Case Study: Business Writing
Large financial services company’s internal auditors improve their writing
Company Profile
Industry: Financial Services
Ownership: Publicly Traded
Employee Count: 12,000+
Annual Revenue: $12+ Billion
Location: United States
The Challenge
The financial services institution identified a need to improve internal auditors’ writing so as to clearly and concisely identify risk (financial, legal/regulatory, reputational, etc.) and recommend ways to mitigate it.
Class participants in most instances had had no formal writing training beyond a college composition course, which focused on academic rather than business writing.
Training needed to build skills that would be sustained long after the training so that management required much less time for review and editing.
A large financial services company’s internal audit unit (employees based primarily in two states) approached us, seeking to improve auditors’ writing skills.
They wanted us not only to help auditors improve their writing generally but especially to help them learn to write clear statements identifying risks and recommending opportunities to mitigate those risks—financial, regulatory, and reputational.
In particular, we sought to help the audit unit learn to write documents that were clear, concise, and compelling, so as to help produce the desired business results by:
Eliminating ambiguity, misunderstanding, and confusion.
Making good use of both the writer’s and the reader’s time.
Helping the reader, such as a senior manager or colleague, make more informed business decisions and avoid costly mistakes.
The Solution
We worked with audit services’ subject-matter experts to identify the key issues in auditors’ writing and custom-design a course to address common issues in that writing. We focused on clarity, conciseness, courtesy/professionalism, persuasiveness, and correctness.
The interactive training that we designed combined short, engaging instruction units with large- and small-group discussion. But the most important component was individual and group hands-on writing exercises with feedback that comprised two-thirds of the total workshop time.
After the group workshop, the Writing Coach met one-on-one with each class participant to review and provide individual feedback on their writing samples.
Before the training, we talked with senior leaders in their department to learn about the unit’s specific needs and concerns.
We also obtained roughly three dozen copies of both well-written and poorly-written examples of typical audit documents, such as audit reports and preliminary issue reports.
Based on those interviews and writing samples, we created a highly interactive course customized specifically for auditors called Writing for Results, a 1 ½-day training session followed by individual coaching sessions.
Materials and exercises were based primarily on real, anonymized documents from the company.
Auditors were asked in advance to submit 3-5 samples of their unedited audit writing, preferably choosing these with input from their supervisors. The Writing Coach reviewed those samples, provided feedback on them in advance, and returned them to class participants before the class.
Not only did participants use those samples as practices during the class, but on the afternoon of the final day of the training, each of the 12 class participants also met one-on-one with the writing coach for 15-20 minutes to discuss the writing samples that participants had submitted and the coach’s feedback and guidance on them.
After each training session, we prepared a written summary of our observations and recommendations, which we reviewed with the audit-unit leaders. We also provided each class participant a workbook to keep for ongoing reference and a laminated job aid as a reminder of how to apply the skills covered in class.
Classes were taught in person in 2018 and 2019 and virtually in 2020, 2021, 2022 and 2023. Currently we offer our workshops in both formats.
The Results
Participants reported that they were much better equipped after this training to create effective audit documents.
Participants consistently said they found the training engaging, practical, and relevant, with several saying that Writing for Results was the best training they had ever had with the company.
Two additional business units of the company were so impressed with the audit unit’s results that they also contracted with us for customized writing training.
After training, class participants were asked to rate themselves on a 1-to-5 scale on such statements as “BEFORE I attended the training, I was able to write clear, unambiguous, easily understood sentences,” and to rate their ability AFTER the training. Participants consistently rated themselves significantly improved after the training.
They also were asked to respond from 1 to 5 on an agree-disagree scale with statements such as whether the stated learning objectives had been met, whether the materials were relevant, and whether the instructor was knowledgeable about the content.
Participants tended to agree or agree strongly with these statements, with average scores running as high as 4.91 on a 1-to-5 scale.
Some of the comments from auditors reporting self-improvement:
Excellent training. I really liked the teaching method, the materials, and the way it was presented.
I loved this training! This has been the most beneficial training to me since I started with (company) and the most tangible. Thanks!
I really liked (instructor) and think he was a great instructor!
Managers also have reported that they spend less time rewriting auditors’ reports.
The audit unit now typically schedules at least two Writing for Results classes of 12 auditors each per year. It also has added a third class, exclusively for new auditing hires and customized for their needs. Moreover, two other units in the company were so impressed with audits results that they also have contracted with us to provide customized Writing for Results training for their associates.
