So freshman composition wasn't your favorite subject-- does that mean you can't write? Not necessarily. Although freshman composition courses differ, most focus on teaching the conventions of academic writing-- which is quite different from writing on the job. The conventions -- or informal rules-- are also different. Just as you probably dress differently on the job than you did to go to school, you should adjust your writing style to fit the context. In this column, we'll look at what I call the "Five Great Myths" from freshman composition -- rules that may be appropriate for academic writing, but not for most workplace writing.
Myth 1: "Never use personal pronouns in writing." The goal of the academic paper is objectivity. Although this convention is changing, writers are still encouraged to keep themselves out of the text. In business writing, this is obviously not effective. It would be silly to write letters that didn't use "you" and "we" or "I" as in the following:
- If you agree to the terms laid out in the attached document, please sign and return it to us so that we can start processing your order immediately.
But in reports, writers sometimes tend to fall back on their composition training, producing awkward, stilted writing like the following:
- Eight of the top 100 investment companies were researched in our report. The company location, history, salaries and benefits, and employee requirements were considered and are given on the following pages.
How much more elegant (and comprehensible!) to say:
- We researched the top investment companies. The following pages give information on eight of the top ten companies, including their location, history, salaries and benefits.
Myth 2: "Don't use contractions." Again, writing without contractions is suitable to very formal documents. If you want a more conversational style, it's perfectly all right to use contractions -- like "it's", "you're", "isn't:", etc.
Myth 3: "Don't end sentences with a preposition. " As one pundit said, "That is a rule up with which I will not put." Look at the overall effect of the sentence -- if it becomes stilted and ugly when you move the preposition from the end, then by all means, let it dangle!
Myth 4: "There's no such thing as a one-sentence paragraph." Academic writing is about theories and ideas. When a writer states a theory or an opinion, that writer needs to provide support or evidence. That results in the standard academic paragraph structure of:
- Topic sentence stating the theory, idea or opinion the writer wants to present. Support sentence giving data, examples, or other evidence related to the topic sentence. Another support sentence. Another support sentence.
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