Edit and rewrite messages for vividness, clarity, and conciseness.
Identify factors affecting readability and revise messages to improve readability.
Revise and proofread a message for organization, content, style, mechanics, format, and layout.
To add energy and impact to your writing, paint vivid mental images that receivers will find exciting and will remember.
When are general words preferred?
In getting along with others, writers find general statements useful; they can keep negative ideas from getting more emphasis than they deserve. In addition, writers who don’t have specific information or for some reason don’t want to divulge it use general words.
For vivid business communication, use specific words.
What is a cliché? How do cliché affect the effectiveness of a message?
Phrases that have become overused are called cliches.
Clichés can make reading monotonous and can make the writer or speaker seem like a copier.
Less frequent used words capture the reader’s attention because they are original, fresh, and interesting.
What hidden message (metacommunication) might cliché convey?
A worn expression can convey such messages as "you are not special"; I won’t bother to think; the phrases I u8sed in talking with others are surely good enough for you.
Using overly strong adjectives and adverbs may damage your credibility.
What is a superlative?
Messages are sometimes influenced negatively by another form of adjective or adverb-the superlative.
The superlative is the form of the adjective or adverb that compares the thing modified with 2 or more other things.
When are superlatives appropriate?
Superlatives are very useful words. The extreme unit in a series needs to be identified-the highest or lowest score, the latest news, and the most qualified applicant.
When superlative are totally unsupported or unsupportable, their use is questionable.
The objective of business writing is to express, not to impress. Why?
The degree of formality in writing is indicated by the nature of the message and the backgrounds of the receivers.
The writing in dissertations, these, legal documents, and high-level government documents is expected to be formal.
Business memorandums, email messages letters and reports are expected to be informal.
Business writers prefer the informal words from the left column rather than the formal words from the right column.
Using difficult, formal language may confuse and intimidate the receiver.
Can you clarify this message: "Management has become cognizant of the necessity for the elimination of undesirable vegetation surrounding the periphery of our facility?
Why build a good vocabulary?
You should build your vocabulary so that you can use just the right word for expressing an idea and can understand what others have written.
Just remember the purpose of business messages is not to advertise knowledge of infrequently used words but to transmit a clear and tactful message.
For the informal writing practiced in business, use simple words instead of more complicated words that have the same meaning.
Place words, phrases, or clauses near the words they modify.
To "dangle" is to "hang loosely." A phrase dangles if it is not clearly attached to the appropriate noun or pronoun.
Dangling modifiers do not convey the true meaning the writer intends. The meaning may be illogical and perhaps even humorous (e.g. children rather than a monkey hanging from a tree in the sentence in the Self-check).
What is an expletive? Why should you avoid using expletives?
An expletive is a meaningless word. Expletive beginnings are not considered grammatical errors but are seldom advisable. Usually any sentence that begin with there is, or it is can be improved.
What is parallel construction and why is it important?
When ideas appear together for a certain purpose, they should have commonality in grammar. If one of the ideas is presented in a different way grammatically, it appears to be out of place.
Commonality in grammatical presentation is called parallel construction.
The principle of parallel construction applies not only to elements in a series that appear in a sentence but also to major units in an outline, to subunits that appear under a major unit, and to headings that appear in documents. If one major heading is a complete sentence, all other major headings should be complete sentences. If one subheading is a question, all other sub-headings under that division should be question.
A concise message is not necessarily short but is written in as few words as possible.
Does use of a certain word three times in a paragraph constitute redundancy?
A redundancy is a phrase in which one word unnecessarily repeats an idea contained in an accompanying word.
Concise messages save time and money for both the writer and the receiver.
The receiver’s attention is directed toward the important details and is not distracted by excessive words and details.
To prepare a concise message, include only that details that the receiver needs, and state these details in the fewest possible words.
Redundancy is unacceptable, but repetition can be very helpful.
What 2 factors affect the readability of a message?
Two factors contribute to the readability of a message:
Length of the sentence.
Difficulty of the words.
The Fog Index score is the approximate grade level needed to understand written material.
What Fog Index score is recommended for most business writing?
The desirable score for most business writing is in the 8 to 11 grade range.
What purpose does calculating a readability index serve?
It provides the writer valuable feedback about the average length of the sentences and the difficulty of the words. For quick easy reading (and listening), use small words and short sentences.
How can writing analysis software improve your writing?
They can help you locate grammatical errors as well as improve your style-the way you express ideas.
These programs required writers to:
Compose the document at the keyboard.
Instruct the program to analyze the writing.
Study the writing analysis (includes readability index).
Revise the text incorporating valid suggestions only.
If you have not used writing analysis software, determine if this software is available in your computer lab and begin learning to use the software to analyze your writing.
You must understand basic-writing principles to benefit from computer generated writing critiques.
A spellchecker does not free you from the responsibility of careful proofreading each document.
Take a few minutes to review the standard proofreaders marks listed in Appendix A. then use them consistently so you can quickly mark revisions and others can understand your revisions easily.
Is proofreading one time adequate if your goal is to prepare error-free message?
Proofread a second time to locate the following mechanical errors:
Typographical, grammatical, capitalization, and punctuation errors.
Incomplete sentences.
Omitted and repeated words.
Word substitutions (yours and you) and words that sound alike (there for their).
Assume that you have been asked to explain to a coworker a systematic way for proofreading company correspondence. What steps would you describe?
Study the conventional business format in Appendix A. compare with Appendix A.
Proofread letter parts, including the date line, letter address, and salutation, subject line and closing line.
Be sure that all necessary special letter parts (mailing notation, attention line, subject line, enclosure, copy and mailing notations, second-page heading and the writer’s address for a personal business letter) are included.
Check to be sure that number items are in correct order; inserting and deleting text may have change the order of these items.
Consider whether the text has the visual impact you desire.