Recommendation-First Writing
Lead with the call, label the context, and never hide a point of view inside a neutral-looking pros-and-cons list.
- Difficulty
- Moderate
- Time to result
- ~weeks to results
- Steps
- 5
- Confidence
- 90%
Business writing fails in two ways: it buries the conclusion under the reasoning, and it interleaves decisions, FYIs and background so the reader can't tell what they're being asked to respond to. Kao's structure puts the most important point at the top, then a labelled 'Context:' block below for anyone who wants the thinking. She adds a second rule: never write a pros-and-cons list that pretends to be neutral when you actually have an opinion — state the recommendation, then give the honest downsides.
Origin
Kao's own writing practice, drawn from studying the craft of writing (she recommends 'It Was the Best of Sentences, It Was the Worst of Sentences' by June Casagrande and HBR's 'Better Business Writing'). The top-line-first structure is the military BLUF ('bottom line up front') convention, which Lenny taught in his course, and is closely related to Barbara Minto's Pyramid Principle from McKinsey.
Core principles
- 01Structure so a reader who already agrees can stop reading, and a reader who doesn't can keep going.
- 02A sentence always carries a point of view — don't let it be an accidental one.
- 03A pros-and-cons list implies you are weighting both sides equally and objectively; if you're not, the reader senses it and stops trusting you.
- 04Being direct about what you're advocating for — while naming the downsides — builds trust rather than costing it.
- 05Precision of language is a craft skill, not a social-media growth hack.
How to run it
- 1
Open with the TL;DR
Put the most important point — the recommendation or conclusion — at the very top. The reader should know what you want before they know why.
Watch out In external or customer-facing writing, a blunt 'bottom line: here's where we're at' can read as aggressive. Soften the register while keeping the structure.
- 2
Label the context block
Write 'Context:' and put the multiple paragraphs of rationale, thought process and how you got to the decision underneath it. Anyone who already agrees can stop at the top.
Pro tip The explicit label is what lets readers spend their time well — it tells them exactly where the optional part begins.
- 3
Separate decisions, asks and FYIs
Split action items and decisions out from the background, factors and thought process instead of interweaving them. Make it visually obvious which is which.
Pro tip Ask: from this message, can the reader tell exactly what they're being asked to chime in on? If not, split it further.
Watch out Kao names interleaving as the worst failure mode, and says it happens a lot.
- 4
Audit the sentence for an accidental point of view
Re-read what you wrote and ask whether the phrasing already leads the reader to a conclusion. If it does and that is your recommendation, good — make it explicit. If it does and you're actually undecided, rewrite for a genuinely objective response.
Pro tip The clean self-test Kao uses on teammates' drafts: 'Is that your recommendation?'
- 5
If you have an opinion, state it, then give honest downsides
Replace the falsely-neutral pros-and-cons list with: 'My recommendation is X. Here are the pros and cons of that, and here are the risks.'
Watch out A pros-and-cons list that omits inconvenient cons makes the reader suspicious and they can't trust you anymore.
In the wild
A teammate asked Kao for feedback on a Slack message about whether to change the offsite location. As phrased, the obvious conclusion was to stick with the current one. Kao asked whether that was her recommendation — it wasn't; she was genuinely open. They first reworked it to get an objective response, then decided a recommendation would actually be easier for the reader, and reworked it again so the recommendation was intentional rather than accidental.
→ The message went from unknowingly skewing the answer to deliberately guiding it — the point of view became a choice, not an accident.
Lenny presented a pros-and-cons list to his team while clearly having an opinion; the list was visibly skewed. His manager told him to either be genuinely unbiased or just say what he thought they should do and why.
→ The same correction Kao gives: the structure of a pros-and-cons list is a promise of objectivity, and breaking it costs trust.
Common mistakes
The rigged pros-and-cons list
The format implies equal, objective weighting. When it's skewed and inconvenient cons are left out, the reader notices, becomes suspicious, and can no longer trust you — the exact opposite of the persuasion you were attempting.
Interleaving decisions with context
Action items, decisions, thought process, factors and downsides all randomly interwoven leaves the reader unable to tell what is FYI, what is background, and what they're being asked to respond to.
Learning writing only by mimicking Twitter
Copying what other people do to drive engagement is useful only to a point. Without the craft — sentence mechanics, logic, precision — you accidentally mislead people because you didn't know your phrasing could mislead them.
Is it for you?
Best for
PMs, operators and managers writing decision docs, Slack messages and email to busy internal stakeholders
Not ideal for
Cold external or customer-facing communication where an abrupt bottom-line-up-front opener reads as aggressive without softening
From the transcript
“so I'll usually put the most important point at the top the tldr if you will the gist and then I'll say context colon”
“the structure of a pro and con list implies”
“whereas if you do a pros and cons list but at the top you say my recommendation is X here's pros and cons of that”
“the worst which happens a lot is mixing all of those things with the action item or decision”
From the episode
Persuasive communication and managing up
Wes Kao (Maven, Seth Godin, Section4)