How a Free Tool Saves Time and Reduces Costly Rework

In 2019 I moved from the Netherlands to New Zealand to live there for a while.

I started working full-time for an irrigation installer as a project engineer.

Although English is my second language. I was fairly good at it. I could communicate easily in social interactions. But, “technical English” was something different. That needed work.

With "technical English" I mean terms for certain tools, parts, materials and other industry-specific words I needed for my engineering work. You don’t learn all those in school or by watching English spoken movies.

Because of this, typing emails took much longer than it should.

You might say, it doesn’t sound like a big problem since I was on a salary. But I cared because the to-do list grew longer and longer to the point where I started earlier and left later. This was unpaid.

Also, I was not always confident I could get my message across with words. This can be expensive if you are a project engineer. For example, if I send an email to a serviceman to do something the following day and he misunderstands what I typed, it could lead to expensive rework.

And of course, for most project work I create drawings the serviceman can follow. But if you are a technical professional, you know how it can go if a system breaks down, it needs to be fixed. And fast. Not always time for fancy CAD drawings!

Do you ever experience frustrations because of miscommunication in your technical work? Do you find yourself in back-and-forth email exchanges trying to explain something?

It actually can be stressful if you're not sure your message got across clearly.

There is a simple tactic and free solution that has helped me a lot, and I believe it can help you too. Let me show you.

Visual Communication

To get my point across in emails and quotations I started using visual communication a lot.

It must have been because of my CAD design background that I came up with this idea.

So instead of me sending just text saying to the serviceman: "Can you make sure you glue a PVC threaded spigot and a threaded cap in both PVC tee pieces which are located at eye height in water technical area 2? Walk straight, then…" and so forth.

I would write a small section of text and add helpful visual: "Can you make sure you glue a PVC threaded spigot and a threaded cap in both PVC tee pieces which are located at eye height in water technical area 2?

The tee piece look like this:

This is just an irrigation related-example. But I hope you can see that this is easily applicable to your situation.

This is why I think using visuals to communicate (technical) information is so powerful.

• One visual can replace big sections of text
• Visual communication reduces language barriers
• You'll spend less time writing back-and-forth emails
• Clear visuals reduce expensive mistakes and misunderstandings
• The sender and receiver feel more confident the message is understood

These benefits make visual communication a great tool for anyone who emails a lot and makes proposals. Let me show you a simple and free tool that makes this easy.

Greenshot - A Free Screenshot Tool Optimised for Productivity

The tool I use for making screenshots and to add text to it is Greenshot.

Here is a link to it: Greenshot

It’s free.

Go to the link and download it onto your computer.

Once you’ve got the tool on your computer, you can use it by going to the bottom right corner and look for the Geenshot logo → right mouse click on the logo → click on Capture region → drag a region → once you click, a pop-up will appear and the Greenshot tool will open. It’s time add instructions.

You can draw lines, arrows, circles rectangles, write text and more. For this example I draw red arrows pointing to the TEEs and add a text block in red too. This stands out. Once finished you can save it on your computer or you can copy and paste it into an email for example.

Below are examples of other drawing and writing features that are included in the tool.

What is super handy to set up is a keyboard shortcut for the Capture Region feature. I use Control + G. You can do that in Preferences. This makes the process much faster.

You might wonder: “Why not just use the Snipping Tool or Paint?”

The biggest benefit I found is that in Greenshot you can edit the text whenever you want. In Paint you can not edit the text after you click out of the text block. And the Snipping Tool does not have a text feature.

In summary, Greenshot allows you to be more flexible and offers a couple more features.

I’m not affiliated with them.

• It saves me time typing
• I just like the tool and use it daily
• I got good feedback when I started using it
• I’m more confident my message gets across

Give it a try.

But even if you are not planning to use the tool, I encourage you to introduce visual communication to your workflow. Once you get the hang of how to use these tools, you will be more productive and better understood. Because who wants to read big sections of email text? Me neither.

If you need help or have other questions, reach out!

Action Points

Here are the key steps to improve your online communication:

• Download Greenshot for free
• Set up a keyboard shortcut (like Control + G)
• Add screenshots to your emails and documentation instead of just long text
• Play around with the features until you can use them well
• Save the images or paste them directly into your emails or documentation

Give it a try and you'll quickly see how much quicker and clearer your communication becomes.