Larry Ragan’s 10 ways to get what you want

A sad reality of being a corporate editor is that you often have to communicate vague, meaningless initiatives.

You know how it goes: The word comes down from the Ivory Tower that Mr. So and So thinks Such and Such is an important topic, and you need to pump it up.

Which leads to two problems:

1. Such and Such is often not an important topic.

2. You don’t really have any information on the topic. There are no case studies to write about, examples to show or qualified people to interview.

So you end up writing C.R.A.P. You end up using the same corporate-writing formulas that you always use. And as a result, the stories are filled with platitudes, empty quotes and meaningless content.

“Diversity” is one of those topics that seems to inspire all of the above. There are no case studies. There are no great examples. It’s impossible to write a good diversity story … so instead of even trying to write good diversity stories, editors usually do one of two things: