Center for Business and Technical Writing
Top Ten Mistakes in Writing*
The following mistakes can embarrass your company and cause it to lose
time, money, and stature:
- Poor organization is a surefire way of being
misunderstood and ignored by prospects, customers, and upper management.
- Inappropriate tone and vagueness can ruin a message
and cost you customers. Vague writing invites follow-up contacts to
clarify the message.
- Passive language makes your company’s documents
tentative and less authoritative.
- Lengthy sentences can derail your reader’s train of
thought and put off clients.
- Redundancy taxes your reader’s attention and
patience.
- Misused words, such as "anxious" for "eager," make
the writer seem less professional.
- Hedging, a mistake by writers who lack confidence,
can make readers doubt your intentions.
- Lengthy paragraphs may lead to overly large blocks
of writing that people never get around to reading.
- Grammar and punctuation, if incorrect, may convey a
message that wasn’t intended. Did the client order nine-foot-long poles
or nine foot-long poles?
- Spelling and capitalization may not send a client
out the door . . . as long as you didn’t misspell the client’s name.
* Writing problems adapted from Gary Blake,
The Wall Street Journal
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