almost 246 billion emails are sent each day worldwide. You, me, and everybody else receive at least hundreds of emails daily; a few go straight to the spam folder, a few come from our workplaces, and most of them are usually from some brands trying hard to sell their products. But unfortunately, most of them sound boring and robotic.

With time and progressive technology, our likes, dislikes, and lifestyles have evolved drastically, but emails!

Nay. Not much...

We're still writing emails in that age-old formal tone with plenty of passive-voice sentences and complex literature which neither sounds good nor is persuasive to the readers.

She added some more valuable insights while working with an MNC in Singapore; they tweaked their workbook and emails and wrote in the simple English language and they got 25% lesser customer queries and 11000 lesser phone calls by the end of the year. Basically, nobody has the time to appreciate your rich vocabulary in an email. We need to write this with simpler language and short active-voice sentences that will be easy to read and understand and help us take action accordingly. Basically, active-voice sentences set a friendly conversational tone and show responsibility and accountability. So, you can build a connection faster.

At the end of the day, only that matters. If you solve your clients' or customers' problems faster, they'll remember you for a longer time. That's how modern businesses grow with a lasting relationship with their consumers. This was my main takeaway from her TED Talk video. It was short and sweet with a lot of learning about writing principles. So, if you're a modern writer trying to engage with your audience and provide them value, then definitely give it a watch on YouTube.