How We Write
blog.griffin.sh
blog.griffin.sh
Doesn't take that much time and the quality of the writing goes up when hearing the prose as I perceive it differently, which allows me to feed this back into the final edit.
Writing isn't hard, it's just work like anything else. I think people have a false perception of it requiring some sort of talent, when in fact anyone can eventually hit a home run if you let them take 50 swings.
PS: the reason reading it out loud helps is that certain multiples of syllables per sentence tend to sound better. People tend to pair stressed / unstressed syllables rhythmically (iambs, using the ancient word, and hence the iambic notation mentioned in reference to Shakespeare's iambic rhymes, for instance). Recreating the same rhythmic patterns in writing makes the phrases on the page stand out as your mind voices them internally. So, always finish paragraphs with short, strong, 5 or 10 syllable phrases and you'll have people hanging on your every word and thinking you're singing the gospel to them.
“This sentence has five words. Here are five more words. Five-word sentences are fine. But several together become monotonous. Listen to what is happening. The writing is getting boring. The sound of it drones. It’s like a stuck record. The ear demands some variety.
Now listen. I vary the sentence length, and I create music. Music. The writing sings. It has a pleasant rhythm, a lilt, a harmony. I use short sentences. And I use sentences of medium length. And sometimes, when I am certain the reader is rested, I will engage him with a sentence of considerable length, a sentence that burns with energy and builds with all the impetus of a crescendo, the roll of the drums, the crash of the cymbals–sounds that say listen to this, it is important.
So write with a combination of short, medium, and long sentences. Create a sound that pleases the reader’s ear. Don’t just write words. Write music.”
Quoted in http://www.timcasasola.com/blog/writing
> , it is important
5 syllables ;).
The second version is always a joy to write.
For less important documents, the Mac-OS built-in text to speech is pretty good at catching typos and reading text to you. I highly recommend y'all try it out. It's a great too. Info about how to setup a keyboard shortcut here: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1mApa60zJA8rgEm6T6GF0yIem...
I am not saying that is necessarily wrong (maybe it is), nor that is not useful, but it just seems like another small step in removing the individuality of the people working there. It doesn't feel right to me.
The writing advice that I follow and that I like to give is that your writing style should reflect your personality. Your individuality should be with you on some level even if you are representing your company in a meeting with a client, or to the press, or internally. Writing style should be unique to you, not to your company. An exception should be someone whose job is to be the spokesperson or a lawyer creating a document that declares the position of the company. But that's a very different use case from the one declared at this guide.
The way it says "How we write", "Our voice is who we are", "We are clear/honest/transparent", "We are empowering"; it looks uncannily familiar to the Borg.
eidt: Another thing. When they say "Swap formal words for normal ones. There's a whole lexicon of British "business-speak" that one can use to sound professional, but also needlessly distant. We try to avoid that:
It reminds of another cultural change where the principles remained just the same, like: "Remember when everybody on business had to wear a suit and people would make fun of anyone who showed to work on a plain t-shirt? We are not like that. Here we make fun of people who want to wear a suit".
When you're speaking on behalf of an organization, be it a business or non-profit or government or whatever, you're obligated to use their words. When I pick up a novel I know I'm reading the novelist's ideas, but when I call tech support I'm not looking to talk to Joe or Jane, I'm looking to talk to AT&T about why their DSL equipment in my neighborhood is broken. They aren't personally responsible for it, they're speaking for the company.
This even extends to political press. If you go read the submission guidelines for virtually any news or political publication that accepts freelance inquiries, you'll find that they all suggest reading a lot of their prior articles "to get a feel for our tone and style," if they don't just outright hand you a style guide to read such as the one linked.
You can be you standing in plain clothes on a street corner by yourself. You can't be you when you're answering the company's phone. It's not nefarious mind control, it's just business.
We want a consistent corporate voice - partly because otherwise we don't have an actual brand identity, but also because if Jessica or Andrew leave then that voice leaves with them, which also just services to confuse.
But the guide seems to talk about regular day-to-day communication on a startup. Jessica emails to a customer should have Jessica writing style in them, in my opinion. Just like any salesperson carries their own personality to a sales meeting.
Or internal emails between employees. You don’t write to Andrew to clarify some doubts about a report in the same tone of the company website. Or any standard tone. You write in your own style. At least I think you should.
* George Orwell's essay 'Politics and the English Language' [0], which includes his six rules for writing
* Sir Ernest Gowers' The Complete Plain Words [1], originally a style guide for the notoriously prolix British Civil Service, in which he offers this memo from the ancient Egyptian ministry of finance as a paragon:
> Appollonius to Zeno, greeting. You did right to send the chickpeas to Memphis. Farewell.
[0] https://www.orwell.ru/library/essays/politics/english/e_poli...
I don’t like “hard and fast” rules, in general. I prefer a more “heuristic” approach.
This rule, in particular, sticks in my craw, because, as a former art teacher once told me: ”Things are cliché for a reason.”
I write about that here (but for design): https://medium.com/chrismarshallny/the-road-most-traveled-by...
I also enjoyed this: https://blog.griffin.sh/2020/04/17/making-decisions/
I know it’s basically promotional material, but it’s pretty classy stuff. I wouldn’t mind if most corporations did the same.
I think a good exercise for me would be to do something similar.
I do have this, but it is not really the same kind of thing: https://medium.com/chrismarshallny/leaving-a-legacy-1c2ddb0c...
I try to have a casual voice in the vernacular. It pains me to use technical documentation as a soporific.
I got used to breaking up my writing into small paragraphs; often single sentences, when I worked for a Japanese company.
Another exercise that I have started doing in my writing, is to exchange the word “you” with “I” or “we.” I have found that people tend to react a bit negatively to a dictatorial tone.
Editing, for me, is a kind of ongoing process, and I will revise a document continuously after publication; sometimes, finding typos or suspect grammar weeks later.
I often continue to fact-check, and will do things like correct links, or add “after the fact” updates with additional information, errata, or elucidation.
Not only that but writing (instead of a Powerpoint) levels the playing field for non native English speakers. That in itself is a huge bonus for having a culture of writing, especially when you have folks from all walks of life working at Amazon.
Uh.
I was loving it up til this point.
(Two spaces after a sentence [in TeX source] has the advantage of distinguishing between sentences and other places where a full stop might appear, such as in abbreviations.)
On my own sites, I tend to use sans-serif fonts, but sometimes convert to serif in print CSS. I also use very common typefaces in my CSS, even if a unique one is more to my taste. Browsers are quite plebeian, and will display my beautiful prose using whatever crayons are in their toybox. If I keep my demands simple, it’s a lot more likely that I’ll be able to exert some control over the presentation.
I generally don’t like serif fonts too much, even in printed material, but that is completely personal.