Writing clearly is the most important skill for a remote engineer. When you work remotely the majority of your communication with your team is written. This writing takes place in many formats. The best way to write for a bug comment is not the best way to write a design document or an email.
This chapter focuses on two areas: how to write more clearly and where to write. If you are want to improve your performance as a remote engineer, then improving your writing is the first place to start.
No matter who you’re communicating with, all good writing has consistent features, so I’ll touch on how to make your writing better in general first, then I’ll detail how each type of remote written communication differs from normal writing and how to write best in that medium. Most importantly, we’ll talk about when you should be using each type of communication, and for what.