BackHow to write
The inability to write well is a dead giveaway that the mind isn't trained to think critically
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There is no empirical evidence to back this. But as someone who conducts the occasional writing workshop at various organizations, I have anecdotal evidence to argue that people who do well in the C-Suite write well. To my mind, there is no taking away from the fact that the inability to write well is a dead giveaway that the mind isn’t trained to think critically.
Kyle Wiens, the founder of ifixit.com, puts it succinctly in the Harvard Business Review: “If you think an apostrophe was one of the 12 disciples of Jesus, you will never work for me. If you think a semicolon is a regular colon with an identity crisis, I will not hire you. If you scatter commas into a sentence with all the discrimination of a shotgun, you might make it to the foyer before we politely escort you from the building.
“Everyone who applies for a position at either of my companies, iFixit or Dozuki, takes a mandatory grammar test. Extenuating circumstances aside (dyslexia, English language learners, etc.), if job hopefuls can’t distinguish between to and too, their applications go into the bin," Wiens writes.
That in mind, I turned to Niranjan Rajadhyaksha, executive editor of Mint, for some insights. Why is it that his columns attract loyalty? How does he manage to clearly articulate what complex documents like the budget contain? In his unassuming way, Rajadhyaksha summed up his methods in a few lines, all of which contain a world of wisdom.
• While everybody provides data, I need a take and need to think hard about it.
• I need to compare it across time, countries, space and various indices.
• It is important not to put too much into a report. Of the 5,000 data points in the budget, I need to cull the five that matter and kill the 4,995 that don’t matter.
• I need to convey clearly where I stand vis-à-vis the consensus view.
• I keep monetary policy transmission out because it is reported every day. If I didn’t, it would be a report on a report.
• I keep talking to people regularly. It is not a transactional conversation. These conversations are filed away in my head.
• While writing, I keep thinking, what is the key bit of data that is going to lift it and how to structure it.
The question now is: How do you implement this with the precision that Rajadhyaksha does? The theme is the matter of a few dozen books.
That said, allow me to share a few tips that can hopefully elevate your writing a few notches. A caveat must be filed, though. All of what follows are not rules in the strictest sense of the term. Master craftsmen often break them with alacrity. But to break the rules, it is important to know the rules.
Two places to begin with understanding the rules are On Writing by Stephen King, a timeless classic my friend and former colleague Peter Griffin recommended. On a more contemporary note, I stumbled upon The Sense of Style by Steven Pinker, a philosopher and linguist of remarkable merit.
Now, for some pointers:
1. You cannot write for everybody. Imagine your reader. Think up one person. What is his name? What does he look like? What will get his attention? Can you place yourself in that person’s head? Your objective ought to be to reach out to that one person. You cannot write for an undefined mass.
2. As a thumb rule, no more than 10-12 words per sentence. That’s because it compels you to do two things. First, eliminate wordiness. Second, it forces you to stick to one thought per sentence. Any more words or thoughts and it is unwieldy for both the writer and reader. A word of caution. If all sentences stick to the 10-12 words rule, writing can become horribly monotonous. So play around. A good place to practice this is on Twitter. Try tweeting your thoughts without resorting to abbreviations which, once again, I firmly believe, is emblematic of a lazy mind.
3. Cut, cut, cut! Be brutal. Don’t fall in love with clichés or what you’ve written. Consider these phrases for instance.
a. Active consideration
b. Basic essentials
c. Basic fundamentals
d. Consensus of opinion
e. Final outcome
What in the devil’s name is active consideration? If something is under consideration, it is implicit that the task is active. What the heck is basic essentials? If it is essential, it is basic. Incidentally, all outcomes are final. Therefore, something like final outcome sounds ridiculously incompetent. My limited point here is, watch for redundancies.
4. Brutality means hacking adverbs like the ones above. But there are good adverbs as well. Consider the following:
a. She smiled happily
b. She smiled sadly
In the first instance, implicit to a smile is happiness. So ‘happily’ can be chopped. But when she smiled sadly, there is a point to be made. That’s what you call a good adverb. It adds drama and mystery. Why would anyone smile sadly? What is it they’re trying to hide? What hurt is the face trying to mask?
5. Pull out the last note you wrote. Count the number of words that end with ‘ing’ (for instance, withering) and ‘ly’ (for example, similarly). Now think up alternatives to these words. If that means rewriting all of a sentence, do it. Sure, some are unavoidable. But after giving it a good shot, look how your copy comes to life. I’ll bet to my last rupee that the copy will turn out a lot more crisper than what you originally thought of.
And finally, memorize the no-bullshit tips articulated by legendary ad man David Ogilvy.
1. Read the Roman-Raphaelson book on writing. Read it three times a day.
2. Write the way you talk. Naturally.
3. Use short words, sentences and short paragraphs.
4. Never use jargon like reconceptualize, demassification, etc. These are the hallmarks of a pretentious ass.
5. Never write more than two pages on any subject.
6. Check your quotations.
7. Never send a letter or memo the day you write it. Read it aloud the next day and edit it.
8. If it is something important, get a colleague to improve it.
9. Before you send your letter or your memo out, make sure it is crystal clear what you want the recipient to do.
10. If you want action, don’t write. Go out and tell the guy what to do.
Charles Assisi is co-founder and director at Founding Fuel Publishing (www.foundingfuel.com).
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