GrammarPhile Blog

Everyone remembers that childhood game, right? The one where you couldn’t take a step forward unless you asked the game leader, “Mother, May I?” Funny how we were grammatical as children, but we lost that ability as we aged.

Making sales today is tough business. Finding jobs is even tougher. And though everybody is allowed a mistake here and there, the gatekeepers to both sales and jobs are clamping down on proposals and resumes, and even speech patterns. They're saying to themselves more and more, "Make the first pass easier by simply eliminating the ones with mistakes." So you want to avoid mistakes! Here are some more tips on making the right choice in words:

I received the following from one of our editors, Marie Stewart. Neither Marie nor I could find information about the author of this piece although we found it quite a few times on the Internet without any attribution.

Well, the words aren't confused, but sometimes people who use them are. Our job today is to help you avoid confusing the following words, some of which we've seen even in documents processed by our editors THIS VERY DAY!

• The work is now finished, so you can all go home.
• Please finish what you are doing so that we can all go home.

• We wish to honor those individuals who had the courage to serve their country in its time of great need.

• All the parties to the original agreement must sign the attached amendment.

• Please tell me the name of the person in charge of your water ski tournament.

• If you like, I can send you a list of all the people in our club who will be skiing in the tournament.

• We do not doubt that she is capable. (Negative statement.)
• Does anyone doubt that the check was mailed? (Question.)
• I doubt whether I can go.

• You'll soon master the everyday (ordinary) routine of the job.
• He has skied every day (each day) this week.

Here are more words that business writers often confuse. Check your writing to be sure you don't fall into word confusion.