Reading time: Less than 3 minutes Is writing a chore that you dread? Here are some suggestions for how to make writing more fun… Would you rather write a blog post or go play a game of Hearts? Do your household budget or read a novel? Produce a report for your boss or take the […]
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Reading time: About 3 minute Are you afraid of self-editing? Here’s how to make editing less daunting. Instead of vaguely aspiring to make your text perfect, pass through it many times looking for specific problems…. One of my clients used to find writing horrifying, frightful and nerve-racking. But as a student working on her PhD
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Reading time: About 3 minutes Having a “vocabulary” of writing problems might sound like a strange idea but there are some terrific benefits from knowing how to ID your bad writing… I was speaking with a coaching client last week about “bad writing.” Here’s what we decided: Most writing is neither bad nor good. Instead,
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Reading time: About 3 minutes Over the last two weeks, I’ve written about why and how to paraphrase. If the thought of this still makes you nervous, here’s a guide to a faster, better approval process from the people you’ve interviewed… Many corporate communicators go crazy with what’s known, euphemistically, as the “approval process.” Usually, a
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Reading time: Just over 2 minutes The Hemingway App promises to make your writing bold and clear. How does it do that? Most writers today strive to avoid the passive voice. Do you know what I mean by passive? Don’t be too quick to say yes! It may be easy to identify the blatantly obvious
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Reading time: About 3 minutes Do you have enough sentence length variation in what you write? The biggest problem? Most people don’t use nearly enough very short sentences. Perhaps it’s time to consider the age-old question: does length really matter? I’m talking about writing, and sentence length of course. Let’s begin by taking a look
Are your sentences the right length? Read More »
Word count: 757 words Reading time: About 3 minutes Is there anyone — apart from school students — who doesn’t enjoy taking an easy, self-revealing test? Today, I’m giving you the chance to take a quick quiz for writers. Sharpen your pencils! If you want to be a better writer, it’s important to know what
Test: are you a born editor or a born writer? Read More »
Word count: 710 words Reading time: less than 3 minutes If you’re unfamiliar with readability statistics, here’s an introduction. And if you haven’t gone beyond the Flesch-Kincaid index, here’s a new idea for you… Did you know that in pre-Elizabethan times an average written sentence was 50 words long? Fifty words! Why? I’m guessing that
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Word count: 654 words Reading time: Less than 3 minutes You probably learned the difference between past, present and future in preschool. But how hard do you think about tense when you’re writing? Perhaps, not hard enough…. I am fascinated by tense. Not becoming tense, of course. Just tense. What do I mean? Well, tense
Are you tense over your verbs? Read More »
Word count: 743 words Reading time: 3 minutes Have you ever struggled with the passive voice? Here is a tip for avoiding that problem. Readers ask me about grammar, a lot. I don’t quite know why. I’m not the Grammar Girl or anything. I make more than my share of grammatical mistakes. And my wonderful
Why you should look for a spell of bad weather Read More »
