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Business Prose StylePart 1: Readability

• Achieving a Readable Style• Cut Lard.• Use Strong Verbs.• Check Sentence Length, Cadence, and Stress Emphasis.• Keep Paragraph Short and Use Topic Sentences.• Avoid Strings of Prepositional Phrases.• Avoid Needless Business Jargon.

© 2015 Karen L. Thompson Department of English University of Idaho

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Cut Lard and Stop Writing It

• Redundant Words• Meaningless Words• Dead Phrases

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Why you may have developed a lard habit.

• The most common cause of lard-laden prose is mistakenly trying to meet a page-length requirement by adding more words.

• Most teachers do not insist that you meet a specific number of pages or else.

• Okay, well maybe my 8th grade English teacher did, but she was a bit strange.

Karen’s 8th Grade English Teacher

Who are you calling strange?

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Here’s how to think about page length requirements.

• They are (or should be) aimed at helping you think about the level of development you need in any given writing assignment.

• Some assignments require a sustained piece of writing. For others, something shorter is needed.

• You don’t want to write three pages when the assignment asks for ten and vice versa.

• Writing more words that do not contribute to meaning is just adding lard, so if you aren’t meeting a page length guidelines, consider if your writing needs development.

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already existingalternative choicesat the present time presentlycurrently at this timebasic fundamentalscompletely eliminatecontinue to remaincurrently beingempty spacefirst beganhad done previously

introduced a newmix togethernever beforenone at allnow at this timeperiod of timeprivate industryseparate entitiesstart outstill persistswhether or not

Cut Redundant Words

Zeros are meaningless phrases.

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it is my intent to show that = 0

as a matter of fact= 0

as is well known= 0

as stated earlier= 0

it is noteworthy= 0

the presence of = 0

it goes without saying= 0

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Dead Phrases

it is my intent to showas a matter of factas is well knownas stated earlierit is noteworthythe presence of it goes without saying

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at the present timenowat that point in timethenhas the ability tocanhas the potential towillin the event that ifin the vicinity ofnearowing to the fact thatbecausethe reason being thatbecausethe question as to whether whetherthere is no doubt but that no doubtfor the purpose of to

They’re Alive!

Reanimate Dead Phrases by Replacing Them with a Single Word

A strong verb (or verb phrase) conveys action that is specific.

Example of a weak verb:The analysis shows…..

Example of a strong verb:The analysis reveals…..

Use Strong Verbs

For more examples, see the Strong Verb handout in bblearn.

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When possible, eliminate “there” with all forms of the “to be” verb.

There is a section in the report that describes….– The report describes….

There are changes that we need to make in ….–We need to make changes….

There was a failure in the power system at….– The power system failed at….

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Sentence Length

• Typically, modern business prose style uses shorter sentences.

• The average sentence length is between 14 and 18 words, but avoid applying this average as a rigid rule.

• It’s a good idea to vary sentence length to avoid a choppy cadence.

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Understanding Cadence• Cadence refers to how your words come together

and flow smoothly rather than being choppy in ways that jar a reader.

• Cadence is like a music beat, it’s the rhythm of your sentences that pushes the reader forward.

• To determine if your writing has rhythm or if the cadence is choppy, read it aloud.

• If it is choppy, the problem is likely that you are not structuring the sentences to create what is known as “stress emphasis.”

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Stress Emphasis and Speech: when we speak, how we emphasize or stress certain words affects the meaning.

• I only tested the Labrador for rabies yesterday.• I only tested the Labrador for rabies yesterday.• I only tested the Labrador for rabies yesterday.• I only tested the Labrador for rabies

yesterday.

Notice how the sentence structure may be exactly the same, but the meaning will change because of how we stress certain words by using our voice.

Writing, however, is different.

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To understand this difference, it’s important to know how readers look for meaning.

• In the English language, readers naturally look for meaning at the end of a sentence or paragraph, known as the stress position or stress emphasis.

• This means that the start of a sentence or paragraph sets up the topic and readers look to figure out the point of what you are writing at the end.

• If writers get this structure wrong, one of two things will happen.

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• In lengthy compound sentences, the reader may decide to emphasize something the writer did not intend to be emphasized because there is no way to know what’s most important.

Or• In shorter sentences, the reader will mistakenly

think the material in the stress position (at the end) is important and interpret this material as worthy of emphasis.

• Either way, the meaning the writer intended will be missed or misinterpreted.

• If your writing has a choppy cadence, analyze it to determine if you are structuring your sentences to place the emphasis at the end of a sentence of paragraph. Here are some tips.

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1. Trim the end.Sociobiologists claim that our genes control our social behavior in the way we act in situations we are in every day.

Since social behavior means the way we act in situations, so the information after social behavior is sitting in the stress position but it’s information we don’t need.

2. Avoid writing metadiscourse, particularly, at the end of a sentence.Job opportunities in computer programming are getting scarcer, it must be remembered.

Metadiscourse draws attention to what is being said, it often sounds preachy and pompous, and it can often be written in the stress position. Eliminate it.

3. Shift new information to the right.Questions about the ethics of withdrawing intravenous feeding are more difficult.

The “more difficult” phrase is referring to something that was stated previously, so it’s old information. Keep the new information to the right, so it is in the stress position.

More difficult, are questions about the ethics of withdrawing intravenous feeding.

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Keep Paragraphs Short and Focused

• Paragraphs in business writing are often much shorter than in academic prose style.

• Keeping your paragraphs short and focused on creating the right stress emphasis by starting with a topic sentence.

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Strategy for Focusing Paragraphs• Underline the sentence in a paragraph that you think best

introduces or frames the rest of the sentences in that paragraph.

• If you can’t do that, then your paragraph is probably rambling without a point. Get a point, and write a topic sentence. Or, if you have a paragraph that is rambling without on without a point, then consider deleting it entirely.

• If you can underline a sentence, then make certain it is helping you to govern the meaning in that paragraph by placing it at the start of the paragraph.

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Summative Modifiers• A summative modifier works by summing up what’s

been said so far in a sentence, and it can help you create the right emphasis. Notice how the bolded text below does this:

– Economic changes have reduced Russian population growth to less than zero, a demographic event that will have serious implications.

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Strings of prepositions make it hard for readers to find the emphasis you intend.

• Strings of Prepositional Phrases

The condition of the patient was documented in the patient profile written by the nurse on duty during the after-hours shift.

• Revised by using active voice and placing the modifiers before the nouns:

The after-hours nurse documented the patient’s condition in the patient profile.

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Avoid Needless Business Jargon.• Jargon is industry or discipline specific terminology. It is

used when the audience is knowledgeable about how the term is both being defined and used.

• When your audience would not have this knowledge, then jargon creates a problem with being clear.

• Often business prose is needlessly filled with jargon, particularly, when a business or organization is stating goals and writing mission statements: – “Jargon masks real meaning,” says Jennifer Chatman,

management professor at the University of California-Berkeley’s Haas School of Business. “People use it as a substitute for thinking hard and clearly about their goals and the direction that they want to give others.”

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For the last three years, Forbes magazine has conducted an NCAA tournament-style-bracket contest for Jargon. They pick 32 terms most abused in business and ask readers to vote on these. To vote and view results: Jargon Madness

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You will find additional tips about these prose style concepts and others in the textbook chapters.