Writing is hard, but don't overlook the difficulty - and the importance - of editing your own work before letting others see it. Here's how. The secret to good writing is good editing. It's what separates hastily written, randomly punctuated, incoherent rants from learned polemics and op-eds, and cringe-worthy fan fiction from a critically acclaimed novel.
Most writing mistakes are widespread, but good writers just get better at spotting them. Some things you'll learn to watch for are:
Overuse of jargon and business-speak, like "utilize" or "endeavor" instead of "use" or "try."
Clichés are stale phrases that have lost their impact and novelty through overuse. If you are used to seeing it in print, don't use it.
The passive voice. The subject of the sentence should be the person or thing taking action, not the thing being acted on. "Harry wrote this article," is better than "This article was written by Harry."
Rambling. When you are not sure what you want to say, it is easy to phrase it in three or four different ways. A single concise sentence is generally better.
When you write something, you get very close to it. It is nearly impossible to distance yourself from it straight away to edit properly.
The longer you can leave a draft before editing, the better. Half an hour to two days is enough of a break to edit well. When you do edit, read your work out loud. You'll catch more problems and get a better feel for how everything flows.
8 min read Opinions expressed by Entrepreneur contributors are their own. One hundred twenty-six. That's how many emails are expected to be sent and received per business worker, per day, in 2019. Even more startling? We spend 28 percent of our work week on emails. That comes out to more than 11 hours per week.
Responding to emails as soon as you receive a notification gives others the impression that you’re at their beck and call. It also prevents you from reflecting on your own priorities for...
To avoid filling the email box of staff members, only CC the relevant parties. Ask your team to respond to you individually instead of using the reply-to-all button.