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2015 is still young, and you probably haven’t broken many of your resolutions yet. Among the yet-unbroken ones, I hope, is your determination to be a better writer.
Don’t be offended. I’m a copywriter, and much of my working life is spent writing and, unsurprisingly, in improving the quality of my output. Trust me, that’s a continuous process. Some days, the words flow easily, and some days I can’t write my way out of a paper bag. I’ll leave it to you to guess which days I have more of.
I saved an October 2014 post from Jacqueline Whitmore about good business writing in my “blog” folder to use later. And later is now. The author contributes to Entrepreneur, and I’m so glad to have stumbled across her work. An “Author, Etiquette Expert, and Founder of The Protocol School of Palm Beach,” Ms. Whitmore presents six helpful hints for “writing sterling business prose.” They’re so simple that they will probably require endless practice to perfect, but hey, it beats hanging out on street corners and in pool halls.
Here you go:
- Limit prepositions. Prepositions are often unnecessary, and they slow things down, too. Instead of saying “Let’s meet to have a discussion about product adoption on Wednesday,” you can say “Let’s discuss product adoption Wednesday.”
- Always try to find one word that does the work of two. Ms. Whitmore notes that the adjective “very” takes up space without adding much value. (To that I add, don’t use “very” in front of “unique,” which says it all and doesn’t need further embellishment.)
- Be active. Like prepositions, the passive voice weights your writing down with extra words. Use the active voice as much as you can. Ms. Whitmore’s example: “Sarah approved the business plan.” Doesn’t that sound better than “The business plan was approved by Sarah.” A side note: I’ve heard that engineers like the passive voice because they think it sounds politer.
- Avoid big words. Yeah, you probably think they make you sounds smarter, but … “Eschew,” which means the same thing as “avoid,” makes you sound educated, but if they confuse your audience, “you’ve fallen short … of offering the best in communication.”
- Punctuate properly. Use commas consistently. Do away with run-on sentences. Stay away from exclamation points. Get smart about when to use semi-colons. Good grammar guides abound. My favorites are Woe is I by Patricia T. Conner and Strunk and White’s Elements of Style.
- Be brief. As my former Dictaphone sales manager Bruce Cartier used to say, “When we boil the fat out of this, what are we really saying?” Say only what’s necessary. Avoid side excursions into fluff. You want people to read your emails, rather than nodding off somewhere in the middle.
I love these tips. They’re deceptively simple but potent. They require practice to master, but I believe that good writers are good thinkers. As you refine your writing, you’re probably improving your thought processes.
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