GrammarPhile Blog

Establishing a voice in your writing isn’t just beneficial for writers of novels and opinion-based columns. It’s beneficial for all types of writers, including business writers.

When you distinguish your voice in your business writing, you reveal your professional personality to your bosses, coworkers, clients, and a broader industry-wide audience. Instead of sounding like a robot rambling off statistics and numbers in a report, or coming across as an unreliable novice, you become an approachable expert who can offer real guidance and support when necessary.

Continue reading to see the benefits of establishing a voice in your business writing, as well as some tips for developing and maintaining your voice.

We’ve recently shared posts about different style guides and when they should be used. Now it’s time to test your knowledge, to see how well you know some of the most common style guides used. Match the entries to their respective style guides.

Have fun and let us know how you did in the comments section.

As promised last week, here are some popular style guides listed by industry.

By Industry

American Medical Association Style Guide (AMA)

The AMA style was developed by the American Medical Association for the purpose of writing medical research papers. Many scientists use this style too.

American Psychological Association Style (APA)

The APA style guide is the style manual of choice for writers, editors, students, and educators in the social and behavioral sciences. It provides vital direction on all aspects of the writing process, from the ethics of authorship to what words writers should choose to best reduce bias in language. And it offers guidance on choosing the headings, tables, figures, and tone that will result in strong, direct, and sophisticated scientific communication.

Many grammar aficionados will fiercely debate writing rules and techniques among themselves and with others until they run out of breath. But sometimes their quibbles may prove to be entirely pointless. And that’s not because there are no grammar rules worth knowing or following, but because these self-proclaimed grammar aficionados are from different industries and have developed their writing skills with very different schools of thought and practice. Or it’s because they’ve simply had different professors or teachers who encouraged them to follow very different style guides for very different purposes.

It’s important to consider how you have come to understand grammar and writing techniques as a writer, editor, or proofreader, and where the rules and techniques you follow come from, because you could unwittingly be making grave errors. Or you could be confounding your readers, and that’s never good to do.

At the very least, you should know and designate a style guide for everything you write that will be published or somehow shared with others, especially in professional settings. After you review the list below, you might discover a style guide that better suits your needs or the needs of your organization.

Have you ever been tasked with writing something that was so mundane you caught yourself drifting off to sleep while writing? Looming deadlines or not, boring topics can be difficult to write about and can be very tedious. Truly, how interesting can you really make a white paper on things like office supplies or manufacturing equipment?

Well, with the right mindset, you can make any topic interesting. That’s right—any topic. The real trick when writing about a seemingly boring topic is to look at the topic as an opportunity to let your mind wander, do some digging, and uncover something unique about something that is typically mundane.

With the advent of new communication technologies and platforms, business writing in the 21st century has drastically changed. Regardless of your industry or occupation, there are certain things you’ll need to know as 2018 begins, if you want your business writing to remain effective.

Data Will Drive Your Business Writing

In 2018, every organization’s reliance on data will increase significantly, especially when it comes to business communications and reporting. According to The Economist, the world’s most valuable resource is no longer oil, but data. And how each business decides to write about the hundreds of terabytes of data it encounters can make or break its success.

Tis the season to relax, enjoy the company of your friends and loved ones, and seek inspiration for the new year. And what better way to gain inspiration for the new year than through the immortal words of famous authors? Match the quotes below to their authors, and then tell us which one inspires you the most in the comments below.

Feel free to share your favorite quote in the comments as well, if you don’t see it here. Cheers to a new year filled with productivity and amazing writing!

Gerunds and infinitives are often confused in writing and in everyday speech, even though they seem very different at first glance. Here’s what you need to know, so you can avoid mistakes in your writing.

A modifier is a word, phrase, or clause that functions as an adjective or an adverb to describe a word or make its meaning more precise; it describes or modifies other words or parts of a sentence. Before you take the quiz below, here’s a quick refresher about the types of modifiers, and some common mistakes writers make when using them.

Proofreading professionals take pride in their occupation and work diligently to ensure readers don’t encounter typos or any other inaccuracies in a piece of writing. Being responsible for a published typo has the potential to keep a proofreader up at night, cringing with anguish and regret. But every now and then, even proofreaders (the holders of the red pen, the original grammar nerds, and the deciders of the fate of the written world!) deserve a break too.

Whether you proofread marketing material, academic material, legal research, or something else for a living, the tips and tricks listed below are designed to make your proofreading life easier. Once implemented, they’ll help you become even more efficient than you already are.