We Don’t Stand For Much

Your typical mission statement is a glowing, intended-to-be inspiring description of everything an enterprise believes in. But the other day I read an article arguing that one way to establish your brand is to proclaim what you stand against. And since it cites Jon Stewart as the prime example, who am I to argue?

So here’s a list of what re:Write is against:

• Bad writing — everything from grammar and usage mistakes, to clichés, pomposity, needless complexity, biz speak, gobbledy-gook, careless repetition, and jargon.
• And especially: bad news writing – all of the above, plus: stating the obvious, bias (not just the usual suspects, but also a bias towards The Official), unsubstantiated assertions, and misuse of science, statistics, and/or surveys

I’ll have more to say on these from time to time, but I’ll start with a couple of points on bad grammar.

You’ve probably heard it said that letting bad grammar into your writing (whether it’s an email, a report, or a memo) makes a poor impression, and can prevent your message from even being considered. One could argue that, given the sheer volume of bad grammar on display everywhere, nobody really cares about this anymore. But I believe there’s still a critical mass of people who DO care; thus, it’s worth making an effort to keep your grammar as polished as your shoes would be for an important interview.

And there’s a second reason: making sure your communications are grammatically correct forces you to understand what it is you’re trying to say, and be sure you’re actually saying it.

This doesn’t mean hauling out your high school English book and trying to remember what a participial phrase is, or all the other fine points of grammar you memorized for the tests and promptly forgot. But there are a couple that are worth brushing up on:

• Subject /verb agreement: Over the years, I’ve found that looking out for subject/verb agreement forces me to make my writing clear and unambiguous, and to understand the point I’m trying to make. It’s shocking to me how often this is botched, particularly in news writing, not just in broadcasting but sometimes even in the august pages of The New York Times. In the process of combing your copy for misaligned subjects and verbs, you’ll naturally consider whether the whole thing makes sense.

• Dangling participle: A source of inadvertent humor, and occasionally confusion. Here’s one, courtesy of Grammar Girl: “Hiking the trail, the birds chirped loudly.” I guess we could be talking about Woodstock and his buddies (from Peanuts), but otherwise, birds don’t hike. Again, paying attention to this issue forces you to focus on what you’re trying to say.

Are all grammatical rules reasonable? Nope. But a consensus has built up over the centuries about many if not most of them, and if nothing else, they help eliminate ambiguity. So it won’t kill us to follow them.

One rule I don’t care about: the ban on ending a sentence with a preposition. If Shakespeare ignored it (“We are such stuff as dreams are made on”), then we can too. The alternative is to twist your sentences into pretzels (the infamous “it is a situation up with which I will not put” for example).

The bottom line: being careful about grammar will help you be careful about every other element of your writing.

Something to stand for.