Even in the relative meritocracy in which we work and live, people still judge others to a large extent on the quality of their written words.  Consciously and subconsciously, clients and colleagues make determinations about another’s education and competence when reading their correspondences.  Sadly, secondary schools have subordinated the importance of proper language skills in attempts to make education more “relevant” to their diverse student bodies.  This course was created to enhance the image of the company and the advancement of the participants by addressing the common mistakes that signal lack of written language skills.

Among the characteristics of good business writing are clarity, precision, and economy of language.  And before dispatching the correspondence, all work should pass through the final, often overlooked stage: editing.  This workshop presents principles designed to enhance these qualities in participants' writing and thus increase the power and effectiveness of their prose.  Course principles are relevant for diverse types of business documents.

Clarity: 

Clarity should be the principal goal of writers in a corporate environment.  Unfortunately, obfuscation is sometimes mistaken for sophistication; one purpose of this workshop is to disentangle the two.  Participants learn to enhance clarity by improving word choice, sentence structure, paragraph organization and development.  They also learn about the importance of the organization of a document as a whole, whether a memo, report or other written communication.

Precision:

Business communications often suffer from the improper selection of words or phrases.  Going beyond mere semantics, participants learn the distinctions between groups such as “due to” and “because of”, and how making incorrect word choices often alters the meaning of their messages in unforeseen ways.

Developing clear, correct sentences

Participants receive a comprehensive checklist of 7 criteria used in a proper sentence structure.