Email Memos, Part 2

OPENING STATEMENT

Research on Reader Preferences

BY WAYNE SCHIESS, TEXAS LAW, LEGALWRITING.NET

Part 2 of a three-part series on e-memos reports on Professor Brad Desnoyer’s article E-Memos 2.0, in which he gathered opinions from 113 lawyers on four sample email memos. The samples were written by a junior attorney for a supervising attorney and represented different approaches to organization, analysis, tone, and content. The responding attorneys were in private practices, small to large, and governmental, judicial, corporate, and other jobs. Their ages ranged from under 30 to over 60. This column summarizes Desnoyer’s data on e-memo reader preferences, with five key takeaways.

1. READERS RELY ON COMPUTER SCREENS.

Nearly 89% of respondents said they read memos on a screen, with 40% saying they read e-memos on a phone. We’ve known for a while that screen reading is normal for legal readers, and this data reinforces that reality. Screen readers tend to be more impatient and more distracted than paper readers. So, successful e-memo writers should adapt to those characteristics by being brief, using headings and subheadings, and enabling skimming.

2. E-MEMOS ARE QUICK-TURNAROUND PROJECTS.

Ninety-two percent of respondents said the turnaround time for an e-memo assignment is 48 hours, and nearly half said the typical turnaround is 24 hours. As a teacher of beginning legal researchers and writers, that information scares me: The more time pressure you put on novices, the more likely they are to cut corners and make mistakes. But that’s the reality today. Quick turnarounds are the norm, so legal writers must learn to write better faster.

3. UP-FRONT CONCLUSIONS NEED REASONING.

It’s standard advice in any good textbook on legal writing and in many guides on legal style: You’re not writing a mystery novel with a surprise ending, so spill the beans! Give the bottom line first, plainly and right up front. But Desnoyer’s data goes further. Even though an up-front conclusion should be short, it shouldn’t be shallow. Supply reasons, give explanations—clarify the why. But do so concisely. Find twelve tips for concision on my blog, LEGIBLE.

4. ANALYTICAL DEPTH MATTERS.

This concept builds on the previous one. Taken together we can say this: It’s essential that your e-memo be short, but it’s just as important that it be thorough. At this point, we should acknowledge the demanding expectations supervising attorneys often have of younger attorneys: “I want to understand everything, but I don’t want to read much.” Or as one senior attorney put it to me: “I don’t want to have to scroll to understand the analysis—not even on a phone.” As with the previous point, this point suggests that concise writing is at a premium in e-memos. (In fact, Prof. Desnoyer’s article on e-memos mentions concision and its importance 28 times.)

5. ATTACHMENTS AND HYPERLINKS ARE USEFUL.

Yes, your e-memo should be brief or, better yet, concise—implying brevity plus depth. You shouldn’t include lengthy explications of the law, the legal standards, or the cases. Instead, get to the point: Show how the law applies to our scenario.

So what about the reader who wants to, shall we say, check your work? This reader who wants to read the cases you’ve cited, see the full text of the statute you summarized, or examine the verbatim passage you paraphrased. For that reader, the e-memo writer should do two things: attach copies of the cases and statutes cited in the e-memo and, where possible, embed hyperlinks to key sources in the message’s body. Half of the respondents answering Desnoyer’s question about hyperlinking said it should be a “common practice.”

Next month, the final takeaways from Prof. Desnoyer’s article. AL