not all readers will detect your lapse. But those who do may be the ones who count.

People seldom act on what they cannot understand. Good results are even less likely if you flood the reader with information that isn’t organized to lead to an action or isn’t relevant to a grasp of the subject.

Yet another advantage of the active voice is that it tends to push you to decide precisely what you want to say, to be more specific.

your writing is you. It reveals how your mind works. Is it forceful or fatuous, deft or clumsy, crisp or soggy? Readers who don’t know you judge you from the evidence in your writing.

Effective means picking your spots, concentrating your

it would have seemed both natural and literate. The old rule is simple: Don’t use “like” in any case where “as if” or “as though” would fit comfortably.

There are only 266 words in the Gettysburg Address. The shortest sentence in the New Testament may be the most moving: “Jesus wept.”

putting down first what you want the reader to do, next the three most important things the reader needs to understand to take that action, then starting to write.

The only way some people know you is through your writing. It can be your most frequent point of contact, or your only one, with people important to your career — major customers, senior clients, your own top management. To those women and men, your writing is you. It reveals how your mind works. Is it forceful or fatuous, deft or clumsy, crisp or