I studied journalism in college, and wrote a great deal in the (now archaic, maybe?) style of the inverted pyramid, and learned about writing a great lead.

An interesting thing I read about writing recently is the enormous difference between writing as if you are speaking to yourself, as juveniles typically do in school when they are asked to write a 300-word essay, and writing with an audience and goal in mind, which is everything in business writing.

You last paragraph succinctly states the technique.