Skip to content
Writing Style Library

Definitional

Leads with a definition and elaborates through its facets, edge cases, and what-it-is-not - the definition is the load-bearing first move.

Definitional

Section titled “Definitional”

Definitional writing puts the definition first and then tests it. The opening sentence or paragraph names what the thing is - precisely enough that the reader could use the definition to decide whether a given example counts. Everything that follows refines or stresses that definition: the facets it has, the edge cases it survives, the adjacent things it is not. The definition is not a summary at the end; it is the load-bearing first move, and the rest of the piece earns it.

The discipline of definitional writing is the negative space. A good definition is as much about what the term excludes as what it includes. “Refactoring is changing the structure of code without changing its behavior” only does its work if the reader understands that changing behavior would not count - and the piece must show that, often through cases that look like refactoring but are not. The “what it is not” section is where the definition is tested under load.

Definitional writing is the form of the glossary entry, the concept page, the “what is X” article. It fails when the definition is vague enough that no example could fail it, and when the elaboration loses the thread by drifting into adjacent topics. A reader who finishes a definitional piece should be able to apply the definition to a new case - that is the test of whether the piece worked.

Structural conventions

Section titled “Structural conventions”
  • The definition appears in the opening, often the first sentence, and is precise enough to discriminate cases
  • The body elaborates the definition through facets, components, or distinguishing features - not through narrative or argument
  • At least one section addresses what the term is not, with concrete adjacent cases that fail the definition
  • Examples are used to test the definition rather than to illustrate atmosphere - each example should be answerable as “does this count or not?”
  • The piece does not end on a new claim; it ends on a refined or stress-tested version of the opening definition

When to use

Section titled “When to use”

Glossary and concept reference pages, “what is X” introductory articles, disambiguation between similar terms, foundational documentation that other docs will build on.

When not to use

Section titled “When not to use”

Narrative or experiential writing, argumentative pieces where the term is contested, material covering questions across many concepts (use FAQ instead), devotional or reflective writing.

Pairs well with

Section titled “Pairs well with”

technical-writer, diataxis-explanation, technical-reference

Often confused with

Section titled “Often confused with”

diataxis-explanation: Diataxis explanation can use any structure - narrative, comparison, analogy, model-building - to convey understanding of a concept. Definitional commits to a specific structural move: lead with a precise definition, then test and elaborate it. A diataxis explanation might include a definition; a definitional piece is built around one.

Instruction

Section titled “Instruction”
Write using definitional structure. Lead with the definition - the first sentence or short
opening paragraph names what the thing is, precisely enough that the reader could use the
definition to decide whether a given example counts. Elaborate through the definition's facets,
components, or distinguishing features rather than through narrative or argument. Include a
section on what the term is not, with concrete adjacent cases that fail the definition. Use
examples to test the definition, not to add atmosphere - each example should be answerable as
"does this count or not?" End on a refined or stress-tested version of the opening definition,
not on a new claim.
Section titled “Related”

Pairs well with

Section titled “Pairs well with”

Technical Writer, Diataxis Explanation, Technical Reference

Avoid with

Section titled “Avoid with”

Storyteller, Pastoral

Often confused with

Section titled “Often confused with”

Diataxis Explanation

Examples

Section titled “Examples”

What an async-first standup is

Section titled “What an async-first standup is”

Definition. An async-first standup is a daily team ritual in which each member posts a short, structured status update in a shared written channel during their own working hours, with the explicit expectation that no synchronous meeting will replace or repeat the post. The post is the standup. The channel is the room. The artifact persists.

That definition does work. It rules out several things that get called async standups but are not.

What it is not

Section titled “What it is not”

It is not a sync standup that some people skip. A team that has a 9am Pacific meeting and tells the Bangalore engineers “just post in Slack if you cannot make it” does not have an async standup. It has a sync standup with a second-class participation tier. The default is still the meeting. The text post is a fallback.

It is not a status report sent to a manager. A status report flows upward to one reader. The async standup flows laterally to a team that reads each other. The audience is the difference.

It is not “we use Slack.” Tool is not format. A team can run a Slack-native async standup or a Notion-native one or a Linear-native one. The defining property is the structure of the ritual, not the surface it appears on.

It is not the absence of synchronous contact. Most teams running async standups still meet synchronously, for retros, planning, demos, or weekly social calls. Going async on the daily standup does not mean going async on everything.

The required facets

Section titled “The required facets”

Three properties have to be present for the definition to hold.

  1. A fixed structure. The team agrees on the fields. For this team: yesterday, today, blockers. Three fields, not three paragraphs. Structure makes the post scannable and reduces the cognitive load of writing it.

  2. A posting window, not a posting moment. “By 10am local” is a window. “At 9am sharp” would defeat the purpose - it would re-create the synchronous burden that motivated the change. The window has to be wide enough to accommodate the actual variance in how people start their days.

  3. A clear escalation path. Blockers cannot just sit in the post. The @mention is the mechanism. If the post says “blocked on X, @Sarah” and Sarah does not respond within her working hours, there is a defined next step (escalate to channel). Without escalation, the async standup degrades into a write-only ritual.

The edge cases

Section titled “The edge cases”

Edge case 1: A teammate forgets to post. The post is missing. Does this count as a skipped standup? Treat it like a skipped sync standup: noticeable, addressable, not catastrophic. Two misses in a week is a signal, not a violation.

Edge case 2: Someone posts but no one reads. This is the failure mode the definition has to guard against. If the team is writing into a channel that nobody opens, the ritual is dead. The team lead reading and reacting to posts (a one-line “saw this, ack” or an emoji) is the cheap fix.

Edge case 3: A blocker that needs the group, not one person. The @mention pattern handles 1-to-1 blockers. For 1-to-many blockers, the right move is a follow-up thread or a 15-minute call. The async standup is not a substitute for the call, it is the trigger for it.

Edge case 4: A genuinely synchronous moment is required. Release coordination, incident response, a difficult cross-team decision. These were never standup work. Going async on the standup does not change what they require.

Why the precision matters

Section titled “Why the precision matters”

A team that adopts an async-first standup without being precise about what it is will end up with a vague hybrid: half the team treating it as a status report, half treating it as optional, the sync meeting quietly reappearing as “just a quick sync to align.” Precision is not pedantry. It is the difference between adopting a new ritual and slowly drifting back to the old one.