The unwitting writer

our chosen careers. What many of us do not realise is that many occupations require the individual to take up a sort of secondary profession that is perhaps not obvious within the profession itself. Unfortunately, it is sometimes this job within a job that can be a defining and deciding factor as to how successful we are in our chosen lines of work. If it is not obvious yet as to where I’m going with this, the second job I am referring to is that as a writer.

Take for example a doctor; even those who are not in the medical profession will probably have a clear idea what a doctor does and hence why I am using it as an easy example. In general, doctors diagnose and treat patients. In order to make a diagnosis they will talk to, physically examine or have the patients undergo some sort of test. In order to treat patients, doctors will have to prescribe drugs or carry out certain procedures such as surgery. That’s perhaps the extent of what many think as covering the job scope of a doctor.

In reality, a doctor also usually spends a lot of time writing reports — case histories and case reports — including the reports used for insurance claims as well as those that are published in order for experiential medical knowledge or research outcomes about diseases and treatments to be shared in the medical community.

Many doctors may have even entered the profession not knowing that they also need to be writers in addition to the obvious tasks that they have to undertake. Writing is such an important skill in the medical profession, it is perhaps unsurprising that many acclaimed authors are or were medical doctors. Michael Crichton, who wrote, among others,

and the 90s television series was a Harvard medical school graduate, although he never practised medicine.

In the bestsellers list, you probably see many doctor authors — Oliver Sacks, Paul Kalanithi, Henry Marsh and James Doty to name a few. Closer to home, we of course have none other than our Prime Minister Tun Mahathir Mohamad, himself the author of several books. One can still argue that doctors are very academic too and thus they should also be good writers.

So let’s take a look at a different profession — those who work in the field of intelligence in other words, your run of the mill everyday spy. The version of a spy or intelligence officer we have been fed with by Hollywood is that of a dashing very physical individual — dodging bullets and defusing bombs despite having taken a brutal physical beating at the hands of their evil tormentors — James Bond and Jason Bourne come to mind. What we may not realise is that the job of the intelligence officer involves a lot of writing.

Many of the institutions tasked with collecting intelligence train their officers extensively in this particular skill. It is from well-written intelligence reports and analyses that allow for action to be taken by the powers that be. In fact, many retired intelligence officers went on to become very successful and famous authors, among them — Ian Fleming, John Le Carre, Roald Dahl, Graham Greene and Stella Rimington.

There are many types of writers. Journalists and authors are the obvious ones. But there are also those who edit and copywrite. These perhaps form the bulk of those who write full time for a living. But there are also many, perhaps even you, who may have unintentionally signed up to be a writer. Many jobs may be silent on the fact that to achieve success, you also need to be a good writer.

Think about the last assignment or task you had completed. How much writing did that require? Are you able to communicate well via the written word that will in turn provide you an edge and allow your career to progress? Writing takes practice. It requires a conscious effort to improve. Take the time to reflect on how much writing you may have been doing or should be doing in your chosen career path. Have you chosen the path of the unintentional writer? If you have, then the time is ripe to work on and improve your writing skills.

Writing takes practice. It requires a conscious effort to improve.