Negative Message Outline

The generic organizational outline for a negative message uses the three blocks news, reasons, and goodwill and action. It uses these organizational blocks in a different order and also adds the buffer block. Remember this is the outline for writing the entire message (step 2 in the writing process). With these notes, the writer can write the entire message without stopping to look for detail.

In this example of a negative message, assume the sender is delivering the bad news about a delay in the promised ship date of a book. The receiver needs this to prepare for a two week training conference but didn’t order it early enough.

Organization Section	Purpose	Notes to write message from….
Buffer	Starts the message by being on topic, but not clearly laying out the news. It is important to start neutrally so as to avoid getting the reader’s expectations set to high.	Been a customer for many years.
Reasons	This is the body of the message that contains the detail supporting the news. Reasons must have the you-view. Avoid mentioning policy or rules as this just encourages the reader to escalate to a higher level of management.	Very popular title. good quality takes time.
News	The bad news is stated directly, yet gently. Offer any offsetting news, if possible. Avoid apologizing. It can bring on legal guilt in extreme situations. In many cases, the sender’s company did nothing wrong. If truly necessary and in alignment with company policy, then apologize.	book delayed by 7 days. focus on her receipt added free shipping.
Goodwill and Action	Avoid sounding trite but express interest in continuing the good relationship. Confirm the delivery date.	past good experiences. delivery april 5 Notice there is missing punctuation and capitalization. These are only notes, so those issues will be cleaned up in the following steps.