We are all familiar with letters. They are a traditional form of communications. However, emails are recently new to the business scene and require their own email-centric form of writing and organizing. Why? Emails were never designed to be a formal method of communication. When emails came into being in the early 90s, they were […]
The word staff is a collective noun. It represents a group. Some other examples of collective nouns are board, committee, company, organization, department, and faculty. The trick with these words is that when the group is acting in harmony, you must use the singular form of the verb. Correct The customer service staff is not available after […]
Andy’s question: “Is it proper grammar to use ‘Billy jumped off of the ladder’? I don’t think so. I think it should be ‘Billy jumped off the ladder.’” BizWritingTip response: “Off” and “of” are both prepositions. A preposition is a word mainly used before a noun or pronoun to show its relationship with other words. […]
A BizWritingTip reader wrote, “One of my pet peeves is the use of impact. More and more, I see and hear it being used as a verb. It seems to even have a past tense – impacted. My experience is that people are using impact in place of affect (as a verb). My only knowledge of impact is as a noun. Do I […]
Today’s busy readers are skimmers, drowning in paperwork and are impatient. Therefore, when they glance at one of your documents either in hard copy or on a screen, what do they want to know right away? They want to know “What’s in it for me?” They mentally ask themselves “Why do I need to read […]
The colon (:) is an important punctuation mark in that it signals to your readers that an explanation follows. Unfortunately, many readers tend to overuse it. If you are staying on the same line, you must have a complete sentence before you use a colon. Correct Our client list includes many companies from the automotive […]
Kirby’s question: “I know you have written about the abbreviations Mr., Mrs., and Ms. before. However, is it correct, as Ms. is not a true abbreviation, not to place a period after it? With each year, we are using Ms. more often than either Miss or Mrs.” BizWritingTip response: Ms. can be written with or without […]
A BizWritingTip reader wrote: “A colleague and I are trying to decide what is the appropriate use of the words advice and advise. When signing off on an email, that required a response, my colleague used the term “Please advise” to which he got a grammar error (green squiggly line). Could you please clarify this for us? BizWritingTip […]
We all know the adage write to the reader. And we all agree it makes perfect sense. Why then do most business writers neglect their readers when they prepare an email, a letter, a proposal or a report? I maintain it is because they don’t really understand who today’s readers are. Think about it. Would […]
However is one of the most frequently-used words in business writing. It’s a wonderful word. It tells the reader that the sentence contradicts the previous thought. Unfortunately, many writers do not know the correct punctuation that accompanies the word. Because however is a two-syllable connecting word, there must always be a comma after it. But what do you […]