About Us
The Company
Write It Well was founded in 1980 to help people in the workplace communicate clearly and work together effectively. We have one guiding principle: business writing is a leadership skill.
E-mail and other forms of fast-paced electronic communication can expose the weaknesses of any organization’s communicators. The ability to write clearly and effectively is necessary to demonstrate an analytic capacity to understand clients’ and customers’ needs in today’s business world.
Clear written communication can inspire change and drive growth. We don’t waste time on dusty writing traditions; instead, we focus on what matters for your business’s credibility and its unique, evolving needs.
We have three operating principles:
- The quality of Write It Well’s products and services will not be compromised. It might be easier to create something once and put it on the shelf forever; instead, we constantly update our offerings. Our content stays fresh, relevant, and ready to deploy across a variety of print and electronic platforms.
- Write It Well offers a full range of services focused exclusively on written communication. We are the leading global, full-service training firm for writing skills. We have seen thousands of different forms, procedures, processes, memos, reports, and other documents with highly specific functions.
- Content can — and often should — be customized. We can adapt or build materials so they’re sharply tailored to your specific business needs. We can add logos, job-relevant examples and assignments, and company-specific guidelines. Our customizations are efficient because we begin with a vast library of ready-to-go content and extensive familiarity with many client industries.
Here’s our three-step approach to creating customized trainings:
- We assess writing samples and review learning objectives with stakeholder, ensuring that a training’s curriculum fits your organization’s needs.
- During the training, we encourage active participant engagement through discussion and practice.
- Participants apply concepts and techniques by evaluating, editing, planning, and drafting job-related documents. The instructor then offers one-to-one feedback.
Contact Information
We have offices in the San Francisco Bay Area and in Singapore, and we’d love to hear from you. To e-mail us, please use this easy online form or call us at (510) 868-3322 or 65 9648 7727.
Our Clients
Our San Francisco Bay Area office services to clients in San Francisco, the East Bay, and Silicon Valley as well as clients in New York and Philadelphia. Our Singapore office services clients in Singapore, India, Thailand, Indonesia, the Middle East, and Europe.
Our clients and customers are multinational corporations including the Bank of America Merrill Lynch, HP, McDonald’s, and Nestlé; top ranked business schools including UC Berkeley’s Haas School of Business and the National University of Singapore; leading construction and engineering companies; and innovative and resourceful nonprofit organizations and government agencies.
Click here for a complete list of our clients.
You can also read case studies about the blended learning programs that Write It Well has recently developed for Berkeley-based Satellite Housing and a Fortune 15 computer manufacturer and distributor.
The People
Natasha Terk, Managing Director
Author of Professional Writing Skills: A Write It Well Guide, Writing Performance Reviews: A Write It Well Guide, co-author of The Due Diligence Tool, and contributing editor of E-Mail: A Write It Well Guide, Natasha Terk, president of Write It Well, leads the firm’s business operations and strategy.
A recognized expert on business communication in the workplace, Natasha leads workshops, webinars, and consulting engagements for clients including IKEA, Hitachi Data Systems, Hewlett Packard, Granite Construction, Check Point Software Technologies, and the Port of Oakland. Her focus is on developing job-relevant, engaging training solutions that help people work more effectively and efficiently.
Natasha served as program officer at the Packard Foundation, as a management consultant with La Piana Consulting, and taught Business Writing at the University of California at Berkeley. Natasha holds masters degrees from the University of San Francisco and the University of Manchester, UK.
Program Development and Delivery
Hope Timberlake, Trainer
Hope has almost ten years’ experience as an executive-level coach for communication skills. In her workshops, she helps busy professionals write and present clearly, concisely, and persuasively.
Hope has facilitated sessions in a variety of industries, including advertising, banking, financial services, technology, and consumer packaged goods. Her clients include Microsoft, Bank of America, Schwab, Clorox, Organic Inc., Brocade Software, and VMware.
Before working as a communication-skills trainer, Hope was a program director at UCSF. At the university, she was responsible for program operations, staffing, fundraising, media outreach, and community collaborations. Hope earned an MA from UC Berkeley in 1999 and earned her BA from Duke in 1994.
Roshini Ganesan, Trainer
Roshini is based in Singapore and has facilitated lively, exciting, effective workshops for hundreds of bankers, engineers, and professionals; these workshop participants have represented all levels of the information technology, oil and gas, manufacturing, and engineering fields. During her past decade as a corporate trainer, Roshini has worked in ten countries, including the United States, Singapore, Japan, Australia, India, and Hong Kong.
Roshini completed an undergraduate degree in the United Kingdom and an MBA in the United States.
Marya Danihel, Online and On-Site Trainer
Marya has been a creative, clear communicator in business and the arts for more than 20 years. She joined Write It Well in 2011, bringing extensive experience in both on-site and online course design and delivery, as well as a background in journalism and radio and television broadcasting. Her industry experience is unusually broad, encompassing law, finance, government, biotechnology, engineering, and transportation.
Marya is a specialist in strategic business communication. She has helped thousands of people at Fortune 500 companies and major nonprofit institutions craft compelling presentations, proposals, and other crucial business documents. She also has written or edited many articles, scripts, nonfiction books, and newsletters.
A resident of New Hampshire, Marya pursues music and gardening in her spare time. She is the artistic director of Vintage Voices, a vocal trio that performs Victorian popular music. Her weekly radio show, The Gentle Gardener, airs on a local FM station.
Josephine Bellaccomo, Trainer
Author, communications coach, and consultant Josephine Bellaccomo has 16 years’ corporate training and coaching experience. It centers on business writing for impact, pitch consulting and presentation skills, and leadership and management.
In communications consulting, Jo focuses on financial and professional services, technology, advertising, and nonprofit clients. Her clients have included Microsoft, JP Morgan Chase, Bank of America, Goldman Sachs, Merrill Lynch, KPMG, Citibank, Deutsche Bank, and Ernst & Young.
Jo led professional development and technical training at Microsoft Advertising, directed an extensive training project at NYC’s Human Resources Administration, coached clients at several communication consultancies, and taught writing and literature at Long Island University and other colleges. She earned her BA from the University of San Francisco and her MA from New York University.
Writing & Editing Services
Christopher Disman, Editorial Director
Christopher edits and cowrites our expanding line of books, e-books, and e-learning modules. He designs Web- and print-ready files in Captivate and InDesign. He analyzes document sets and maps out patterns of problematic and effective writing. He helps craft training agendas and customizes the instructional design to each participant group’s distinctive writing challenges.
He compiles organizational style guides and edits documents for Write It Well clients. For instance, he might suggest how a team could rearrange chapters for a half-written manual — cleanly dividing major themes. Or he might suggest revisions to weed out redundancy and clarify murky passages in a document one writer is almost ready to send.
He also offers editorial coaching for individual writers — commenting, without text revision, on documents’ clarity, concision, and organization. For instance, he might suggest ways one job applicant’s cover letter and resume could better match a job description by focusing more on problem solving than on project management. Or he might analyze a proposal’s effectiveness in light of an RFP.
All these services help our clients feel confident about the writing they send out. Write It Well is proud to help clients identify strategies to solve the writing challenges that come up most often in their fields and positions.
Aditi Mehra, Director of Consulting Services
Aditi is a Singapore-based organization and strategy expert. She spent nine years working with Fortune 500 companies in the professional services industry where her areas of responsibilities included global and regional project management and change management. Aditi has led several large-scale projects involving Microsoft SharePoint, Oracle Hyperion, SAP Business Objects, etc. She delivered process improvements using LEAN and Six Sigma methodologies at GE Capital International Services and Jones Lang LaSalle. Aditi has also worked on outsourcing and training and sales support projects which tapped her skills in the areas of organization development, knowledge management, and sales force effectiveness.
Aditi is a TTT level 1 certified trainer and conducts various classroom and online trainings as a part of change management programs and consulting assignments. She earned an MBA from the National University of Singapore (NUS Business School) with a specialization in Strategy and Organization.
Business and Operations Management
Kirsten Hosemann, Business and Operations Manager
Kirsten helps the Write It Well team meet the varied needs of our corporate, nonprofit, and government clients around the world. Her extensive experience in customer service and project management comes from more than eight years of dedicated service to the Oakland Unified School District as a parent, PTA Board Member, event organizer, and classroom volunteer. She has two years’ experience as a Human Resources Manager for an Internet company and three years’ experience as a flight attendant and supervisor for United Airlines.
Kirsten holds a BA in American Studies from Yale University. She lives in Oakland, CA, with her husband and two boys.
