A champion of plain language leaders

Champion organisations and individuals are leaders in clear communication | Photo by Occasionalclimber on excio.io

Lynda Harris, Awards founder and CE of our principal sponsor Write, is a champion of plain language organisations. Read on to find out why.

I’ve always been proud to reserve sponsorship of the award for Plain Language Champion — Best Organisation for Write Limited. You’d have to wrestle it from me! That’s because the Champion award embodies all the qualities of people and organisations that have worked hard to empower others through plain language.

‘Champion’ means being ‘the winner’ — the best, the highest achiever, the standard-setter, the model for others to follow. And we applaud that! But also it includes the concept of being an advocate — or a champion for a cause.

Plain language champions believe in the power of clarity and are proud to share their ideals with the world.

Leadership sets a champion organisation apart

An organisation that wins the Plain Language Champion — Best Organisation category will have many characteristics that set it apart from others. A champion organisation will be able to show evidence of deliberately choosing to use plain language throughout the whole organisation. To do this successfully, they will have to make their expectations clear from the top.

For example, the chief executive and senior leaders of a champion organisation will talk about the ‘why’ of plain language. They and their management teams will encourage and support others to adopt a clear style of communicating both internally and externally. They won’t hold back from promoting the connection between clarity and their organisation’s values.

They will understand and be able to articulate the value that clear communication has for their organisation, their brand, their customers, and ultimately society as a whole.

Champion organisations celebrate the benefits of clear communication — things like greater job satisfaction and improved workplace culture, along with better customer retention, greater trust, and a reputation for doing good work.

Be inspired by a past winner of this best-of-the-best category

The judges look for evidence in a winning champion portfolio

Evidence to back up your claims is essential to a winning portfolio! The judges look for evidence of a wholehearted commitment to making plain language the expected standard across the whole organisation. As a bonus, evidence of impact in the community will be compelling too.

In a plain language organisation, you’ll be able to see evidence that the CEO and senior team have stated their strong expectation for a culture of plain language. That means things like:

• everyone considers their reader in every piece of communication, both internal and external
• everyone knows what good looks like and writes to an agreed plain language standard
• senior people and other advocates model plain language practice
• helpful resources including plain language champions are readily available to help writers.

In other words, plain language is woven into the fabric of the organisation so that:

• documents are consistently clear and reader-friendly
• feedback and measurable results demonstrate the effect of plain language.

Individuals and teams are honoured too

The Awards also celebrate individuals and teams that have achieved great things with a plain language project. The Plain Language Champion — Best Individual or Team award honours the people who work hard to make plain language a reality in their organisation.

The award is open to individuals or teams who have significantly contributed to a plain language initiative in any New Zealand or Australian organisation. For example, you might have:

• convinced senior management or others of influence to support a plain language initiative
• led a plain language project — large or small
• run training or team meetings on plain language topics
• helped other writers to produce clear, reader-friendly content
• written newsletter articles or intranet resources about plain language topics
• rewritten template letters into plain language.

Feel free to nominate yourself, your team, or someone else you work with.

Meet one of our celebrated individual Champions

Write’s sponsorship celebrates plain language organisations

Lynda explains what’s behind Write sponsoring the Champion category.

You can see that everything about this category is dear to Write’s heart. Our purpose is to use words for the power of good by helping organisations and individuals get more value and impact from business communication. Ultimately we help build a fairer, more respectful society.

We see the Plain Language Awards as another way we can showcase the benefits of clear communication. Sponsoring the Champion category is one way we can celebrate other organisations doing their bit towards a society where people are able to participate more easily.

Read about Write and its B Corp status

Get your entry portfolio ready!

Entries must be in by 31 July and the Champion categories need a portfolio of evidence — so don’t delay!

Read the entry criteria and prizes for the Champion categories

See other clues that your organisation is a champion of clear communication

Anne-Marie Chisnall July 5th, 2022

Posted In: 2022 Plain Language Awards, Plain Language Champion

Tags: Best Individual or Team, Best Organisation, Champion, clear communication, impact, Lynda Harris, sponsors