Writing tips

The following is what I learnt from a business writing course that I completed a number of years ago. I hope that these points will be useful to you with your email, presentation and general business writing that you will do.

• Be direct by using short and familiar words
• Be concrete and specific
• Concrete nouns e.g. CEO Jane Smith
• Abstract nouns – avoid, so – state what must be done and by when
• The aim is to be clear and concise
• Nouns describe people, places and things
• Use adjectives and adverbs sparingly
• Adjectives that clarify nouns – What kind? Which? How many?
• Adverbs modify verbs, adjectives and other adverbs – how? why? when?
• Transitional words help guide the reader and connect sentences
• Be concise – get to the point fast and without waste
• Write short sentences – 15 to 17 words max. per sentence
• One idea per sentence

Examples of bad and good writing
Bad version
We should involve Marketing, who incidentally have been quite successful in their latest campaign to sell more text books, in the development of this new product

Good version
We should involve Marketing in the development of this new product. They have been quite successful in their latest campaign to sell more text books.

Bad version
We´re as of this date running over budget for August. on the other hand we´re on target to meet the deadline

Good version
We´re running over budget but we are on target to meet the deadline

Active and Passive voice
Avoid unnecessary words

Avoid unnecessary sentence starters, e.g. “please be advised that…”

Identify what you want to communicate – hold onto the main point and avoid clutter

Verbs convey action so use precise verbs

Lois is the driver of the truck

Lois drives the truck

Use active voice to give writing more energy –  active voice is SUBJECT + VERB + OBJECT
“The buyer signed the contract”

Passive voice is OBJECT + VERB + SUBJECT
“The contract was signed by the buyer”

Use passive voice when the action is more important than who performed it
passive – eventually, the skyscraper was completed
active – Eventually, the builders completed the skyscraper

Structure 
Introduction – get the reader hooked with a question or interesting fact plus outline what you are going to talk about, the key message and explain the purpose of the document

e.g. the department can increase its efficiency by an estimated 15% if we take one step – purchasing 5 new computers (Hook and stating what you want)

faster, new computers will significantly speed up ordering and bill processing (key reasoning)

after reading this report, I hope that you will approve the purchase of the faster, new computers (Purpose)

Main body – provide justification and reasoning that supports the main idea from your introduction. Each paragraph explains one idea and each paragraph should follow on from the previous one. Start the paragraph with a topic sentence, state your core point.

e.g. currently, we have 5 obsolete computers in the office (purpose). In the past year at least one computer a month has crashed requiring help form IT (justification).

organize main body by –
chronological order
advantages and disadvantages
level of importance
categories

Conclusion – summarize what you want, keep it strong, discuss the implications of your main point and call to action

e.g. in conclusion, the issues we´re facing are severely hindering the work of the department – and by extension the company. Approving the requested purchase will solve the problem immediately and we can all get back to doing what we do best, making a valuable contribution to the work of this organization.

Design
You need to format your text so it can be easily read. Use white space to give the reader space to breathe – e.g. margins, pictures, graphics

Include short lines of text. Do not justify the text. Use bullet points / list. Use headings to break up long documents if it looks good that will help the reader