Clear – Be clear in purpose and in outcome. Your audience needs to be able to receive the message quickly and with complete understanding. Concise…
When looking at the careers section of your local weekend paper, you’ll find some great examples of how not to write a list.
Conclusions often don’t get the time they deserve. Typically, they are dashed off with little thought, and therefore are full of clichés, bulky, bureaucratic phrases and…
You may have been told that you shouldn’t use a comma before the word and. However, you need to be careful – this statement is not always true. Here’s an…
Many things influence whether or not you express numbers in figures or in words. Sometimes it’s your profession, and sometimes it’s the editing style of your organization.
Continual and continuous can’t be used interchangeably. While some people consistently use continuous, other people consistently use continual. For the most part, it’s because…
If there’s one saying that will always be true, it’s “quality over quantity”. This saying is very helpful in reminding us that a long sentence leads to a frustrated reader…
Many of our grammar errors are due to the errors we make when we use a structure in speech. However, if we want to write correctly, we need to not only identify those…
To ensure correctness in your writing, pencil editing is one of the best things you can do. Pencil editing is a proofreading technique. To do it, touch and speak each word…
Many people believe that plain language equals simplifying the language to a very low level. This is untrue. Plain language means using language and formatting that allows the…
Why not you ask? Because if your wine compliments the meal, it means that your wine is praising your meal! Be aware of the spelling of these two words: complement and…
Hands up everyone who was taught that you can’t start a sentence with the word because. Ah, thought so – many of you were taught that “rule”. The most…
