The Business Writing Course

1. About this Class: Your success in business depends on your ability to communicate. If you can't write clearly, you won't get hired. And if you can't write clearly, you won't last long enough in a position to be considered for promotion. If you want to get ahead in your career, you must learn to write. Well. Welcome to the online business writing course. I'm your instructor, Alan sharp. I teach business people around the world how to write clearly, concisely and convincingly. I landed my first paying writing assignment in 1987, and I taught my first business writing workshop in 1989. Since then, I've helped hundreds of individuals advance their careers by improving their business writing. Now, I'd like to help you. Here are four ways you benefit by taking this course. Number 1, you improve a threshold skill. A survey of a 120 major American corporations employing nearly 8 million people concludes that in today's workplace, writing is a threshold skill for hiring and promotion among salaried employees. Effective business writing is your ticket to professional opportunity and poor writing is your ticket to oblivion. Benefit number two, you advance your career. Half of all companies take writing ability into account when making promotion decisions. You can't move up without writing skills. Benefit number 3, you sell your ideas. We have the electric light bulb today because Thomas Edison persuaded others to finance his ideas and bring them to fruition. All brilliant inventions start in someone's head, but the only ones that make it to market are the ones that the inventor can communicate to stake holders in writing. When you improve your business writing skills, you improve your ability to sell your ideas and yourself to others, whether those people are team members, management, or investors. Finally, benefit number for you, boost your credibility. Grammatical mistakes in your emails, reports, and proposals are deadly. And so our spelling mistakes and punctuation mistakes, they make you appear unprofessional and ignorant. Improving your grammar, spelling, and punctuation improves your credibility. The online business writing course is divided into modules. Module 1 is an introduction to the world of business writing. Module 2 teaches you the first step in business writing, which is how to organize your thoughts. Module three teaches you the second step in business writing, and that is writing your first draft. Module 4 teaches you the third and final step in business writing, which is editing your first draft. The ideal student for the online business writing course is anyone who wants to advance their career by improving their writing at work. If you want to get hired or if you want to get promoted. And if poor writing is holding you back, then this course is for you. The online business running courses, practical. I pass on to you all that I've learned about effective business writing during my last three decades. As a writer, an editor, and a proofreader, I show you the most common mistakes that business people make in their writing today. And then I show you how to avoid these blunders in your writing at work. 2. Avoid the bureaucratic style: Way back in the 1990s, I spent a day teaching some bureaucrats who worked in Canada's federal government in Ottawa. My job was to teach them how to write using plain language. I needed my students to understand the difference between bureaucratic writing and plain language writing. So I put on the overhead projector a paragraph written in the bureaucratic style. The paragraph was pompous, long-winded, impersonal, and redundant. It looked something like this. Extended discussion of an improved and more robust mission statement that is aligned with the basic fundamental business objectives of this government department will require a clearly structured facilitated sessions conducted in full transparency and with the active participation of designated representatives from all departments, unquotes. Then I asked my class for a volunteer to translate that bureaucratic paragraph into plain language. No one in the class raised their hand. I thought perhaps they didn't understand the exercise. Paragraph explained is written in bureaucratese. It is pompous, long-winded, impersonal, and redundant. It's hard to understand. I need one of you to translate this hopeless paragraph into plain language. One of my students raised their hand and she said, but my colleagues and I can all understand this paragraph. It doesn't need translating. I could see that my exercise wasn't going to work with this audience. My students, we're so immersed in the bureaucratic writing style that they could no longer right, or even think in plain language. They could not translate a paragraph of gobbledy gook and doublespeak into plain language. So I decided to have some fun and I reversed the assignment. Okay, I said, instead of translating a piece of bureaucratic writing into plain language, I need you to translate a piece of plain language writing into bureaucratese. Here is your new assignment. Imagine that you are talking with one of your kids. I want you to suggest that the two of you go and see a movie tomorrow. But don't say that in the way you would normally say that to your child. Say it in the way that you would if you were writing a government memo. One of my students raised his hand immediately. Oh, he said, That's easy. This writer proposes that entertainment of the silver screen variety might be enjoyed by this writer and the person to whom this memo is addressed, not within the current 24-hour window, but instead during the 24 hour period that follows the current period, a response to this inquiry is requested, unquote. We all had a good laugh. My students could see how ridiculous their colleague sounded. Some of them could see where I was headed with this exercise. Okay, I said, Here's another exercise. Imagine that you're tucking one of your kids into bed at night. I want you to say, I love you the way you would if you were writing a government report. Another student raised her hand immediately. Oh, that's easy. That's easy. She said feelings of deep affection or had by me towards you. Now we all had a good laugh. How ridiculous to say feelings of deep affection or had by me towards you when you simply want to say is, I love you. That class was a turning point for me as an instructor. That day, I discovered that some writers feel an overwhelming pressure to take the simple and make it complex, to take the straightforward and make it convoluted to replace simple words with complex ones. In short, they feel compelled to write in a bureaucratic corporate style. These writers are terrified of the simple English sentence. They are afraid to state their ideas clearly and concisely. This sphere was best articulated by one of my students who was bilingual. I first think of what I want to say in French. She explained, then I translate it into English and then I translated into government writing. By government writing, she meant the stodgy, dense mumbo jumbo that is so typical of bureaucracies, scholarship and scientific writing, and even some corporate writing. You'll be glad to learn that during that workshop, my students learned how to write using simple words and simple sentences. But doing so didn't come easily. They had to fight the pressure to revert back to bureaucratese. Here are the eight characteristics of the bureaucratic style. Number one, it's overly formal. Bureaucratic writing contains words that are overly formal, such as whilst, hence here too. And thus, these words are RK isms that are out of style words from another era, probably the Edwardian era. These old-fashioned words make a business document sound theatrical, an artificial. Number 2, bureaucratic writing is designed to impress the reader with the writers erudition. Bureaucratic writers search for complicated, highfalutin ways of saying the simple. They care more about conveying their self-importance than they do about communicating with their readers. Bureaucratic writers never explain anything. Instead, they furnish an explanation. They call a janitor, a sanitation engineer. They never write the word. Apparently, when they can instead write, it would appear that. Number 3, bureaucratic writing involves nouns that are verbs in disguise. Bureaucratic writers are terrified, strong verbs. So instead of telling you to adjust the sales projections, bureaucratic writers recommend that you make and adjustments. They replaced the word consider with take into consideration. They never act, they take action. They never investigate when they can instead conduct an investigation. Number for multiple syllables when one is enough. Bureaucratic writers compose their emails, reports, and memos as though they are being paid by the syllable. They didn't ever used a single syllable word. When a multiple syllable word can be discovered. They will never offer you their help. That's one syllable. When they can instead offer you their assistance, that's three syllables. The number of their ideas is not many. It's numerous, that's three syllables. They never start anything, they always implement three syllables. Bureaucratic writing is long winded in saying the simple. Bureaucratic writers never say in one word what they can say in a phrase. Why write? Vp Smith couldn't attend the meeting until a mechanic fixed his car. When you can instead write the VP referred to as Smith, totally lack the ability to attend the meeting until such time as he visited a mechanic for the purpose of fixing his car. Number 6, redundancy. Bureaucratic writers are terrified of words. They don't trust nouns and verbs to do their job. They are afraid to leave them alone. So they modify them with adjectives and adverbs hoping to make their meaning clear. But all they do is pad their writing and make their sentences redundant. Bureaucratic writers never plan. They plan ahead. Now planning by definition is for something ahead. They never reach a conclusion. They reach a final conclusion and conclusions by definition, our final to them, imports are foreign imports. The incumbent is the current incumbent and the sky is blue in color. You see what I mean about them being redundant? Number 7, excessive, passive voice. The policy was adopted, decisions were reached, mistakes were made. Bureaucratic writers love the passive voice, the refuge of scoundrels who want to hide what happened. Disguise the identity of who acted, or take the emphasis off who acted. They will never tell you the committee voted on the policy. They will instead say the policy was voted on by the committee. Number 8. Buzzwords. Bureaucratic writing is characterized by euphemism and obstraction. Buzzwords are particularly popular. Sentences like this are common. Our agency offers a range of bleeding edge above the line products that help CMOs leverage synergies for global brands, enabling them to optimize solutions that pick low hanging fruit, unquote. As you can see, writing in the bureaucratic style makes you sound pompous, long-winded, invasive, impersonal, and redundant. If those aren't your goals in your business writing, than avoid writing in the bureaucratic style. 3. Start with your reader: I have a brother-in-law who has been a farmer his entire adult life. He amazes me. He can weld, he can operate a backhoe. He can change the engine and attractor. I can't do any of those things. So I admire anyone who can. One day, I told my brother-in-law what I did for a living. I'm a writer. I said, I start each day with a blank computer screen and by noon, I have to fill it with words. That thought terrified my brother-in-law. Oh, I could never do your job. He said, I wouldn't even know where to start. If you are like many business people, when it comes to writing, you don't know where to start. You don't know what to write or how to write it, or how long to write it. If you don't know where to start, I recommend you start with your reader. Your reader is the one person who determines what you write, how you write it, and for how long you write it. You don't have to struggle with writer's block once you know who your reader is and what your reader expects from you. Remember, every one of your readers has expectations of you. Your job as a writer is to discover those expectations and meet them. This probably sounds all theoretical. So let me explain what I mean by way of an example. Let's say your company is getting a new chief executive officer. Her name is Sally Carruthers. She's coming to your firm from a competitor, sees the first woman to lead a firm of your kind. She is an engineer and she wants to kill some of your products and launch new ones. Imagine that your job is to write an internal memo that goes out to each department in your company telling them what to expect in the weeks ahead. Will you send everyone the same memo? Know? Consider your legal department, for example. Do they care that your new CEO is an engineer? Probably not. Do they care that she is coming from a competing firm and that she likely signed a non-disclosure agreements that may hinder her work with your company? Absolutely. They care about that. Your legal department has unique expectations of your announcement. Consider your marketing department. Do they care that your new CEO is the first woman to lead a company of your kind? Probably not. But do they care that she wants to acts some of your products in your product line? Absolutely. You care. Do they want to know what the CEO is? Proposed new products are going to be? Sure they do. Do they care that she is an engineer who understands your product line? Absolutely. Your readers in your marketing department have unique expectations of your announcements. Finally, what about your public relations departments? Do they care that your new CEO is an engineer when every other CEO in your industry is also an engineer? Probably not. But do they care that she is the first woman in a role like this? Absolutely, they do. That's a newsworthy story that they can pitch to the media. Your readers in your public relations department have unique expectations of your writing, of your announcement. As you can see, different readers have different expectations of your writing. So the first question you must ask yourself is what information your reader needs from you. Once you know who your reader is, you know what to say and what not to say. You know what is relevant and what is not relevant. And that is the main question you must answer when drafting any business document, how is what I'm writing relevant to my reader? Or you can pose this question as though it is coming from your reader. Why should I care about what you have to say in what you've written? The second reason for starting with your reader is to discover how much to write. Some of your readers need you to condense your message onto one page. All they want from you is an executive summary. Other readers need much more information from you, such as background information and details. Here's an example. Consider a typical annual report. Most shareholders start at the front of the report with the letter from the chair of the board. It contains an executive summary of the report. It gives them all the financial detail that they need. Most analysts, on the other hand, need a lot more information than they find in the letter from the chair or in the executive summary. So they spend most of their time at the back of the annual report poring over the charts and tables and graphs. Once you know who your reader is, you know how much to write and you know how little to write. The third and final reason to start with your reader is to decide what tone to use. Different readers expect different tones. If you are writing a memo to your boss, for example, and if you work in a large firm and rarely see your boss, they are tone will likely err on the side of being formal. On the other hand, if you work for a small firm and if you work shoulder to shoulder with your boss every day, then your tone will likely be on the informal side of formal. For example. Look at these two examples of the same message. In the left column, you have the formal version. Global Business Services revenue of $16,348 million increase 2.1% compared to the prior year. The company continues to transform this business and shift its practices to digital, cognitive and Cloud, unquote. In the right column, you have the informal version. Great news Sam. Our revenue and Global Business Services grew by a whopping 2.1% compared to last year, we reached $16,348 million exclamation mark. We continue to transform our business, shifting our practices to additional cognitive cloud. Notice the change in tone. The formal example is impersonal. The informal version is personal. The formal example refers to an increase. The informal example refers to a whopping increase. The formal texts refers to the business division by name, Global Business Services, and refers to the company. The informal texts refers to the business division and the company as we. The first example is formal, the second example is collegial. Your job as a writer is to decide which tone to use. And you can only do that by determining who your reader is. One final thought. Once you know who your reader is, you know how technical you can be. Every industry, every business has its own peculiar vocabulary. You and your colleagues have your own jargon, acronyms and abbreviations. You know what these mean, but folks outside your circle do not. And there might even be folks in your company who do not know the meaning of every acronym or every abbreviation. Once you know who you are writing for, you know whether you can use jargon, acronyms and abbreviations without explaining them. But if in doubt, spell them out. Understanding your reader is vital in business writing. So before you pick up your pen or lay your fingers on your keyboard, decide who you are writing to. What do they expect from you? What are their goals and priorities? How well do they know your subjects? If you fail to understand your reader, you have a lot to lose. You can lose their attention. You can lose their respect, you can lose their business. Or to put it in a positive way. If you know who you are writing to. If you understand what they need from your writing and if you deliver what they want from you, you keep their attention, you earn their respect, and you keep their business. 4. Know your goal: Earl Nightingale, the American radio speaker and author, once said, people with goals succeed because they know where they're going. The same can be said of business writers. Business writers with goals succeed because they know where they're going. Which means that business writers fail when they don't have a goal, when they don't know where they are going. Every document that you write it work must have a goal. It must have an aim or purpose and intended results. This goal is something that takes place in the life of your reader, not yours. If you want to change behavior, if you want to change minds, if you want to pass on knowledge, you must give yourself a goal with every document that you write, not work. There are four goals to choose from. The first goal is to inform. Choose this goal if your aim is simply to pass on information, choose this goal if you know something that your reader or readers do not know. An example of this goal is a memo that states your latest sales figures or an email that describes a change to a policy or procedure. For example, you might craft a memo that states sales for Q3, we're $1.3 million. There's, this represents an increase of 1.3% over Q2 and a 3.8% increase of the same quarter last year. Here's another example. We have changed the way time sheets are submitted. As of April 15. All time sheets must be submitted to your manager, not human resources. You will know that your document has achieved his goal when your readers understand what you have told them. The second goal you can give your writing is to persuade. This is the goal you pick when you want to do more than simply inform your reader, you want to change their behavior. You don't just want your reader to know something new. You want them to do something new. You see this kind of writing all the time in sales letters, sales brochures, advertisements, and commercials. The writer has one goal to persuade you to buy the company's products or services. Proposals and press releases are also examples of writing that is designed to persuade. In your role as a writer at work, choose this goal when you want to persuade a colleague or a manager, a supplier, even an investor, to change their mind or their behavior. You will know your document has succeeded when you see changed attitudes or changed behavior. The third goal you can give your writing is to instruct or educate. An example of this goal is user manuals that describe how to use a piece of machinery. The main difference between this goal and goal number one is that the reader will perform differently. For example, using our first goal of informing, you can write a fact sheet that informs a worker about why customer service is important. Or you can write a document that instructs the worker on how to greet customers, serve customers, and answer customer inquiries. The first document informs, the second document instructs. You will know that your document has achieved its goal when the reader follows your instructions. The fourth and final goal you can have for your business writing is to record or to document. An example of this is meeting minutes. You may be asked to take notes during a meeting and to type these up after the meeting as official meeting minutes. Your goal is not to inform or persuade or instruct, but simply to record and document what took place during the meeting, such as what was discussed, what motions were made, what was voted on, and so on. You will know you have achieved your goal when your document captures completely and accurately everything that needed to be recorded or documented during the meeting. Let me show you an example of these four goals at work. Imagine that a company has launched a new product, a piece of agricultural machinery. A writer creates a fact sheet that describes the specification of the product, such as its length, its width, its height, horsepower, and torque. This document in forms. Another writer crafts a product brochure that describes the features and benefits of this new product and describes why it is better than competing products. This document persuades. Another writer, drops a user manual that teaches new owners had a setup, operate, and maintain the equipment. This documents instructs every quarter the sales team sits down with the engineering team and discusses how well this new product is doing in the marketplace, how well it is selling. And they also discuss how the product can be improved. A writer sits in on one of these meetings and takes notes and then turns these notes into meeting minutes. This document records now that you and I have looked at for goals that you can pick for your writing. We come to the hardest part of this process, and that is picking just one goal. Not three goals, not too goals, just one goal. This is hard because choosing a goal for your writing is the same as deciding why you are writing. So instead of asking yourself, what is my goal, ask yourself, why am I writing? What do I want my reader to know or to believe or to understand or to do after reading my document, answer these questions and you will know what your goal is. As Earl Nightingale observed, you will fail if you don't have a goal, but you will also fail if you have too many goals. So pick just one goal for every document you write. Your writing will be better for it, and your readers will appreciate it as well. They won't get lost. 5. Write your outline: Imagine that you're sitting in the international departures lounge at an airport. You're about to board a flight that will take you halfway around the world to a country you have never visited before. The steward at your gate comes on the public address system and makes the following unusual announcement. Ladies and gentlemen, we're about to start boarding. Sorry for the delay. Or Captain couldn't find his map and her on-board compass is broken, but never mind. Captain has a pretty good idea of where our destination is. And even though we will be flying across the ocean at night for 15 hours, he thinks he can get you to your destination without a map and without a compass. And without a GPS, please prepare for boarding. Would you board that plane? Of course, not. Every pilot needs a map. Every aircraft needs a working compass. No one should fly without them. In the world of business writing, every document whew right, needs an outline. Here. Outline helps you organize your thoughts before you start writing. It helps you discover where you are going and it keeps you on track until you reach your destination. Start with a blank piece of paper or an empty word documents. Write out your key message. What do you want your reader to understand or believe or do after reading your document? Write that down. A good practice is to write out your key messages. One sentence. After reading this document, my reader will ex. Writing your key message helps you stay focused. Your key message prevents you from Drift. It prevents you from wandering into topics that are not relevant to your goal. Everything you write must support your key message. Always identify your purpose for writing before you start writing. Stating your key message saves you lots of time and agony rewriting later, and it prevents a lack of direction from creeping into your contents. List your major points. Create a list of all the major points you want to make in your document. Do this as a brainstorming exercise as you think of a point, write it down. Don't worry about the order of your points. Just yet. Don't spend anytime organizing your thoughts. Just get them down on paper or onto your screen. One useful exercise is to act like a reporter. And asked yourself the five Ws and 1 H. Ask yourself who, what, where, when, why, and how, who are you writing to? What are you writing about? Why are you writing? Where is this applicable? When is this taking place? How will it happen? If you're addressing a problem? How should you describe it? How do you aim to solve it? If you're drafting a report, what is the background? What steps were taken? What are your findings? What are your recommendations? What is your conclusion? Don't worry at this stage about being grammatical or about writing in complete sentences. Just write your thoughts down in point form. You will flesh out these thoughts. Later on. As you continue, you'll discover the outlining isn't just a way to organize your existing ideas. Outlining helps you discover new ideas. As you capture your thoughts. In your outline, your mind thinks of other ideas and points that you want to include in your documents. Organize your thoughts. Arrange your thoughts in the order that you are going to write them. When you find a point down in your list that belongs at the top, move it to the top. Likewise, if you find a point at the start of your outline that really belongs somewhere else in your document, then move it down in your outline. I use the outlining tool in Microsoft Word for this, you'll notice that Microsoft Word lets you assign heading styles to your points, heading 1, heading to heading three, and so on. This lets you give your document a hierarchy that you can see easily at a glance. Set your main points as heading one. Set sub-points is heading to heading three and so on. Remember, as you write your points down and as you write your sub-points, do not start to write just yet. Put everything in point form. Only. Your only goal in outlining is to decide what you want to say and in what order you want to say it. How you say it comes later on. During the writing process. As you organize your thoughts, check to see that each point belongs where it is. As you review your outline multiple times, you'll discover that some points need to be revised, reworded to accurately say what you want to say. You'll also discover it. The some points need to be moved to other parts of your outline, other parts of your document. Do this as many times as you need to until your outline reflects what you want to say. Your outlines shouldn't have a lot of detail, but it shouldn't have anything missing either. It should, it should contain all of the main points and minor points that you want to make in your document written out in point form. It shouldn't have any gaps that you aim to fill in later once you start writing. One temptation with outlining is to say to yourself, oh, I know what I'm going to say in this section of the outline. I know each point I want to make, so I won't bother completing this part of the outline. I'll just write point 1, point 2, point 3 or blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, as a placeholder for the content that I'm going to write later. Don't do this. The whole reason for doing an outline is to give your document order and logic, this order and logic that your readers are going to appreciate. So if something is important enough to include in your document, include it in your outline if only in point form. Here are three rules to help you create a successful outlined. Rule. Number one, always know your key message. Always decide why you are writing your document. Always know what you are needing to communicate. This is your key message. Write it down. Rule number 2. State your key message. Immediately. Put the most important information at the start of your document. Don't make your reader read page after page or paragraph after paragraph without knowing the point you're trying to make. If you are making a recommendation, for example, state that recommendations at the start of your documents. If your document is lengthy, write an introduction or executive summary, state the recommendation and summarize how you justify that recommendation later on. In your documents. Rule number 3 only include points that support your key message. In the body of your document. Give the facts, the findings, the explanations that data, and the examples that support your key message only include those things that are relevant to your key message. Don't stray. Don't introduce new topics or new messages in your document. Once you finally get the hang of outlining, you'll discover that creating an outline helps you decide what you want to say. A good outline gives your document order and logic. It keeps you focused. And relevance. Outlines help you make your writing more clear and more compelling. And odd as this may seem, outlines speedup the writing process. It's kind of odd, but adding an extra step to your writing by outlining actually shortens your total running time. This is because, contrary to popular opinion, outlining is actually part of the composition process. Once you have analyzed your audience and selected an appropriate medium, you are ready to begin writing your outline. Your outline is like a blueprint or it's like a map. For your draft. It is a design that tells you how you will organize your message, how you will sequence your key ideas, and how you will support those ideas. In contrast to a draft, you are the audience of your outline. Beginning outlined by creating a list of information you think your readers need or expect. For example, if you are crafting a document about the Environmental Protection Agency's role in fluoride in drinking water. Your list might look like this. Explain what the EPA is doing about fluoride in drinking water. Define what fluoride is. Explain how Fluoride gets into drinking water. Lists some of the effects of fluoride includes specific data, refers to the safe water drinking ax. Next, organize the list into a map that guides your reader from point to point. Create an introduction, body and conclusion, and then decide how you will divide each topic into subtopics. Your outline might look like this. Part 1 is the introduction. Define fluoride. Part two. The body Explain how Fluoride gets into drinking water. Lists some of the effects of fluoride. Explain how fluoride is regulated, namely the 1970 for Safe Drinking Water Act, MCL, GS, maximum contaminant levels. Part 3, conclusion, describe the EPA standards. For a long, complex document. Use a format that includes Roman numerals like this to indicate the three main sections of introduction, body, and conclusion. Use indented capital letters like this to indicate the first level of subtopics. Then use indented Arabic numerals like this to indicate the next level of subtopics. Finally, use indented lowercase letters like this to indicate the third level of subtopics. This outlining strategy is known as alphanumeric notation. Other types of outlines, including full sentence outlines and decimal outlines, will also help you compose an effective design for your draft. After you complete your outline, you're ready to write your draft. 6. Structure your message: Every piece of business writing needs a structure. Whether you're writing a short email or a long proposal, whether you're crafting a detailed report or a simple brief memo you're writing needs a structure. The structure of your business writing is its basic design or architecture. It's the foundation on which your words are built to mix my metaphors, your structure gives your sentences and paragraphs a sense of direction. It ties them together and helps your reader make sense of what you've written. A good structure in your business writing guides your reader along a logical path, giving order to the information you're providing, giving them a, a map to guide them as they read your document. Choose your structure before you start writing. After you have gathered all of your notes, facts, data, and other information. And during this stage where you outline what you are going to write, choose your structure. Often, the information you want to convey suggests the structure you should choose. If you're writing an executive biography, for example, the obvious structure is chronological. You start with your subjects, early life and career, and you describe events and milestones and positions up to the present day. The same goes for writing business proposals. Typically, when you are responding to a request for proposals, the client decides the structure of your document that gives you a template to follow up a document that describes the structure you are to use in responding to their RFP, such as company description, project description, project scope, project timelines, budget, and evaluation. But when the information you are working with doesn't suggest a natural structure to follow, you must pick your own structure. Here are seven structures to choose from. Number 1 is the inverted pyramid. This is the structure that journalists use. It presents the most important and relevant information first, and it works its way down the pyramid to the least important information and less relevant material. The inverted pyramid structure was developed by journalists who worked for daily newspapers way, way back in the day of daily newspapers. The editors made their editorial decisions right up until the moment that the newspaper went to press. Often, a story had to be shortened to make room for another story or because there was not enough room on the page for the story in its entirety. So journalists began writing their stories using the inverted pyramid structure. And they still do so. Today. Pick up any newspaper or read any newspaper online. And you'll see that each story begins with the most important facts. The who, the, what, the why, the where, the when, and the how. The story then develops. Those points. Moving from the most compelling and most newsworthy material down in the article to the least compelling and least newsworthy Material. This way, if an editor has to shorten their story, the editor cuts from the bottom, paragraph, paragraph by paragraph or sentence by sentence, until the text fits in the space available. You should follow this structure whenever possible, especially with long documents. When you write a lengthy proposal or a lengthy report, you must give your reader the most important information early on. Don't ask them to wade through page after page after page of your document until they finally get to the point or the recommendation or the conclusion that you're making because some of your readers won't. If you have a point to make, make it at the beginning of your document, the way that journalists do. Structure number 2 is chronology. You and I experienced life chronologically moving one direction through time. And so it makes sense sometimes to structure our business writing this way. Business readers are busy readers and they want the facts quickly. But there are occasions when the chronological structure is suitable. An example of that would be when you're writing a resume or drafting a biography of one of your executives. The chronological structure is also perfect for how to articles or manuals and guides other types of writing that teach you how to do something step-by-step by step. Number three is the building block structure. If you need to explain a complex subject, you should start with the simplest issues and progress towards the more complex ones. For example, let's say you have to write a manual that explains how to update your company blog. Using WordPress. You will start with simple concepts such as what a blog is, what WordPress is, and how often you publish blog content. You will progress to more complex topics such as how to create pages and posts and how to optimize images for search engines. Finally, you'll discuss the most complex topics such as how to install widgets and plugins. You don't have to worry about what they are. And a tweak Cascading Style Sheets. Number 4 is classification. Sometimes you will write a document that has multiple items related to a single topic. Annual reports fall into this category. They present the year that was in multiple ways. There's a letter from the chair of the board, perhaps a letter from the Chief Executive Officer. Than there are sections about company milestones, profiles of various divisions, profiles of key people, company accomplishments. And then at the end, the financials. What these items all have in common is that they are all related to the company. And the old deal with the year that was. You can use this same structure when drafting a product brochure or the About Us page on your website. In fact, websites follow this structure. Every area of the site has its own classification. Number 5 is the list structure is perhaps the easiest document to write, is the one that is structured as a list. And this can be a bulleted list or a numbered list. You simply introduce your topic and then you run through your list. This structure works best for short messages, such as emails and memos. Number six is the question and answer format. Sometimes what you have to write is basic background information that is not in any way exciting or compelling. But you can give your messages certain flair, I suppose, by crafting it as a Q and a. And imagine, for example, that you work for a Nestle group and you're writing the history of the company. You could write. Our history begins in 1866 with the foundation of the angle of Swiss condensed milk company. Henri Nestle develops a breakthrough infant food in 1867 and in 1905, the company he founded merges with Anglo Swiss to form what is now known as the Nestle group. Or instead, you could craft this history as a Q and a question. When was Nestle group founded and served 866? Question, what was the firm called back then? Answer Anglo Swiss condensed milk company question. Who was the founder of the company? And Sir Henry Nestle question, what was the breakthrough of 1867? And Sir Henry Nestle developed a breakthrough infant food. I think you see the difference. The Q and a structure does not work for most types of writing, but it has its place, especially as a sidebar or call-out in reports, brochures, and long webpages. Our final type of structure is compare and contrast. Here you take two or more items and compare them and contrast them. A good example is a document that compares your company with a competitor, or that contrasts your product with a product offered by a competitor. Your document, for example, would compare your retail price with your competitor's price. Or contrast your specifications with a competitors specifications. This structure lends itself to tables. You find plenty of these online, particularly with firms that offer commodity products and commodities services. These companies will show you through compare and contrast, how their products and their services are superior to the products and services offered by their competitors. As you can see, there are multiple ways for you to give your business writing a logical structure. Giving your writing structure helps your reader follow and understand your message. But that same structure also helps you craft your message. Sometimes the hardest part of business writing isn't knowing what to say. It's knowing how to say it. You wouldn't build a race car without a plan. You wouldn't cross the Sahara without a map. So neither should you write a business document without a structure. 7. Get to the point: The most common mistake that business people make in their business writing is not getting to the point. Soon enough. I see new hires make this mistake, and I see CEOs make this mistake. I'm not saying that they're writing is confusing necessarily, or that it's filled with grammatical mistakes, or that it's poorly thought out. In many cases, their writing is clear, it's logical and it's professional. What I am saying is that they don't get to the point soon enough. And this mistake cost their organizations countless thousands of dollars each year in lost productivity. Plus, it wastes everyone's time, the writer's time, and the reader's time. The challenge that you face with your readers is that they are busy. Your readers don't have enough time in their day to read every document that comes across their desk from start to finish. That is so they skim they read your first few sentences. They skim the rest of your document and they likely read your conclusion or your recommendations. This means that unless you get right to the point in the first few sentences of your document, you would likely will never make your points. And if you never make your point, then your reader will never get your points. Business writing basics says that to get to the point, you need to communicate your key message in two ways. Early. Clearly. Let's look at each of these in order. First, get to the point early. If you're like most business people, you'd like to give a little background before you make a request. You'd like to provide a rationale. Before you make a recommendation. You'd like to present your research before you present or state your findings. In other words, if your typical you'd like to get to your point slowly to you, it makes sense to get to the point eventually to you. It makes sense to lead your reader step-by-step to your conclusion. But to your business reader, it doesn't. As I said, business readers are busy. They need you to get to the point early. They need you to return to business writing basics. Let me show you what I mean. This is a memo from accompany to its employees memo, Arne spear phishing. You may be vulnerable to phishing attempts. Spear phishing is an email fraud attempt that targets a specific organization or person seeking unauthorized access to information to avoid being a victim of phishing attempts. Please remember the following. Keep in mind, most companies, banks and agencies will not request personal information from you in an email or request it over the phone. Never click a link in an e-mail to go to a secure site. Always enter the URL yourself. Never opened unexpected attachments from unknown sources. Use strong passwords. Make sure anti-virus software is updated. A great video produced by the Office of the Director of National Intelligence shares detailed information regarding spearfishing. Click the link below to watch the video and afterwards, check out their YouTube page for other insightful videos. Regarding security. There is a mandatory workshop on spearfishing being held this week in the main auditorium on the usual training day. It starts at nine AM. Attendance is required. Artists VPs should be sent to security at Acme core.com. If this memo arrived in your e-mail inbox today, would you read it all the way through? Probably not. Because it ignores that business writing basics. The memo looks like it contains simple tips on preventing spearfishing. It looks like the kind of MIMO that you can file away. The writer does not do anything in this memo until the last paragraph to let you know that this email is essential reading for you. If you did not read this memo right to the end, that means you didn't attend the mandatory workshop being held in the main auditorium. I doubt that anyone in your organization attended. This is a classic example of getting to the point too late. The most important part of this memo is the announcement that there's a workshop that you, the reader must attend. But you don't know that by reading the headline, the subject line, you don't know that by reading the introduction. You don't know that by reading the bulleted points. So what should the writer have done? Instead? The writer should have returned to business writing basics by getting to the point immediately. Here's how this memo should look. Mandatory workshop on spearfishing. This Thursday. You are required to attend a mandatory workshop on spearfishing. This week. You must RSVP to this e-mail. So we know you are attending when? Thursday, 8th of May starting at nine AM, where? Main auditorium, RSVP send an email to security at Acme core.com saying that you will be attending this workshop. Why you need to attend this workshop? You may be vulnerable to phishing attempts. Spear phishing is an email fraud attempt that targets a specific organization or person seeking unauthorized access to information to avoid being a victim of phishing attempts. Please remember the following. Keep in mind, most companies, banks and agencies will not request personal information from you in an email or request it over the phone. Never click a link in an e-mail to go to a secure site. Always enter the URL yourself. Never open unexpected attachments from unknown sources. Use strong passwords. Make sure anti-virus software updated. A great video produced by the Office of the Director of National Intelligence, shares detailed information regarding spearfishing. Click the link below to watch the video and afterwards, check out their YouTube page for other insightful videos regarding security. See the difference. The first memo buries the most important information at the end of the documents. The second memo puts this information where it belongs at the beginning. Anyone who received the second memo might not know anything about spear phishing, but they would know that there was a workshop being held that week on the topic of spear phishing, and they would also know that they were required to attend. This brings me to my second get to the point. Clearly. Take a look at these two memos again, and you'll see that the first one is fuzzy and the second one is clear. The first one is vague, the second one is specific. Notice the differences. The first memo tells you that the workshop is being held this week. That's unclear. The second memo tells you that the workshop is being held on May the eighth. That's clear. The first memo tells you that the workshop is being held on, quote, the usual training day, unquote, that's unclear. The second memo tells you that the workshop has been held on Thursday. That's clear. The first memo tells you that attendance is required, unquote, but by whom? You can't be sure because the writer is not clear. The second memo tells you that you are the recipient of this email, are required to attend a mandatory workshop. That's clear. As you can see, the first memo is slow in getting to the point and is unclear, unspecific. The second memo gets to the point and immediately and is clear and specific. Here's how to do it. Make your request first, give your reasons. Second, give the meeting invitation first. Give the background for the meeting. Second, state your recommendations. First. State your findings that led you to those recommendations. Second, state the policy changed first, give the reason behind it. Second, give the order first, give the details. Second, state your research findings first, describe your methodology. Second, state the sales results first described how you reach them. Second, make the announcement first, give the context. Second. In other words, get to the point and upset. 8. Write simple sentences: Imagine that you receive in the mail a letter from the manufacturer of your car. The letter says, with respect to possible mechanical deficiencies, the rear axle bearings of the cars can deteriorate. Continue driving with a failed baring could result in disengagement of the axle shaft and adversely affect vehicle control, unquote. What will you do after reading this message? Throw the letter away, file it, give it to your mechanic, phone your car manufacturer, do nothing. If you do nothing, you'll be in good company because plenty of people who read these two sentences won't understand what they mean. They won't understand what they as the readers are supposed to do after reading the sentences. And this is the challenge that you face in your business writing. You write to inform and you write to motivate action. If your sentences are complicated, your readers won't understand your meaning and they won't take the action you want them to take. That's because the secret to effective business writing is simplicity. These two sentences appeared in a letter that the Ford Motor Company mail to customers who purchased the 1972 mercury montane ego. That model had a safety defect. The bearings in the rear axle and we'll assembly could fail and the rear axle could pull away from the car. This safety defect was so dangerous that Ford recalled the entire production run of 1972. Mercury Monte goes 423 thousand cars. But from their letter, you wouldn't know that the car has a safety defect that could kill you. That's because the sentences in the letter aren't simple. They're complicated. Let me show you what I mean. First, the writer doesn't mentioned you, the owner. The writer simply says the rear axle bearings of the cars can deteriorate. What the writer means to say is the rear axle bearings of your car can deteriorate. The writer also says, continue driving with a failed baring could result in disengagement of the axle shaft and adversely affect vehicle control. Translated, what the writer means to say is, if you continue to drive your 1972 mercury Monte ego with a failed bearing, it could result in disengagement of the axle shaft and adversely affect vehicle control. The writer means your car, your bearings, your axle shaft. Second, the writer is not definite. The writer says with respect to possible mechanical deficiencies, the rear axle bearings of the cars can deteriorate. This doesn't sound all that hazardous, right? It's possible. Can the writer is working in the world of possibilities and things that can happen. Remember, the subject at hand is a safety defect that makes these cars so dangerous to drive that they had been reclaimed by the manufacturer. And Mitre doesn't have the luxury of writing about possibilities, not when lives are at risk. The writer should have said, quote, your 1972 mercury Monte ego has a mechanical defect. The rear axle bearings on your car will likely deteriorate and fail, unquote. Writers are indefinite in their language for one of two reasons. Either their Carolus or they have something to hide. The easiest way to avoid responsibility is to say maybe, possibly, perhaps. The easiest way to avoid confusion and to take responsibility is to make your assertions definite. Third, the writer is abstract. What does this writer from Ford Motor Company mean? By quote, continue driving with a failed baring could result in disengagement of the actual shaft and adversely affect vehicle control unquote. Well, continue driving with a failed bearing is an abstract statement. Of fact. It doesn't imply any Schumann agency who for example, is doing the driving. The writer doesn't say. But what the writer is talking about here is you, the owner, the driver, continuing to drive your car, a car that has defective rear axle bearings. That's not abstract. The writer describes something called disengagement of the axle shaft. What does this mean? Exactly? It's abstract. It means that the axle on your 1972 mercury Montenegro might sever from the rest of your car? That's what it was. The sound dangerous when you state it this way? Sure. Does disengagement of the axle shaft sound like something you should fret over. Be worried over. Not really. It's abstract. Finally, the writer gets to the point of the letter. But in an abstract way, this possible deterioration of the rear axle bearings could adversely affect vehicle control. Abstract. In other words, you might lose control of your car. In other words, your car might swerve off a cliff or swerve into oncoming traffic. Your car might kill or maim you and your passengers. These are a few of the adverse effects of adversely affected vehicle control. Here's how you write a simple sentence. As you can imagine. The way to improve this paragraph from the Ford Motor Company is to address the reader directly. State the facts definitely, and warn the owner in concrete as opposed to abstract terms. If I was crafting this paragraph, if you are crafting this paragraph, it would look something like this. Your 1972 mercury Monte ego has defective rear axle bearings that will likely deteriorate and fail. If you continue driving your car, the rear axle may sever and you will lose control of your vehicle. As you can see, our version uses the same number of words as the original, but is more direct, more concrete, and more clear. Your writing will be just as clear once you start writing in simple sentences. 9. Write with paragraphs: If you want to improve your business writing skills, thinking of yourself as a guide, your reader doesn't know your destination. Your reader doesn't know the route. Your reader doesn't have a map or a compass, or a GPS. Your reader needs a guide. You are that guide. Your job is to guide your reader from your departure point to your destination. You guide your readers to their destination using three units of composition, words, sentences, and paragraphs. You combine words to form sentences. And you combine sentences to form paragraphs, and you combine paragraphs to create your entire business documents. If you struggled with business writing, you likely struggle with paragraphs. You wonder what they are, how they work, and how you should write them in order to help your readers get to where you want them to go. So here are some answers to frequently asked questions about paragraphs. In business writing. What is a paragraph? A paragraph is a group of sentences that develop a single topic. If you want to improve your business writing skills, right? Better paragraphs. Why must I write using paragraphs? All but the simplest of ideas need to be communicated in stages. Most subjects you write about it work, needs to be divided into topics. Dividing your subject into paragraphs helps your reader follow your thinking as you move from one idea to the next. How many topics should each paragraph contain? One? What should I do? If I want to include two topics in one paragraph? You should divide the topics into two paragraphs. What should every paragraph include? Every paragraph should include a topic sentence, supporting sentences, and a concluding sentence. What is the topic sentence? The topic sentence is the first sentence in a paragraph. What is the purpose of the topic sentence? The purpose of your topic sentence is to introduce the topic of the paragraph. The first sentence of each paragraph is a signal that a new step in the development of the subject has been reached. You write these naturally as you improve your business writing skills. What are supporting sentences in a paragraph? Supporting sentences are sentences between the topic sentence and the concluding sentence. They explain or elaborate on the topic of the paragraph. What is the concluding sentence? The concluding sentence is the last sentence in a paragraph. It ends the topic of the paragraph succinctly, usually with a concluding idea. Sometimes the concluding sentence in a paragraph prepares the reader for the next paragraph using a sentence known as a transition sentence. So you're probably wondering what is a transition sentence. I'll tell you. A transition sentence is a concluding sentence in a paragraph that connects the paragraph to the one that follows. The first sentence in a paragraph can also serve as a transition from the previous paragraph. What is the goal of a transition sentence? The goal of your transition sentence is to help your readers see how your paragraphs relate to each other and how they relate to the overall topic of your document. Good transitions highlight the connections between adjoining paragraphs. There are a number of words and phrases that are perfect for showing that you are transitioning from one idea another. What are some examples of transition sentences? Well, the last sentence that I just said is an example of a transition sentence. That sentence sets you up to expect that the topic of the next paragraph, what I'm now talking about will be words and phrases to use in transition sentences. But, but that's only one example of how to improve your business writing skills with paragraph transitions. What words or phrases can I use any topic sentence to show that I am transitioning to a new topic. There are many words and phrases that introduce a transition. These include in addition, on the other hand, furthermore, for example, naturally, however, finally, and in conclusion, how do I recognize a good paragraph? When I read one? A good paragraph has unity. The sentences in the paragraph develop the topic of the paragraph coherently. The rider develops the ideas in the paragraph in a logical sequence. How long should my paragraphs B, There's no rule for how long a paragraph should be. The only rule is that your paragraphs must be long enough to adequately express one idea. How many sentences should I include? Any paragraph? Again, there are no rules for how many sentences you must include any paragraph, your subject matter determines how many sentences you write. For example, paragraphs in business memos and emails tend to have only a few sentences. Paragraphs in reports and financial statements tend to contain many sentences. In conclusion, let me share a simple tip for writing paragraphs so that you improve your business writing skills. Think of yourself as a guide who's taking your reader from point a to point B, using the written word, your reader doesn't know the destination nor the route that you're taking. Begin your paragraph with a topic sentence. Develop your topic with facts, examples, evidence descriptions and explanations. End your paragraph with a conclusion or what they transition sentence that prepares your reader for the next paragraph. Follow this simple plan, and your readers will get to your destination, the one you want them to reach. Thanks to you. 10. Use simple words: When my waste was smaller, when I had more hair than I do today, I edited a report from the Canadian Department of Fisheries and Oceans. It was written by a scientist who had been studying how fish reacted to chemicals that were introduced into their habitat. The scientist had a poor business writing style. I sat at my desk with my red pen in hand marking up his draft report. My job was to translate his dense, convoluted scientific prose into plain language that any adult Canadian would understand. In the last few pages of the report, I came across this sentence, quote, the species under investigation exhibited a 100% positive mortality response unquote. I took my red pen and I drew a line through that appalling sentence. Beneath it, I wrote this replacement. The fish died. When the author saw the change I made, he objected. I don't remember his exact words, but he said something like this. I can't summarize my study in just three words. My conclusion needs to sound more important, more businesslike than that. This scientists couldn't justify his research grant and his labor with just three words, the fish died. He felt he needed to use 11 words to state his conclusion. He felt that his business writing style needed to be fancy, obscure, and scientific sounding. This scientists suffered from a common malady. The Oxford English Dictionary hasn't given this malady and name, but it exists all the same. It is the desire in scientific writing, in government writing, in academic writing, and even in business writing to appear more important on paper than we are. It is the desire to appear erudite and self-important at the expense of clarity and brevity, is writing that puffs up the writer rather than help the reader. I'm talking about the desire to prefer the multisyllabic word over the monosyllabic, the Latin word over the Anglo-Saxon word. I'm talking about the desire to prefer the pretentious noun, the elaborate way stating the obvious. I'm talking about the temptation as William Strunk so memorably put it to use a 20 dollar word when there is a ten center ready at hand and able. So my advice is avoid fancy words. So let me define what I mean by fancy words. Fancy words have multiple syllables or they are uncommon or both. For example, let's say you need to write an email telling your boss that your customer support line received a lot of complaints last week. What word should you use? If you want to impress your boss with your erudition, you will write there were numerous complaints. But if you prefer to be brief and clear instead, you will write there were many complaints. Numerous has three syllables. Many has just two. Numerous is not a word that you commonly hear people saying in everyday conversation, but many is one. Where does fancy? The other word is plane. Another fancy word is utilize. No one in government ever uses anything. Everything is utilized. I'm not using this microphone to speak right now. I'm utilizing a microphone. If you want to sound impressive. You won't ask your suppliers to use your supply chain management software. You will invite them to utilize our solution. There are many other fancy words to avoid. Don't write optimum when you can write best, don't tell your team to strategize. When you can simply tell them to plan. Don't ever disseminate a letter if you can mail it. Instead. If you see something that worked at needs fixing, don't offer assistance. Offer to help. If you look back over these examples, you'll notice that simple words have fewer syllables than fancy words and they are easier to understand at a glance. Optimum has three syllables, best, has just one and is easier to understand. Strategize has three syllables, plan has just one and is easier to understand. The best business writing style is the simplest. Next, replace wordy phrases with single words. You need to take this new way of thinking and apply it to phrases as well as individual words. In the world of business writing, there are many clumsy, wordy expressions that state this simple, in complicated ways. These expressions use multiple words when one word is enough, with the exception of is a good example. You can replace this phrase with the word except. So instead of writing, each of our divisions boosted revenue last quarter, with the exception of our Winnipeg division. You could instead simplify your writing and write each of our divisions except for our Winnipeg division, boosted revenue last quarter. Instead of writing until such time as you are able. You right? Until you are able. Instead of writing, he totally lacked the ability to you, right? He couldn't. You see the difference? Long winded phrases make you sound pompous, self-important. They're shorter replacements make you sound modest and human. Now I do have a caution for you and for your readers about context and tone. As you can see, what I'm proposing is that you prefer plain words to fancy words. And I'm suggesting that you avoid long words, use shorter equivalence. But there are exceptions. Just because a long word has a shorter synonym doesn't mean you should always use the shorter word. For example, if you are writing a document that is going to be read by surgeons, you will not use the word gut. When you mean intestine. You will not use the word tummy when you mean intestine. But if you are writing a document that is going to be read by children, then referring to a child's intestinal trouble as a tummy ache is likely suitable. Intestine, gut and Tommy are synonymous but not interchangeable. There's my caveat. Your choice of word always depends on your reader, your context, and the tone you want to achieve in your business writing style. But with that caveat out of the way, or perhaps I should say, not using the word caveat. With that caution out of the way. I recommend that you prefer the simple word over the elaborate one. I recommend that in your business writing, you prefer the humble phrase over the pretentious 1. Simplifying your business writing will hurt at first, but your readers will thank you for it. Over time, your writing will become succinct, clear and easy to read. Plus, even though the process will hurt your brain on occasion, it will never result in a 100% positive mortality response. In other words, writing simply will never kill you. 11. Use strong verbs: How did you feel when someone gives you a limp handshake? Does it fill you with confidence or does it creep you out? In the world of business writing, the linguistic equivalent of the weak handshake is the week verb. I'm talking about the lane verb that sucks the life out of your censuses. The vague verb that puts your readers to sleep, the imprecise verb that clouds you're meaning. If you want to get ahead in your business career, use strong verbs in your business. Running. Verbs are the action words of language. They energize your writing. They make your writing more concise. And at the core of every good sentence as a strong, precise verb. Choosing the right verb makes your business running stronger, clearer, more effective. Here's how you do it. Replace verb adverb combinations with strong verbs. First, let's get clear on our terms. A verb describes what happens. An adverb describes how it happens. For example, in the sentence, the committee looked carefully at the documents. Looked is the verb that shows what the committee did and carefully is the adverb that shows how they did it. Now that I've demonstrated what adverbs are, I have this to say about them. Don't use them. Adverbs weaken your writing. Adverbs make your writing more wordy. Adverbs give you a limp. Handshake. Instead of adverbs, use strong verbs in your business running. Don't tell your reader that the committee looked carefully at the documents. Simply write the committee examined the documents. Don't write the engineer held tightly onto the chain. Simply write the engineer gripped the chain. Don't tell your shareholders that your competitors share price dropped precipitously, tell them that it plummeted. Adverbs are invariably a week replacement for a strong verb. Week. Business writers rely on adverbs. Strong business writers rely on unadorned strong verbs. Use strong words to eliminate wordiness. Weak verbs bloat your writing. Strong verbs, make your writing concise. Strong verbs help you eliminate wordiness by replacing forms of the verb to be. These include is, was, R, and we're so instead of writing, Capital Ventures is the owner of a chain of restaurants, you simply write Capital Ventures owns a chain of restaurants. You eliminate three words in the process and you enhance the clarity of your sentence. Let me show you a few more examples of using strong verbs in your business writing. Don't write. John had an argument with his supervisor, right? John argued with his supervisor. Don't write I will be chairing the meeting, right? I will chair the meeting. You strong verbs in your business writing to make your writing precise. In business writing, strong verbs are more accurate than weak verbs. For example, did that troublesome employee of yours leave the company or was he fired? Leave the company is a week and imprecise phrase. After all, every former employee of yours left the company, right? Some resigned, some died, some were fired. If you're a company, fires an employee, but you write that the employee left the company. You are being imprecise now, perhaps deliberately, so I'll admit. But if the more accurate way to describe the departure is to say that the employee was fired. And if you are not aiming for euphemism, then use the more precise verb, right? He was fired or better yet, the company fired him. The verbs you choose make a lot of difference to meaning. If you want to make your meaning clear, make your verbs clear. For example, did the photocopier stop or did it jam? Did your employee missed the meeting or did he avoid the meeting? Did your supplier lie or did she misspeak? Replace nouns that are verbs in disguise? What's wrong with the following sentences? The board of directors has made the following recommendations. The marketing manager came to the realization that print advertising is obsolete. The proposed merger is interesting to a lot of employees. What's wrong with these sentences is that they contain verbs disguised as nouns. Look at the first example. What is the verb in that sentence? It's the word made. But what did the board of directors make? They made recommendations. Is there a verb form? For recommendations? Yes, there is. It's the verb recommend. The phrase made the following recommendations is a verb disguised as a noun. Instead of writing, the board of directors has made the following recommendations. The writer should simply shorten that, use a stronger verb and say, the Board of Directors recommends. The following. The word recommends is a stronger verb. The second sentence makes the same blunder. What is the verb? In that sentence? It's actually three words, what we call a phrasal verb, because it expresses action in a phrase as opposed to a simple word. That phrases came to the realization. Now scrutinize that phrase. Realization is a noun, but isn't there a verb form of that noun? Sure there is. It's the verb realize. So instead of writing, the marketing manager came to the realization that print advertising is obsolete, the writer should simply say, the marketing manager realized that print advertising is obsolete. Now, I'm pretty sure that you're getting the hang of this. By now. I can tell you're learning how to use strong verbs in your business writing. You don't need me to tell you that the third sentence should be rewritten to say the proposed merger interests. A lot of employees. From this little exercise, you see that replacing nouns that are verbs in disguise does two things. It communicates your meaning more quickly and it reduces your word counts. In other words, it makes your writing more clear and more concise. But don't think that putting this lesson into practice will be easy. Using nouns instead of strong verbs is one of the most common place mistakes that business writers make. It's a favorite of bureaucrats and civil servants because it makes the writer appear erudites and in control. You may be tempted to write like this, to impress your boss, to impress your customers, to impress your colleagues. Or you may have other stake holders to use the phrase of the week. For the sake of them all. Don't don't conduct a discussion of anything, discuss. Never make a discovery of anything. Discover, refused to engage in the preparation of anything, prepare, and never make an assumption. Assume you will just improve your business writing. You'll nail it. 12. Keep related words together: William Strunk once said The position of the words in a sentence is the principal means of showing their relationship. Confusion, and ambiguity result when words are badly placed. The writer must therefore bring together the words and groups of words that are related in thought and keep apart those that are not so related. Let me show you an example of what he meant. The sentence. The inspector walked into the room and noticed a large stain in the carpet that was right in the center. This sentence is ambiguous because the words in the sentence that are related are not together. You, the reader cannot be sure just what the writer means. Does he mean the stain in the middle of the carpet or does he mean the carpet with the stain is in the middle of the room. The word stain and center are too far apart in the sentence. Being far apart, they cause confusion, they make the sentence ambiguous. The easiest way to correct this sentence is to move these two words together like this. The inspector walked into the room and noticed a large stain in the center of the carpet. You see the immediate improvement. The meaning is clear. Here's another example of confusing word. Placements. Call our partners in Singapore and tell them to expect the boss closing the deal for just $2. Remember our rule, keep together words and groups of words that are related in thought and keep apart those that are not so related. In this case, the phrase closing the deal and the phrase for just $2 are together indicating that they are related. When they are not related. The boss didn't close the deal for $2. The cost of the phone call to Singapore is just $2. But the sentence is confusing because the phrase call our partners in Singapore and the phrase for just $2 are not together. They are far enough apart to confuse you. The reader. To eliminate this confusion, simply put the phrases that are related together, close together. This call our partners in Singapore for just $2 and tell them about the boss, closing the deal. Avoid problems with relative pronouns. Another cause of considerable confusion happens when a writer names to people in a sentence and then refers to one of them again using only a relative pronoun. Here's an example of what I mean. The Intern of Samantha Carruthers who works in sales has been promoted. This sentence is unclear because the writer is not clear about who the who refers to. Does the intern work in sales or does Samantha Carruthers work in sales? You can't be sure because the relative pronoun who is not close enough to the person that it refers to, which is the intern. As you can probably gather, the best way to fix this confusing sentence is to rephrase it so that the relative pronoun and the intern are closer together. You would write it something like this. Samantha Carruthers intern who works in sales, has been promoted. Another option is to simply named the intern. This removes all confusion. John McCracken, who works in sales and who is the intern of Samantha Carruthers, has been promoted. Next, you're going to want to put modifiers next to the words that they modify. A modifier is a word or phrase that adds meaning to or that modifies another word or phrase. Let me illustrate what I mean with an example from The Elements of Style by Strunk and White. The director said he hoped all members would give generously to the fund at a meeting of the committee yesterday. In this sentence, you can't be sure of what the writer means because of where the writer places the modifier. The modifier in this sentence is the phrase, meeting of the committee yesterday. But does this phrase modify what the director said or does it modify where the members should give generously? You can't be sure because the modifier and the idea that it modifies are too far apart. The sentence. The way to prevent this confusion is to put related ideas in the sentence together like this. At a meeting of the committee yesterday, the director said he hoped all members would give generously to the fund. Here's a final example. The customer only bought two shirts. Now what does the writer mean? That the customer bought two shirts and did not buy or do anything else. Or that the number of shirts that the customer bought was only 2 is the meaning of the sentence, how little the customer did or of how little he bought. You don't know. Because the modifier, the word only is not close enough to the word it modifies, which is the word to. The sentence is free of ambiguity. When you put these two words together like this, the customer bought only two shirts. As you can see from this last example, you can transform the meaning of a sentence with only one word, one word that is put in the wrong place in your sentence. The other thing to notice is that putting a word in the wrong place in your sentence doesn't necessarily make your meaning silly or illogical. It just gives your sentence more than one meaning depending on how your reader understands the sentence. This means that in business writing, your enemy is ambiguity. Defeat that enemy by putting related words together. 13. Be specific rather than general: If you want to make your business writing more effective, Be specific, whether you're writing an email, a proposal, or report, or a memo. Here are five ways to make your business writing more specific. Number one, make your email subject lines specific. I once worked at an organization that was without a chief executive officer for a number of months. Plenty of employees were anxious to know who their new CEO would be. Finally, the day came when the powers that be announced that we had a new CEO, they sent out an email to all employees. The subject line of the email was this announcements. That subject line you'll agree is general. It gives no indication of what the email is about except that the email has some news in it. But what kind of news and news that is relevant to who exactly. You can't tell because the subject line is general and not specific. If you were writing that email subject line, how would you improve it to make it specific? I know what you would do. You would indicate what the announcement is about and you would indicate why your reader should care. Here are some ways you would do that. We have a new CEO. Introducing our new CEO, Maggi, Sanjay Jiu. Announcement, new CEO joins us March first, you get the idea. An email with a specific subject line is more likely to get opened and read than an e-mail with a general subject line. You of course, are the judge of how much detail to include in such a small space as an email subject line. At the very least, you need to include enough detail that your readers know what your email is about and why they should care and read it. Number 2, make your verbs specific. If I asked you to contact our supplier, what will you do? Phone them, write an email, write a letter, text them, send a fax, send an instant message, skype them, visit their office. You can do any of these things and you'd be contacting our supplier. But what do I want you to do specifically? You don't know because I haven't been specific. If I want you to phone our supplier, I should say so. If I want you to meet our supplier in person, I should say so. I should tell you what to do with specific verbs. If I say phone our supplier, you know exactly what I want you to do. You need to do the same in your business writing. Make your verb specific. When you are specific rather than general, your readers understand your meeting immediately. They don't waste your time and theirs asking you for clarification, that's the beauty of making your business writing more specific. Number 3, make your numbers specific. Have you ever driven past a new condo development and seeing a sign that says two-bedroom condos starting in the mid 300000. That's a fine number for a sign. But when you sit down with your reel it or to buy your unit, you need a specific dollar figure, right? You must apply that same level of specificity to your business writing. How specific you are with your numbers depends on your audience. Of course. Sometimes you need to supply numbers down to two decimal points like this. The oil change costs 2999. Other times you can round your numbers up like this. For an oil change, expect to pay $30. The key with numbers is to know your audience and how much detail they need from you. If you are unsure, err on the side of being exact rather than general. For example, you might get away with saying errors and emissions insurance for this project is 12 percent of the total project cost. That might satisfy some of your readers, but other readers. For them, you need to be more specific like this, errors and emissions insurance for this project is $8,898.63, 12 percent of the total project cost. Number four, be specific about time. If I tell you I need your report on my desk as soon as possible, what do I mean? You may think I mean, what I say, namely that I need the report as soon as possible for you to get the report on my desk. For you. That might mean three weeks from now. But when I say as soon as possible, I mean immediately, but that's not helpful. Is it? What I am saying and what I am meaning are two different things. I should be specific. Instead of saying I need the report as soon as possible, which is general and vague. I should say. I need your report on my desk by five o'clock today. Number 5, make your nouns Pacific. What's the difference between a lift and an elevator? Nothing. Those words mean the same thing. In the United Kingdom. It's a lift. In North America, It's an elevator. The words are synonymous. But if you are writing to an audience in the UK, you call it a lift. If your reader is in North America, you call it an elevator. You make your business writing more specific because of your audience, who they are, and where they live. What's the difference between a car and a vehicle? Plenty, maybe a car, for example, is a vehicle, but the two words are not synonymous. A car is a vehicle, but a vehicle is not necessarily a car. A pickup truck is a vehicle, a delivery van is a vehicle. A city bus is a vehicle. The noun you use makes a difference. You'll never read that Donald Trump through his Attorney General under a vehicle. But you will read that Donald Trump through his Attorney General under the bus. Here's an example from the workplace. Please keep personal items off your desk. What does this mean? What are personal items? Exactly. And what is the reason for this policy? You don't know? Because the policy is general, not specific. Look at this same policy reworded. Please keep family photos, lip balm, consumer magazines, cell phones, and other personal items off your desk and out of sight of customers. That's a clear policy statement because it gives specific examples and hints at a rationale for the policy. If I tell you that airline staff are on strike, who do I mean, the pilots, the cabin crew, the grounds crew, you don't know. But the difference is likely important. To make my meaning clear, I must be specific. One final example, which of these three signs is most helpful to you? Beware of our pets, beware of our dog, or beware of our Rottweiler. Number three is the most helpful sign because it is the most specific warning. Your business writing will be just as helpful when you weren't specific rather than general. This final example brings me to my final point about why you should make your business writing more specific. There are three levels of specificity, general, more specific and exact. Beware of our pet is a general statement. The pet might be a hedgehog or a parent. Beware of our dog is more specific. Now we have narrowed our focus to pets who are canines. Beware of our Rottweiler is exact. We're no longer talking about pets in general or pet dogs in particular, but a particular breed of dog, a Rottweiler. Your challenge as a business writer is to be as specific as necessary. Your local by-law officer, for example, likely wants to know that you own a dog, the Breed might be immaterial. But if you want to deter burglars, you likely want them to know that you own a Rottweiler. Beware of our pet, isn't going to scare any burglar off. Your challenge then is to be specific when you need to be specific, which is most of the time. And to be general, only when you need to be general, which is rarely but when in doubt. Be specific. Sorry that I can't be any more specific than that. 14. Be concrete rather than abstract: In 1997, the academic journal philosophy and literature held a bad style contest. The goal of the contest was to find the best example of the worst writing in the world. Here's the piece of writing that won first place in the contest and fasten your seat belt and get ready for takeoff. The move from a structuralist account in which capital is understood to structure social relations in relatively homogenous ways to a view of hegemony in which power relations are subject to repetition, convergence, and re-articulation brought the question of temporality into the thinking of structure and marked a shift from a form of alpha2 Syrian theory that takes structural totalities as theoretical objects to one in which the insights into the contingent possibility of structure inaugurate a renewed conception of hegemony as bound up with the contingent sites and strategies of the re-articulation of power. That's a pretty frightening passage. I suspect that even if I knew what this writer was talking about, I wouldn't know what she was talking about. This sentence is an object lesson in the art of abstraction. Or to put it more accurately, the art of writing using abstract nouns instead of concrete nouns, you are unlikely to come across a piece of writing this impenetrable at work, but you might come close. Some business people feel compelled to write in abstractions, to take the names for ordinary people, places and things, and to abstract them into nouns that cloud their meaning and baffle their readers. The problem I'm talking about is the difference between abstract nouns and concrete nouns. I'm talking about the difference between writing that is abstract and writing that is concrete. The difference between the language that is obscure and that which is vivid. First, let's define our terms. A concrete noun, describe something that your senses can detect, something that you can interact with. Concrete nouns can be seen, heard, tasted, touched, and so on. People, animals, objects, and places are all concrete nouns. An abstract noun describes something that your senses cannot detect. Abstract nouns cannot be seen, heard, or tasted, touched, and so on. And abstract noun exists only in your mind and in the mind of your reader. Events, ideas, emotions, qualities, and conditions are all abstract nouns. Here are some examples to show you what I mean. Supervisor is a concrete noun. You can see here and touch a supervisor. But supervision is an abstract noun. Supervision has no size, odor or flavor, sound or texture. You can't see it, smell it, taste it, hear it or touch it. Canada is a concrete term. You can see it, touch it, taste it, smell it, and so on. Canadian history is an abstract noun. You can't see it or touch it. History has no size, sound, or texture. Let's talk about the power of concrete nouns in your business writing. The difference between concrete nouns and abstract nouns is that you can picture a concrete nouns in your mind, but you can't picture abstract nouns. And this demonstrates the power of being concrete. In your business writing. When you use concrete nouns, you use nouns that your readers can see. Let me show you this vital difference with some examples. If I tell you to get some higher education, you can't picture that in your mind. Higher education is an abstraction. But if I tell you to study at Harvard University, you can likely picture that in your mind. Think red brick IV, professional gowns, death by PowerPoint. Harvard is concrete. If I tell you that your assembly line needs to boost productivity, you can't picture that in your mind. Productivity is an abstraction. But if I tell you that your assembly line workers need to produce one more widget per hour. You can picture that in your mind. If I tell you to take your sales to the next level, what do I mean? You can't be sure because I'm being abstract. The next level is an abstraction. It only exists in the mind and perhaps not even there. No one knows what the next level looks like or where it's located. So if I want you to increase sales, I should say so in a concrete way, I should tell you something like this. I need you to boost sales by acquiring three new customers next quarter. That's concrete, as you can probably gathered by now, abstract nouns are the enemy of clarity. Abstract nouns make your writing fuzzy, vague, and abstract. If you want your business writing to be clear, right? Using clear concrete nouns. Don't warn your social committee that the company picnic takes place during the dog days of summer. That's an abstraction. Tell them that the weather forecasts for the day of the company picnic is calling for thunder showers. That's a concrete thing. And see and hear. Thunder shall be concretes. You need to be concrete in your business writing because abstraction confuses your readers. Or worse yet, if you are abstract in your writing, your readers think you have nothing of importance to say. And so they ignore your message. Let me give you an example of two sentences, one filled with abstract nouns and the other filled with concrete nouns. Here's the abstract version. If you have enough bandwidth, check with our stakeholders to see if they received our deliverable, and then give me your findings so I can decide if they understand our new pricing outcomes. Here's the concrete version of that sentence. If you have one hour to spare today, check with our sales reps and call center staff to see if they received our latest price sheet. And then write me a 200 word memo of their reactions so I can decide if they understand our increased prices. The abstract version may seem to exaggerate my point. But if you have been reading business documents for as long as I have been reading business documents and that's over three decades. You know that some business people write in this way. They're writing is infected with fuzzy, opaque, obscure, abstract nouns that make their writing impossible to understand without a translator. As you can see, the abstract version once translated, transforms the sentence from abstract buzz speak to plain concrete English. Enough bandwidth means one hour to spare today. Stake holders means sales reps and call center staff. Deliverable means latest price sheet and findings means a 200 word memo. Pricing outcomes means our increased prices don't be abstract if you can be concrete. The lesson I need you to take away from this exercise is to be concrete whenever possible. Abstract nouns are the enemy of clarity only when they replace a concrete noun. Or to put it in a positive way, you should replace abstract nouns with concrete nouns whenever possible. Abstract nouns are not intrinsically improper. There are plenty of times when you need to use abstract nouns because there's no concrete substitutes available. Some subjects by their very nature are abstract. Time, for example, is an abstract concepts as its value, return on investment, quality, service, and branding. If you're writing about abstract subjects, you need to use abstract nouns. But if you are writing about concrete subject, right, using concrete nouns, don't tell me you are experiencing photocopying difficulties. When you mean the photocopier is broken. Don't talk about customer facing human resources when you mean your receptionists to call this what I'm doing now, linguistic output. When it's me speaking. You'll be delighted to know that being concrete is easier and faster than being abstract. Concrete nouns are easier to find than their abstract replacements. Here are some more examples of abstract language versus concrete language. Avoid writing like the column on the left. Practice writing like the column on the right. Your writing will improve immediately. 15. Be definite rather than ambiguous: Robert Thornton, a professor of economics at Lehigh University in Bethlehem, Pennsylvania, had a problem. He was regularly asked to write letters of recommendation for students and former students. It particularly those whose work habits and qualifications were appalling. He didn't want to lie and risk his career, but neither did he wants to tell the truth and ruin a relationship with a student. So Thornton created the perfect solution. He crafted a collection of recommendations that could be read in one of two ways. He called his collection the lexicon of inconspicuously ambiguous recommendations liar for short. He published his collection and made it public. So if you ever have to write a letter for a former employee who was lazy, Here's what you write. In my opinion, you will be very fortunate to get this person to work for you. Or let's imagine that you worked with someone who was toxic to work with and everyone in your office thoughts. So what do you write? Here's what the professor recommends. I am pleased to say that this candidate is a former colleague of mine. Or let's imagine that you worked with someone who was not trustworthy. Here's how you could describe them. I think you will find this candidate to be a very promising individually. Here's one final example. An ex employee asks you for a letter of recommendation. This person was fired for incompetence. So here's what your rights all at all. I cannot say enough good things about this candidate or recommend him to highly. Now I think you'll agree. These recommendations are funny because they are ambiguous, but they are also effective because they protect the writer. Ambiguity does that, it lets you write one statement that is understood in multiple ways depending on your reader. Ambiguity is the perfect tool in your business running toolbox. If you can't tell the truth and if you can't tell a lie. But as you can imagine, ambiguity does not help your business writing in any other way. For example, if an a contract, you write a clause that can be interpreted in more than one way, the other party to the contract may sue you. And when. Another example, if you manufacturer a device that's used to diffuse explosives, and if you write operating instructions that are ambiguous, people may die. And as you can see from the work of Professor Thornton who created this amazing collection of ways to be ambiguous. If you're accidentally ambiguous in your business writing, your readers may laugh at you. Ambiguity in your business writing can only hurt you. Ambiguity, of course, happens when a word or a phrase or a statement has more than one meaning. Ambiguous words. And statements make your business running vague and confusing. If you're a reader can interpret your meeting in more than one way, you're writing is ambiguous. Here's how to avoid ambiguity in your business writing. Number 1, assemble your words in the correct order. The way you arrange words and phrases in your sentences can create ambiguity. Consider this example. The attorney fought the case with her legal team. Now as the case between the attorney and the attorney's legal team, or as the attorney with her legal team fighting the case. The sentence has more than one interpretation because the words are in the incorrect order. The correct way to assemble these words is to put the attorney and her legal team closer together. In the sentence like this, the attorney and her legal team fought the case. Here's another example. The property manager will fill the potholes with his crew. You must faith that this writer clearly does not mean that the property manager is going to put the corpses of his crew into the potholes. But you would be missing my points because the writer is ambiguous. That is exactly what the writer is saying as interpreted by some readers. Again, to prevent this ambiguity, the writer must rearrange the words, something like this. The property manager and his crew will fill the puddles. Here's a final example. California Governor Pat Brown, while discussing a local flood, remarked, this is the worst disaster in California since I was elected. I'll let you figure out how to fix that. One. Number two. Eliminate ambiguous words. Sometimes ambiguity is caused not by how words are arranged in a sentence, but by the words themselves. English is notorious for having hundreds of words that have more than one meaning. Consider these examples. I had to subject, the subject to a series of tests on various subjects. The farm was used to produce, produce. The insurance was invalid for the invalid. As you can see, some English words are both nouns and verbs. Produce is a noun meaning products of farms and gardens, especially fruits and vegetables. But produce is also a verb meaning to make or yield something to produce something. The intended meaning of the word depends largely on its context. This is because some English words are both adjectives and nouns. Invalid is an adjective that means not legally binding or enforceable, but invalid is also a noun, meaning someone who has a debilitating disease or medical condition. Again, the intended meaning of the word depends on its context in the document, in the paragraph, and in the sentence. The rule to follow is simple. The context of your sentence makes the meaning of your word clear. Use the word. But if the context of your sentence does not make the meaning of your word clear, then either add some contexts or use another word. For example, in this sentence, I saw her duck. The meaning of duck is ambiguous because the sentence lacks contexts. Do I mean I saw her bend quickly at the waist, meaning it's the verb to duck or do I mean I saw the duck, meaning the common water bird that belongs to her, her duck. If this sentence appeared in a paragraph that is about a danger that the woman avoided by ducking, then the meaning is clear. I saw her duck to avoid the danger or to avoid the hazard. Likewise, if the sentence is in a paragraph about the woman visiting a wetland conservation area with her pet duck, then the meaning is clear. I saw her duck, I saw her pet duck. But if the sentence appears in a paragraph about a woman taking her pet duck for a swim In a water hazard at a local golf course. And if during that visit, I see the woman move her head down quickly to avoid being hit by a golf ball than the word duck is not the correct word to use in this context. I saw her duck is ambiguous. I must use another word instead of duck. I should write. I saw her crotch suddenly or I saw her bend down suddenly. Number 3, punctuate properly. A leading cause of ambiguity is compound nouns and compound modifiers. If, for example, I tell you that my cousin is dating a Swedish used bookseller. Who do you think my cousin is dating? A seller of use books whose nationality is Swedish or a seller of Swedish used books? You can't be sure because my meaning is ambiguous and my meeting is ambiguous because I've used a compound noun with a modifier, but I have not used any punctuation to tell you which is the compound noun and which is the modifier. The easiest way for me to clarify my meaning and to eliminate any ambiguity is to employ the humble hyphen. My cousin is dating a seller of used books whose nationality is Swedish, then I describe him as a Swedish used book seller. If she is dating a seller of Swedish use books, I describe them as a Swedish used book seller. Number four, be proper with pronouns. Pronouns can refer to more than one person or object in a sentence causing ambiguity. A pronoun, of course, refers to a previously used noun, typically a person or object. That noun is called the antecedent. Your pronouns are ambiguous when their antecedents are unclear. Consider this phrase from a contract. Acme Corporation is a subsidiary of wildly Inc. which shall execute the guarantee. Who executes a guarantee? Acme Corp, or wildly ink, you don't know because the writer uses the ambiguous pronoun which, and you don't know which company that pronoun refers to. The way to avoid this ambiguity is to make clear which antecedent your pronoun refers to. In this case, this involves rewriting the sentence like this. Acme Corporation is a subsidiary of wildly Inc. Acme Corp shall execute the guarantee. Here's another example. After the CEO briefs the Vice President, she or he will brief the other managers. Who briefs the other managers, the CEO or the vice president. You think the vice president does, but you can't be sure because the pronouns he or she are ambiguous. You can't be certain which antecedent in the sentence they refer to, whether they refer to the CEO or the Vice President. The way to avoid this ambiguity is to make the antecedent clear, like this. After the CEO briefs the Vice President, the Vice President will brief the other managers. In conclusion, learn a lesson from Groucho Marx. In a famous skit, Groucho says, I once shot an elephant in my pajamas. How he got into my pajamas. I'll never know. That joke is funny because the setup is ambiguous. If you want your business writing to get laughs like this, be ambiguous. But if you want to avoid laughs, if you want to avoid misunderstandings in your business running and lawsuits, don't don't be ambiguous. That is. 16. Use the active voice: In her book, Writing on both sides of the brain, Henry, it and closer says, the passive voice invariably comes across as pontificating, patronizing, talking down. It sounds insincere, even dishonest, and it makes the reader uncomfortable. Not trusting though usually the reader cannot put her finger on why. If you are like many business people, you don't know what the passive voice is, or if you do know what it is, you don't understand how the passive voice harms your writing. Closer says your business e-mails, memos, reports, and proposals sound patronizing, insincere, and dishonest when you write in the passive voice, that's not good. So what does the passive voice and why should you avoid it in your business writing? The passive voice is one of two voices in English. The other voice is the active voice. To understand what the passive voice is, let's first define the active voice. The active voice is when a subject does an action to an object, you can spot an English sentence written in the active voice when the parts of the sentence appear in this order, subject, verb, object. For example, the committee adopted the policy. The committee as a subject, adopted as the verb. The policy is the object, subject verb object. The passive voice rearranges this order and puts the emphasis on the object. The order becomes object, verb, subject. The verb in this case is said to be in the passive voice. So instead of saying the committee adopted the policy, you would say the policy was adopted by the committee. Here are three reasons that you should use the active voice as opposed to the passive voice. Number one, the active voice is more direct, saying the committee adopted the policy is more direct than saying the policy was adopted by the committee. This is because the subject of the sentence, the person or people doing the action comes first, then comes the action, the verb, and then comes the object, the person or thing. Writing, my sales team met our quota for this quarter is more direct than writing. Our quota for this quarter was met by my sales team, which would be the passive way of saying that writing, John is opening our new office in Singapore in 2021, is more direct than writing. Our new office in Singapore being opened by John in 2021. Reason number two, the active voice is more concise. You'll notice from these examples that writing in the active voice is more concise. Or to put it the other way around, writing in the passive voice uses more words. Writing. John is opening our new office in Singapore in 2021, takes 10 words. Writing. Our new office in Singapore is being opened by John in 2021 takes 12 words or 20 percent more words. If brevity is one of your aims and your business writing, then adopt the active voice whenever possible. Reason number three for using the active voice is that the active voice is more definite. One of the major disadvantages of the passive voice is that it takes the emphasis off who is doing the action and puts it on the object of that action. If you write the policy was adopted by the committee, that puts the emphasis on the policy since it comes first in the sentence and takes the emphasis off the committee, since they come last in the sentence. Some writers, particularly those who have something to hide, eliminate the subject altogether from their sentences. They will never tell you that the policy was adopted by the committee. They'll simply tell you the policy was adopted. You don't know by whom, or they'll tell you, decisions were reached, mistakes were made. The passive voice is the refuge of scoundrels and villains. In my opinion. People who want to hide what happened or disguise the identity of who acted or take the emphasis off who acted. If you write mistakes were made, you are hiding something or you're hiding someone to be precise, who made the mistakes. You're not saying, and you're using the passive voice to not say it. Your sentence lacks a subject. The subject is the one who made the mistakes. You're being unclear and imprecise. If this is your aim, proceed without delay. But if your aim is clarity and precision, use the active voice. Having said all of this, there are times when you will want to or need to employ the passive voice. One of these times is when you don't know the subject of the sentence or when the subject of the sentence is not important. In other words, when you don't know or don't care who did the action. For example, if you are typing the minutes of your annual general meeting, you're perfectly entitled to write. The meeting was called to order at nine AM. Who called the meeting to order is not important. What's important is that the meeting was called to order and this happened at nine AM. So you can leave the subject out of your sentence. And your reader of your sentence will appreciate the passive voice. There's no penalty for that. Another time to use the passive voice is when the subject of the sentence does not belong in the sentence. Given the topic. For example, if you are writing the history of your company and if your company was created by the merger of two companies, you would likely want to express this in the passive voice like this. Acme Company was founded in 2015 with the merger of the firm's Simpson and sons and fabrics United. So when should the active voice be used by you? Almost always. Remember Henrietta and closer, author of writing on both sides of the brain. She says, the passive voice invariably comes across as pontificating, patronizing, talking down. If you don't believe her, take a famous quote from a movie and render it in the passive voice to see how quickly you change the tone of your writing. He is going to be made an offer by me that can't be refused by him. That's from The Godfather. Here's a quote from the movie Jaws. A bigger boat is going to be needed by us. Of all the gin joints and all the towns and all the world minus walked into by her. That's from Casablanca. The truth can't be handled by you. That's from the movie. A Few Good Men. Frankly, my dear, a dam is not given by me. That's from Gone With the Wind. Here's the final example. Every time a bell ring is heard by you, it means wings have just been gotten by some angel. That's from, It's a Wonderful Life. Ceo turning a quote from the active voice to the passive voice makes the speaker immediately sound patronizing, indirect, wordy, and imprecise. 17. Omit needless words: William Strunk in his classic book, the Elements of Style remarked, vigorous writing is concise. A sentence should not contain unnecessary words, a paragraph, no unnecessary sentences for the same reason that a drawing should have no unnecessary lines and a machine no unnecessary parts. This requires not that the writer make all sentences short, or avoid all detail and treat subjects only in outline. But that every word tell. This applies to your business writing. If you want your e-mails, memos, reports, proposals, and plans to be energetic and concise. Omit needless words. Here's how you do it. Omit words that repeat your meaning. Some writers are afraid of words. They don't trust nouns and verbs to do what they are supposed to do. They are afraid to leave them alone. So they modify nouns with adjectives, and they modify verbs with adverbs, hoping to make their meaning clear, but all they do is inflate their writing and make themselves redundant. Let me give you an example. The new company logo is green in color. What's wrong with this sentence? The writer does not trust his adjective, green, by definition, is a color, but this writer doesn't trust his adjective to communicate his meaning on its own. So he adds the words in color. He says in eight words, what he should say is six, and he makes himself redundant. All he has to say is the new company logo is green. Other words that repeat your meaning and make your redundant or the words first different and complete. For example, you may be tempted to write, when I first started working at ABC Corp, because you don't trust the word started. You don't trust the word to express what it means. So you add the word first. But unless you worked at ABC Corporation before and quit and started working there a second time than the day you started working at the company is by definition, your first time. You can simply trust the word started to mean what it says. You don't have to say first started, simply say when I started work at ABC Corporation. Then there's the word difference. Many business writers use this adjective to modify nouns that by their very nature are different. For example, writers don't trust the word countries to be out on its own. They must write 10 different countries. When all they have to write is 10 countries. Countries by definition are different, aren't they? They have different heads of state, different borders, different flags. That's what makes them countries plural. If you are writing about two or more countries, then by definition, you are talking about countries that are difference. So you don't have to modify the noun countries with the adjective difference. Anytime you feel compelled to use the word different, examined the noun you are about to modify, you will likely discover this modifier is unnecessary because the noun already communicates this idea of being different. For different colors means four colors. Three different people means three people. Nine different options means nine options. Five different flavors means five flavors. Six different suppliers means six suppliers. Seven different goals means seven goals. Two different years means two years. Three different alternatives means three alternatives. Eight different patents means eight patents. Five different reasons means five reasons for different plans means for plans. The word complete and its synonyms is also guilty of modifying plenty of nouns and verbs that by definition don't need modifying. The highway was completely blocked to traffic. The ship was totally submerged. The house was completely destroyed. Now, what's the difference between blocked and completely blocked? Nothing. There's no difference between the two except redundancy. If the highway is blocked to traffic, the no traffic can get through. It's blocked. You don't have to say anymore, trust the word blocked. To do his job, simply write the highway was blocked to traffic. If a ship is submerged, the no part of the ship is above water. All of the ship is underwater. That's what submerged means. So you don't have to modify the word submerged to mean what it already means. You don't have to tell your reader that the ship was totally submerged. Simply write the ship was submerged. The same goes for the house. If the house is destroyed, then the destruction is complete. Otherwise you can not tell us that it is destroyed. Destroyed means destroyed. Simply tell us the house is destroyed. Tip number 2, omit words and phrases that add nothing to your meaning. Another class of words that you must eliminate from your business writing are the filler words and phrases that pad your writing, but add nothing to your meeting. Some administrators, for example, begin every email announcement with the phrase, Please be advised, as in, please be advised. Belinda is offset today. The phrase, Please be advised that is filler. It adds nothing to the meaning of the announcements. Simply write, Melinda is off sick today. Another culprit is the phrase, I would like to take this opportunity to then take it. Take the opportunity. Don't tell us, you're going to take the opportunity. Just take the opportunity. So instead of writing, I would like to take this opportunity to introduce our new CEO, just right. I would like to introduce our new CEO or simpler still. Just write, let me introduce our new CEO. Tip number 3. Omit multiple words when a single word will do. So. What is wrong with this sentence? I would like to call your attention to the fact that I cannot meet you in the vicinity of the garage at this point in time owing to the fact that each and every taxi is completely full. What's wrong with this sentence is that it uses multiple phrases when simple words will do. I would like to call your attention to the fact that simply means note in the vicinity of simply means near at this point in time means now, owing to the fact that means because each and every mean the same thing, all use one or the other. Completely full means, full. Replace these wordy phrases with single words and you express your meaning more clearly and more economically. Note that I cannot meet you near the garage now because every taxi is full, that revise sentence contains just 15 words. The original contains 39 words and upset. 18. Avoid common grammatical mistakes: What's wrong with this sentence? My manager gave the document to Carl and I. This sentence uses the personal pronoun I incorrectly. In business writing and in conversations in the workplace, you will often witnessed the two personal pronouns, I and me used incorrectly. This grammatical mistake is one of many that business people make. Grammatical mistakes in your business writing damage your reputation at work. Here are the most common grammatical mistakes and how to avoid them. Number one, I versus me. The easiest way to remember which of these two personal pronouns to use is to expand your sentence to include both parties more fully. If, for example, you write out, my manager gave the document to Carl and I and something in your head tells you that this does not sound correct, then expand your sentence like this. My manager gave the document to Carol and my manager gave the document to i u here immediately. That this is incorrect. What sounds correct is my manager gave the document to Carol and my manager gave the document to me. So now you shorten your sentence once again using the correct pronoun. My manager gave a document to Carol and me. Incorrect. You and me deserve to be promoted. Correct? You and I deserve to be promoted. And this is because you deserve to be promoted and I deserve to be promoted. Therefore, you and I deserve to be promoted. Mistake number 2, myself versus me. Me, myself. And I may refer to the same person, but they are not synonyms. You often hear someone referring to themselves as myself in correctly. They are saying myself when they should be saying me. So how do you know when to use me and when to use myself? Simple. Me is an object, pronoun is a pronoun that always refers to the person that an action is done to or to whom a preposition refers. For example, in the sentence Bill, please give me the report. Bill is the subject, give is the verb and me is the object. Myself, on the other hand, is a reflexive pronoun. It is used in conjunction with the subject pronoun and should never be used instead of the object pronoun me. In this sentence, since I had the authority, I hired Sally myself. I is the subject, hired is the verb, Sally is the object, and myself is the reflexive pronoun. Myself refers to I hired Sally. That's something I did. Myself should never appear on its own in a sentence. It should always refer to a personal pronoun elsewhere in the sentence. For example, you should never write something like the CEO wants to meet with John and myself. You should instead write, the CEO wants to meet with John and me. Incorrect. He told myself to conduct the meeting. Correct? He told me to conduct the meeting. Correct. He told me to conduct the meeting myself. The third mistake that people make is confusing fewer, with less. You'll come across in written and spoken English this confusion over less and fewer. You will read a report, for example, in which the writer says, we have less dollars to spend on improvements. What the writer means to say is we have fewer dollars to spend on improvements. If you ever wonder which of these two words you should use in a sentence. Remember this simple rule. If the noun in the sentence can be counted, use the word fewer. If the noun in the sentence cannot be counted. Use the word less. Dollars can be counted. So you either have more dollars than me or you have fewer dollars than me. Savings, on the other hand, cannot be counted. So you either have more in savings than I do or you have less in savings than I do? Incorrect. There are 28 less salespeople? Correct? There are 28 fewer salespeople. Incorrect. We made less sales than last year, correct? We made fewer sales than last year. Incorrect. As for strike action, we saw fewer than expected. Correct? As for strike action, we saw less than expected. Incorrect. My agent wants to book less engagements, correct? My agent wants to book fewer engagements. The fourth mistake that people make with grammar is confusing, is versus are. A singular subject takes a singular verb, a plural subject takes a plural verb. The words is and our AR verbs is, is a singular verb, R is a plural verb. Writers use isn't our incorrectly when they mistake what the subject of a sentence is. In this sentence, the pile of purchase orders are on my desk. The subject is pile. That's pile singular, not piles plural. So this sentence is incorrect. Since it has a singular subject, it should have a singular verb. It should read the pile of purchase orders is on my desk. If there were piles of purchase orders on my desk, then I would use a plural verb like the piles of purchase orders are on my desk. Many writers would confuse is with are in this situation because the subject of the sentence appears to be plural. Purchase orders is plural after all. But look again and you discover that the subject of the sentence is the pile singular. Incorrect. The group of auditors are expected at noon, correct? The group auditors is expected at noon. Incorrect. Hours spent on preparation is always worthwhile. Correct? Hours spent on preparation are always worthwhile. Number five, the most common grammatical mistake I see in business writing is the word, it's I-T apostrophe S being confused with its, ITS, if you want to avoid this frequent blunder, remember two simple rules. Rule number one, when you mean it is, use an apostrophe. For example. If you mean to write, it is the start of our third quarter than right. It's apostrophe S, the start of our third quarter. Rule number two, when you are using it as a possessive, don't use an apostrophe. For example, if you mean to write, our division lost money in its third quarter, don't write our division lost money in I-T apostrophe S third quarter. Otherwise you'll be saying our division lost money in. It is third quarter because IT apostrophe S is always a contraction of, it. Is. Remember that IT apostrophe S is always a contraction of two words. It and is. It's never a possessive. Incorrect. The company owes its suppliers 1 million, correct? The company owes its suppliers 1 million. Incorrect. The receiving door is stuck in its track. Correct? The receiving door is stuck in its track. If you eliminate these five grammatical mistakes from your business writing, you will improve your reputation at work. And remember, you heard it from me, myself, and I. 19. Avoid common mistakes when crafting sentences: How high you get on the corporate ladder depends on your ability to communicate in sentences. If you want to get promoted, learn how to write clear, concise sentences. The quickest way to learn the craft is to avoid the top five mistakes in writing sentences at work. Here they are. Mistake number 1, stick to one tense. In your business writing, you have three tenses to choose from, past, present, and future. Choose the tense that suits your purpose, 1 tenth, and stick to it. Here's what I mean. In the following example, the writer shifts tenses within a sentence. See if you can see how if Margaret would take better care of her accounts, she can be a better account manager. The writer uses two tenses, past and present. Would take is past tense, can be is present tense. The writer should instead choose one tense and stay with it like this. If Margaret takes better care of her accounts, she can be a better account manager. Here are some more examples. Incorrect. In 2018, the Vice President said he is happy with production targets. Correct? In 2018, the Vice President said he was happy with production targets? Incorrect. I reviewed the Q2 financials and I am finding many discrepancies, correct? I reviewed the Q2 financials and I found many discrepancies. Number to express coordinate ideas in parallel construction. William Strunk and his book, The Elements of Style, says the principle of parallel construction requires that expression similar in content and function be outwardly similar. The likeness of form enables the reader to recognize more readily the likeness of content and function. Strunk illustrates his point by citing the Beatitudes from the Bible. Blessed are the poor in spirit for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. Blessed? Are they that mourn for they shall be comforted. Blessed are the meek for they shall inherit the earth. As you can see, these sentences follow the principle of parallel construction. The phrase that follows the colon uses the same construction as the phrase that precedes the colon. Some business people are afraid of using parallel construction for the same reason that they are afraid of using the same word twice in a sentence. They mistakenly believe in the value of constantly varying their form of expression. Here are two versions of the same thought. One expressed without parallel construction, and one expressed with parallel construction. We used to buy our raw materials from Simpson and company, while now they are purchased from Apple be limited. We used to buy our raw materials from Simpson and company. Now we buy them from Apple be limited. In the left example, the writer seems undecided or too timid to choose one form of expression and to stick with it. In the right example, the writer uses parallel construction. The writer chooses one form of expression and sticks with it. Number 3, avoid run-on sentences. A run on sentence contains too many ideas for one sentence. Sometimes these ideas are strung together and sometimes they are separated by a simple comma. Mistakenly, I might add either way, run-on sentences are a mistake because one sentence must contain only one idea. Here's an example of a run-on sentence. Adopting Mobile Inventory Management Systems is imperative. The company cannot get left behind. As you can see, this sentence contains two ideas. One of them is about technology and the other one is about the company. The way to correct a run on sentence like this is to give each idea its own sentence. This adopting Mobile Inventory Management Systems is imperative, period, the company cannot get left behind. Period. Number 4, make sure the participle phrase at the beginning of your sentence refers to your grammatical subject. What's wrong with this sentence? Walking through the warehouse, we saw the janitor. What's wrong with this sentence is that walking refers to the subject of the sentence sets we not to the janitor, but the janitors, the person who was doing the walking. So this sentence is grammatically incorrect. The rule to remember with participle phrases is that the action before the comma is always being done by the first-person who's mentioned after the comma in the above example. That means we are the ones doing the walking, which is incorrect. The way to correct this mistake is to rearrange the sentence. We saw the janitor walking through the warehouse. You see the difference? Here are some more examples. Incorrect. Arriving at Dulles International Airport, our team met the consultant, correct? Our team met the consultant when he arrived at Dulles International Airport. Incorrect. A senior executive for three decades, they awarded him a gold watch. You can you can kinda hear that that's incorrect. Here's the correct version. A senior executive for three decades, he was awarded a gold watch. Incorrect. Being in a dilapidated condition. The company bought the building for the companies in a dilapidated condition, clearly incorrect, the correct version. The company bought the building for a bargain because the building in a dilapidated condition. Number 5, don't never use double negatives. A double negative in a sentence forms a positive. And for this reason, you must never use a double negative unless your aim is Schumer. For example, if you post a sign in your lunch room that reads, don't never leave dirty dishes in the sink. Then you are telling employees they can leave dirty dishes in the sink. At first glance, this double negative appears to merely state its case emphatically, but the double negative actually forms a positive. You can see this by parsing. The sentence. Don't leave dirty dishes in the sink, is clear. That's one negative. You can't misunderstand. This prohibition. Never leave dirty dishes in the sink is clear. That's one negative. You can't misunderstand this prohibition. But as soon as you say don't, never. As soon as you introduce a double negative, you reverse the meaning of the prohibition. It says the opposite of what you mean. Suddenly never leaving dirty dishes in the sink is something you are not to do. Which means leaving dirty dishes in the sink is something that you are allowed to do, which is clearly not the not the point. It's not the truth. Let me give you another example or two. Here's number 1. All the witnesses claimed they didn't see nothing. That means all the witnesses claimed they saw something. I haven't got no time for this meeting means I have some time for this meeting. Mr. Jones was not competent. Means Mr. Jones was competent. The hospital won't allow no more visitors, means the hospital will allow more visitors. How high you get on the corporate ladder depends on your ability to communicate. In sentences. If you want to get promoted, learn how to write clear, concise sentences. The quickest way to learn the craft is to avoid these top five mistakes in your writing. 20. Avoid mistakes with commas and apostrophes: Mistakes and punctuation are among the most common errors in business writing. They make your letters, emails, reports, and proposals unprofessional. Here are the most common punctuation mistakes in business writing and how to avoid them. Number 1, the comma splice. One mistake that business people make with the comma to create run on sentences. A run on sentence also called a comma splice happens when a comet joins two independent clauses. An independent clause, as you may remember from grade school, is a standalone statement or a single thought. You spot a run on sentence by determining if both parts of your sentence makes sense on their own. If they do, do not separate them with a comma, either join them with a semicolon, leave the comma but add a conjunction or three, break the two ideas into two sentences. Here's an example of what I mean. This year, we made great progress accelerating innovation to save customers both money and time in our stores were digitizing experiences to make it easier for customers to shop. Now here's that sentence corrected. Poorly, I might add with a semicolon. This year we made great progress accelerating innovation to save customers both money and time. Semicolon in our stores were digitizing experiences to make it easier for customers to shop. Now here it is corrected with a conjunction. This year we made great progress accelerating innovation to save customers both money and time. And in our stores were digitizing experiences to make it easier for customers to shop. Now here it is corrected. With a period. This year, we made great progress accelerating innovation to save customers both money and time period. In our stores were digitizing experiences to make it easier for customers to shop. The next mistake is the missing comma. Another mistake that business people make with commas is not using them at all. This is common in text messages and comments on social media posts. But you also see this mistake in emails and other forms of informal communication. As you can see, when the comma is missing, even the most well-intentioned statement can turn into a minefield of unintended meaning. This common mistake runs rampant in text messaging, facebook comments, tweets, and social media updates. But leaving comments out of your writing has unintended consequences. You can causal after or epic misunderstandings. Consider the sentence, Let's eat, sir. It's missing a comma, changing the intended meaning, let's eat. Sir, regains the intended meaning with a well-placed comma. The final mistake we'll look at is the unnecessary comma. When there is no rule requiring a comma. And when the meaning of your sentence is clear, without a comma, leave it out. Incorrect. Forklift drivers who drive too fast endanger other warehouse employees? Correct. Forklift drivers who drive too fast endanger other warehouse employees? Incorrect. We are looking for a marketing consultant to help us with prospecting, correct? We are looking for a marketing consultant to help us with prospecting. Now let's look at apostrophes, namely plurality versus ownership. One of the most common punctuation mistakes that people make in their business writing is using apostrophes where they are not needed. This tends to happen when a business person confuses plurality, Which is more than one of something, with possession, which is ownership of something. Let me give you an example of what I mean. The word managers is plural. It means more than one manager. Manager apostrophe S is a singular possessive. It means belonging to one manager. Managers. Apostrophe is a plural possessive. It means belonging to a group of managers to two or more. The most common mistake happens when people use manager apostrophe S, which is a singular possessive instead of managers, which is plural. To prevent this mistake, look at your sentence and ask yourself, do I mean more than one or do I want to convey ownership? Correct. Our division has five managers. Incorrect. Our division has five manager apostrophe S. Now let's look at contractions. Apostrophes are used to join two words to form a contraction. The y apostrophe R-E is a contraction of they are formed by dropping the a in R and adding an apostrophe. But there are other words in the English language with the same sound, namely there and there. Before you add an apostrophe, decide if the word you are adding two is a contraction. Incorrect. We met the software team and went into their office. Correct? We met the software team and went into their office. Incorrect. You're welcome. Correct? You are welcome. Incorrect. That's what I'm looking for. Correct? That's what I'm looking for. Incorrect. We are open on Sunday. Apostrophe S. Correct? We are open on Sundays. These mistakes in punctuation are among the most common errors in business writing. They make your letters, emails, reports, and proposals unprofessional, so avoid using them. Okay. 21. Six categories of words to eliminate: Read this paragraph and tell me what it means. Our agency offers a range of bleeding edge above the line solutions that help CMOs optimize synergies for global manufacturing brands, enabling them to leverage smart solutions and not end up asleep at the wheel. You can't tell me what this paragraph means because it is meaningless. And it's meaningless because it contains the six categories of words that wreck business writing. Namely buzzwords, jargon, initial isms, abbreviations, acronyms, and cliches. If you want to make your meaning clear in your business writing, eliminate the six clarity killers. Number one is buzzwords. A buzzword is a word or phrase that is fashionable at a particular time or in a particular context. The trouble is, buzzwords soon get overused and become meaningless. What, for example, does incentivize mean or bleeding edge? How exactly does anyone optimize synergies? Could you recognize a paradigm if you saw one? And why are we still trying to think outside the box more than two decades after that expression was coined. The problem with these buzzwords is that they are vague. They make your meaning vague. You may think that using the latest buzzwords in your business writing makes you appear competent or in the know or trendy. But it doesn't. Buzzwords simply make your meaning harder to discern. The rule to follow with buzzwords is simple. If everyone else is using it, don't. Number two is jargon. Jargon is special words or expressions that are used by a particular profession or group and are typically difficult for outsiders to understand. The jargon has its place. In our example that we just used. The expression above the line is advertising jargon for marketing that uses mass media, such as television, radio, newspapers, and billboards. Don't confuse jargon with buzzwords. Buzzwords are vague and they come and go. But jargon is well understood by industry insiders and remains. Pick any profession, medicine, accounting, engineering, social work. And you'll discover that their jargon serves a useful purpose and has done for decades. The rule to follow with jargon is straightforward. If your reader is in your industry and if you are certain, your reader understand your jargon. Use jargon. But if your reader is outside your industry or if you are uncertain, if your reader understands your jargon, don't use it. Number 3, initialism comes. And initialism is an abbreviation of a phrase consisting of initial letters pronounced separately. In our example, CMO is an initialism. It consists of the first initial of the term Chief Marketing Officer. Don't confuse initialism with acronyms. With initial isms. You pronounce each letter. You don't say an initialism, you sound it out, letter by letter. Your chief marketing officer is your c, m, o. The North Atlantic Treaty Organization, on the other hand, is nato. Pronounce name TO as one word, not an ATO, as four letters. Initialism are like jargon. They are only understood by industry insiders. So unless you are positive, your readers understand your initial isms in your business writing. Don't use them, spell them out. Instead. The fourth class is abbreviations. An abbreviation is a shortened form of a word or phrase. In our example, MSG dot is an abbreviation for manufacturing. Most abbreviations used in business writing are commonplace, such as Ltd. For limited and I-N-C for incorporated. These abbreviations you can use freely, but most other abbreviations are industry specific and less well-known. Again, usage depends on your readers. If they know that p.ball forward slash E means price to earnings ratio, then use the abbreviation. But if they don't, then spell it out. Number 5. Acronyms. And acronym is an abbreviation formed from the initial letters of other words pronounced as a word. In our example, smart solutions means solutions that are specific, measurable, attainable, relevant, and timely. Sma ART. Don't confuse acronyms with initial isms. You pronounce acronyms as a word. With initialism, you pronounce each letter. Nasa, for example, is short for the North American Space Administration. It's pronounced as one word, nasa, it's not sounded out. And ASA, the rule for using acronyms and your business writing is the same rule that applies to jargon, initialism, and abbreviations if in doubt. Spell it out. Number 6, cliches. A cliche is a phrase that is overused and betrays a lack of original thought. In our example, asleep at the wheel is a cliche. Cliches include only time will tell, read between the lines and hit the ground running. When you use a cliche in your writing, you tell your reader that you are lazy, boring, and lack originality. You make them want to stop reading. The other problem with cliches is that they are vague because they are so overused. That's how they become cliches. They have lost their meaning. They serve only as unoriginal filler. The result is that your readers won't trust your findings or your recommendations or you. So anytime you're tempted to use a cliche, resist the temptation, write something original. Instead. At the end of the day, using these best practices will help you push the envelope going forward. This impactful integrated approach will optimize your output and take your business writing to the next level asap in a way that is win-win 24, 7, run it up the flagpole and see who's solutes it. See you later. 22. Five Steps to Effective Business Emails: Let's talk about how to write effective business e mails. As we delve into this topic, remember that mastering e mail communication is crucial for efficiency and clarity in any professional setting. First of all, think about the appropriate length of an e mail. Idally your business e mail should be somewhere 100-200 words. Keeping e mails brief ensures that your message is digestible and to the point, which is highly valued in fast paced business environments. But why is brevity so important? Well, it respects your recipient's time. It increases the likelihood that they will actually read your message in full and respond promptly. Next, let's consider how to organize an e mail to maximize its effectiveness. The subject line is your first point of contact and should accurately reflect the content of your e mail. A clear and specific subject line sets the stage for the rest of the e mail. Okay. Let's say, for example, that you're writing an e mail to request budget approval for your marketing campaign. Don't make the classic blunder that so many business people make. They write a subject line with just the word budget or they write budget approval. These subject lines are too vague and they don't communicate that the writer actually wants the recipient to approve a marketing budget. Instead, the writer should write a subject line like this. Request for budget approval, the marketing campaign. This subject line tells the recipient exactly what the e mail is about, making it easier for them to prioritize their response. Moving into the body of the e mail, your opening sentence must immediately inform the recipient of the purpose of your e mail. You must grab their attention and set the expectation right from the start. For example, if you are writing to inquire about the status of a report, start with I am writing to check on the progress of the financial report due this Friday. The third step in crafting your e mail is to prioritize the placement of key information. Place the most critical things in the first paragraph. This way, if your reader only skims your e mail, they capture your essential points. For instance, if you need the reader to make a decision, State this requirement and its urgency upfront. Then put additional details and background information in subsequent paragraphs. This is a vital rule to follow. Always, always, always state your request first, then justify it or explain it. Don't start with background and explanations and descriptions and rationales. And then finally, at the very end of your e mail, somewhere down here, ask your question, or make your request. Always, always, always state your requests first or ask your question first, and then justify it or explain it or describe it. This small change alone will dramatically improve the effectiveness of your e mail communications. And this brings us to step number four, which is maintaining a professional yet approachable tone. It's crucial to balance formality with a touch of personal connection. Phrases like I hope this message finds you well or Thank you for your continued cooperation, are professional yet warm. These small additions foster a positive relationship with the person that you're writing to. Fifth, let's also touch on the importance of your e mails closing. Sign off your e mail with a polite and appropriate closing that reflects the tone of your communication. You can write best regards sincerely or thank you. They're all professional options that leave a good impression. Including your full name and position, if it's not already part of your email signature is also good. It helps place your message in context. The person knows who's writing to them. Let's look at an example. Imagine you're emailing a colleague to request participation in a project. Here's how you might structure your e mail. The subject line invitation to join Project X Planning Team. Hello, Janet. I hope this message finds you well. As we kick off planning for Project X. I think your expertise in digital marketing would be incredibly valuable to our team. We are looking for insights on digital strategy and audience engagement, areas where your recent work has excel. Could you join us for a brief meeting next Thursday at 2:00 P.M. To discuss this further? It would be great to have you on board to ensure the success of this project. Thank you for considering this opportunity. I look forward to your reply best regards, and then you put your name and your position. Notice how this e mail is structured to convey all the necessary information succinctly while also being engaging and direct about the need for a response. By the way, to follow the advice that I just gave you about putting questions and requests right at the very beginning, this e mail could be improved by asking the question right at the very beginning. So the e mail would begin, dear Janet. Could you join us for a brief meeting next Thursday at 2:00 P.M. Question mark. Then the e mail would give the explanation, the rationale for the meeting. The request first, the question first, then the rationale, then the conclusion, and so on. You get the idea. The only time you don't really need to put the question first is if your e mail is really short and you're absolutely confident that your reader will read the first sentence or two and get to your question or request immediately. If in doubt at all, especially if the e mail is a little bit longer than a couple hundred words, always always put your request first. Your question first, then explain. In conclusion. By keeping your e mail short and well organized with a clear call to action and a professional tone, you significantly significantly enhance your ability to communicate effectively. Practice these tips in your daily e mail communications and watch how they improve not only the responses you receive but also your overall professional relationships. 23. Editing checklist: In 1989, I applied for my first job as a freelance writer and editor. In the final paragraph of my cover letter, I wrote, the one thing I enjoy doing more than anything else is helping people communicate their ideas effectively. Except that my cover letter had a typo in it that no one noticed. I missed it and so did my future employer. So she hired me years later, I came across that cover letter in my files and I noticed a typo that everyone had missed. In my final paragraph. I'd forgotten to put an I in the word doing. So my sentence actually said, the one thing, I enjoy Dong, more than anything else. I showed my letter to my boss, the one who had hard MY years earlier and she said, Alan, if I had noticed that typo, I would never have hired you. The moral of my story is that errors in your letters and other business writing can cost you a job. Literally. In my case, no one spotted my error, but in your case, someone might. So my advice to you is to run your business writing through a checklist before you submit it. Here are the things to look out for besides spelling mistakes. Organization. Does your document have a clear goal or intended result stated clearly? Have you got right to the point? Have you stated your purpose for writing in the first few sentences of your documents? Have you met the needs and expectations of your reader? Is the length of your document adequate for your purpose? Have you said too little, too much or just enough? Does your writing have a logical structure that helps your reader follow your logic and understand your message. Have you place the most important information, such as a key finding, a vital recommendation, or a request for a meeting at the start of your document and not buried deep in the documents. Paragraphs. Have you communicated your ideas in paragraphs as opposed to a loose series of sentences. Does each paragraph deal with only one topic as it should? Does the first sentence of each paragraph introduce the topic of the paragraph? Do you develop each topic sufficiently in each paragraph? Do you end each paragraph with a summary or logical conclusion? Do you help your readers see how your paragraphs relate to each other? By connecting them with transition sentences. Have you varied the lengths of your paragraphs to avoid monotony? Let's look at words. Have you replace words with multiple syllables with their simpler equivalents? Have you replaced utilized, for example, with the word used? Have you replaced wordy phrases with simple words? Have you replaced lack the ability to with couldn't. For example. Have you replaced obscure words with more common ones? Have you replaced the word ameliorate with the word improve? For example, heavy replaced verb adverb combinations with strong verbs. Have you replaced, looked at carefully with examined? For example, have you replaced weak verbs with strong ones to make your meeting precise? Here's an example. The conveyor stopped. With the conveyor jammed. Have you replace nouns that are verbs and disguised? For example, have you replaced, came to the realization that with the word realized, are your words concrete rather than abstract? Have you replaced the phrase weather system with the word blizzard? For example? Have you removed all buzzwords such as incentivize and Paradigm? Have you limited your jargon to only those words you are certain your readers understand or have you defined what those words mean? If you have used initialism or acronyms, are you sure that your readers will understand them? If not, spell them out? If you have used abbreviations in your document, abbreviations that are particular to your industry. Will all of your readers understand them? If not, spell them out? Let's look at sentences. Have you kept related words together? In other words, have you put adjectives next to nouns that they modify? Have you varied the length of your sentences to avoid monotony? Do your relative pronouns have clear antecedents? In other words, when you use the pronoun him, her, or they, other relative pronouns. Are you clear about who they refer to? Does each sentence in your document contained one major idea? And no more? Are your sentences specific rather than general? For example, instead of saying sales for Q2 are different than for Q1 to you instead say something specific, like sales for Q2 are higher than for Q1. Are your sentences definite rather than ambiguous? In other words, is there only one way your readers can interpret your meaning? Have you used the active voice as much as possible? Have you replaced? Decisions were made by the committee. With the active voice, the committee decided, have you eliminated needless words? For example, have you replaced whether or not simply with the word, whether have you removed redundant words and phrases. This is my pet peeve, my hobby horse of the year. Have you replaced completely full with the word full? For example, is Europe document free of grammatical mistakes? Is your punctuation perfect? Is your document free of spelling? Mistakes? If you want to avoid embarrassing, costly mistakes in your business writing, run your writing through this checklist before you print it or before you submit it as an e-mail attachment.