I say this as a writer, and in the most loving way possible, but there is very little correlation between the frequency and quality of one's writing (or note taking) and one's effectiveness in business or in life.
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Yes yes writing is thinking and good writing is good thinking but oh — are you avoiding that important thing that is gnawing at you that is just too painful to face?
Well, bad news, no amount of journalling is going to help you fire that employee or execute that break up.
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There are smaller, more pernicious forms of this. Like — no amount of good writing is going to help you go from customer worldview to executed marketing campaign.
Hell, no amount of good note taking is going to help you get from book notes to effective application.
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Replying to @ejames_c and @RobertHaisfield
I’m increasingly coming around to the idea that agency and good writing/note taking are orthogonal skills, and both are desirable, but both have no relation to each other.
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Could you talk a bit more about your sense of "good writing" in this thread? There are some definitions of good writing that indeed don't have much bearing on efficacy (of the communication or the writer). Not looking for a logically watertight definition, just a bit of a hint.
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Hmm! I mostly mean compelling writing that expresses clear thinking.
More David Foster Wallace (brings you along on some extraordinarily complex topics) or Paul Graham (extreme clarity) instead of Steinbeck or Hemingway.
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Ah - different then. I've always been around "writing that gets stuff done". Enabling it tech-wise or using it. There, if you're too conceptual, or your clear writing's irrelevant, it fails, and getting stuff done is harder. Must all managers write effectively? No, but it helps.
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