Writing Memos That Hold Up

// 01The regulation, verbatim

Effective Army writing is understood by the reader in a single rapid reading and is clear, concise, and well-organized in accordance with PL 111-274 [Plain Writing Act of 2010]. Two essential requirements include putting the main point at the beginning of the correspondence (bottom line up front) and using the active voice.

AR 25-50 ¶1-38

Keep sentences short. The average length of a sentence should be about 15 words. Write paragraphs that, with few exceptions, are no more than 10 lines. Write one-page letters and memorandums for most correspondence. Use enclosures for additional information.

AR 25-50 ¶1-39, p.7-8

Type "MEMORANDUM FOR" on the third line below the office symbol. Write to the office that is expected to complete the action.

AR 25-50 ¶2-4a(5), pp.8-9

Use only one subject and write the subject in 10 words or less, if possible.

AR 25-50 ¶2-4a(6), p.9

Begin the signature block at the center of the page on the fifth line below the authority line. If the document has no authority line, begin the signature block on the fifth line below the last line of the text.

AR 25-50 ¶6-4b, pp.53-58

Use the MFR to show the authority or basis for an action taken. Also, use the MFR to document informal meetings or telephone conversations when official business was conducted.

AR 25-50 ¶2-7, pp.9-10

// 02What this means in practice

You are going to sign a lot of memos this year. GOMORs, flag actions, counseling references, requests for exception, MFRs documenting a decision you made in a five-minute hallway conversation. Every one of them is a record. Someone above you, or a board years from now, is going to read it cold — no context, no tone of voice, just the words on the page. AR 25-50 exists so that when that happens, the memo still holds up.

Start with the two rules that matter most: bottom line up front, and active voice. The regulation is blunt about it — "two essential requirements include putting the main point at the beginning of the correspondence... and using the active voice." Notice it doesn't say this is a style preference. It calls these essential. If your first paragraph is throat-clearing — background, context, the history of the issue — before you get to what you actually want the reader to do, you've buried the lede on a document that's supposed to be readable in a single pass. Say what you need, then explain why.

Active voice isn't a grammar-class nitpick either. It's about who did what. "The test was passed by SGT Jones" hides the actor behind the object. "SGT Jones passed the test" puts the person who acted at the front of the sentence, in five words instead of seven. When you're writing something like a relief-for-cause memo or a rebuttal, passive voice quietly erases accountability — "mistakes were made," "the deadline was missed" — and a reviewing authority will notice the dodge even if they can't name it.

Length discipline is not a suggestion either. The regulation gives you actual numbers: sentences average about 15 words, paragraphs run no more than 10 lines, and "write one-page letters and memorandums for most correspondence." If your memo is spilling onto page two, that's a signal — not that the situation is complicated, but that you haven't cut it down yet. Use an enclosure for supporting detail and keep the memo itself tight enough that a commander can read it once and understand exactly what's being asked.

The format rules aren't cosmetic either, and this is where new commanders and 1SGs trip most often, because you learned to write in a world where formatting was somebody else's job — an S1 clerk, an admin NCO, a template. Now it's you. "MEMORANDUM FOR" goes on the third line below the office symbol, addressed to the office expected to act — not necessarily the person, the office. Your subject line gets one subject, ten words or less, no decorative language. And the signature block isn't just "put your name at the bottom" — it begins at the center of the page, on the fifth line below the last line of text (or below the authority line, if there is one). That's a precise, countable rule, not a feel. Get it wrong and it reads as sloppy even if the substance is airtight — and on a document that might get scrutinized by a promotion board, an IG, or a lawyer, sloppy formatting invites someone to read the substance more skeptically too.

One more distinction that trips people up constantly: the Memorandum for Record is not a memo with the addressee deleted. It's a different format entirely, with no "MEMORANDUM FOR" line at all. You use an MFR to document the authority or basis for something you did, or to capture what happened on a phone call or in an informal meeting where official business got conducted. If you had a hallway conversation with your brigade commander about why you're pulling someone's flag, and you want that decision documented, that's an MFR — office symbol, date, subject, then straight into the body explaining the background and the authority for the action. Don't try to force a MEMORANDUM FOR line onto it. It doesn't have one, and adding one doesn't make it more official — it makes it the wrong format.

Last thing, and it's easy to forget: every piece of correspondence needs a point of contact line, in the last paragraph of the body — your grade or civilian prefix, name, position, phone, and email. It's not decoration. It's how the next person in the chain knows who to call when they have a question about what you wrote, instead of routing it back through three layers to find you.

None of this is about bureaucratic box-checking for its own sake. A memo that follows this format reads as competent before anyone even gets to your argument. One that doesn't reads as careless — and on documents where someone's career or your own decision-making is on the line, careless is the last impression you want to leave.

// 03What most get wrong

The single biggest miss is burying the bottom line. New commanders and 1SGs — especially ones coming from a world where someone else drafted the memo — tend to write the way they'd explain something out loud: background first, context second, the actual point somewhere in paragraph three. AR 25-50 flips that. The regulation calls BLUF and active voice the two essential requirements of effective Army writing, not stylistic nice-to-haves. If a reader has to get through two paragraphs of history before they find out what you're asking for or reporting, you've already failed the "understood in a single rapid reading" standard the regulation sets.

The second-most-common miss is treating the Memorandum for Record as just an addressed memo with the addressee line deleted. It isn't. The MFR is a structurally distinct format — no MEMORANDUM FOR line, period — used specifically to document the authority behind a decision or to capture what happened in an informal meeting or phone call. If you're documenting your own decision-making trail (why you flagged someone, why you recommended an action), that's almost always an MFR, not a memo addressed to yourself.

// 04Regulations cited in this lesson

• AR 25-50 ¶1-38
• AR 25-50 ¶1-39, p.7-8
• AR 25-50 ¶2-4a(5), pp.8-9
• AR 25-50 ¶2-4a(6), p.9
• AR 25-50 ¶6-4b, pp.53-58
• AR 25-50 ¶2-7, pp.9-10

// 05More in Adverse Actions for New Commanders & 1SGs

• Initiating a Flag Correctly
• Issuing a GOMOR — Filing Determination, Due Process
• Article 15 from the Commander's Chair
• AR 15-6 Investigations — When You Need One
• Relief for Cause — the AR 15-6 Prerequisite
• QMP/QSP Awareness

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