Writing in Plain Language:

Contents: Talk to your reader | Shorter sentences | Cut out useless words | Cut out useless phrases | Words to avoid | Use active verbs | Visuals in Writing | Clear Layout | Layout of documentation | The use of space | Headings | The page | Punctuation | Layout punctuation | Quotation marks | Spelling | Sexism | The Golden Rules | The Fog Test

Introduction:

Many people write:

• too much;
• bureaucratically, and
• obscurely.

It is easy to say that we should all use plain English, but what are the benefits? Using plain English will:

• save you time in writing;
• make writing far easier;
• improve understanding.

Plain English is not patronising or over-simple language and it is not about hair-splitting grammar. It does not mean you lose any part of the message, even in legal or highly technical documents. It is merely the most efficient method of written communication.

Talk to your reader:

Whenever you need to write something, think carefully about who the reader is. Then ask yourself the following questions.

• How much does the reader already know about this subject?
• What information do I actually need to give?
• What information do I need to get?
• What tone should I use?
• Am I giving instructions or advice?

Perhaps the best advice on writing plain English is to imagine you are talking to your reader face to face.

You may find this difficult with long reports, but it is vital in helping you to say exactly what you mean, without waffle and without drifting into a bureaucratic style.

If possible, call your reader 'you'. Only use jargon if your reader will definitely understand it. Finally, don't be pompous. Be open. Be honest. Your reader is human too!

Shorter sentences:

Informative writing should have an average sentence length of 15 to 20 words. This is short enough to be clear and long enough to make the text flow well. (The average sentence length of the main body of this guide is 15 words.)

Be punchy. Mix short sentences (like the last one) with longer ones (like this), aiming for one main point, plus perhaps one other related point, in each sentence.

We tend not to use short sentences enough. We need to vary the length in order to make our writing livelier.

For example, you have the short sentence 'This is an important document and you should read it carefully' in the middle of longer sentences. This is fine. But how much sharper it would be as two sentences:

'This is an important document. You should read it carefully'.

Remember: if you have two different things to say that are fairly short, don't be frightened to use two sentences.

Cut out useless words:

One of the common failings of much writing is either using words that are unnecessary or using wordy phrases when a much shorter phrase would do. We must be concise. Only use as many words as you need. Consider every word and decide whether it adds to the message or tone.

Here are a few examples with the unnecessary words in bold.

....During the course of investigations

also, it should be mentioned that many people...

Allow a few days to elapse before speaking with....

You should contact.....

......Which is done for each and every incident

anything over and above this

For a period of 14 days

Up to a maximum of four people

Cut out useless phrases:

Similarly, there are few writers who do not use some phrases that could be replaced by a single word. Here is a list of some typical phrases:

Words to avoid:

There are also many words we use that have simpler, clearer or less formal equivalents. Don't write 'obtain' when you mean 'get'. Don't write 'residence' when you mean 'house'. The simpler, familiar words put you and your reader on the same plane; longer, abstract words make it more difficult to achieve a meeting of minds with your reader. Many words seem to get used for their dignified appearance, not for their sense. Writers often don't understand them themselves. The result is pomposity, which is certainly not dignified. The author Mark Twain once worked as a journalist and was paid seven cents a word for his articles. He clearly expressed his rules for successful writing when he said "I never write metropolis for seven cents, because I can get the same price for city".

Use the simplest words to get your meaning across. And don't be put off by people who accuse you of being childish or simplistic. Perhaps the idea that they should understand what you write is new to them! Here are some words with their alternatives. Remember that some alternatives only work in a particular context.

Use active verbs:

This subject, the most grammatical part of this guide, is where writing can really let us down. Most people know that a verb is a 'doing' word (such as 'make', 'work', 'write', 'ask' and so on), but they don't know about active and passive verbs.

In speech we use plenty of personal words - "you", "we", "I" and ACTIVE verbs. We do this quite unconsciously and by habit. The personal touch increases human interest. Active verbs make the sentences more direct and easier to understand.

Formal English tends to avoid personal words. PASSIVE verbs are a common way of avoiding them. The result is less human interest and some highly involved sentences.

Passive verbs have nothing to do with verbs in the past tense. They are just a way of turning sentences around and saying something a little different - in the future, present or past.

Spotting passive verbs is easy. They always have two things:

• one of the following - been, being, be, were, was, am, are, is;
• a 'past participle'

So a complete passive verb could be 'is done', 'has been given', or 'will be signed'.

Here are some examples of passive and active verbs from typical official documents.

Your complaint has been investigated (passive)

We have investigated your complaint (active)

Enquiries have been made by us (passive)

We have made enquiries (active)

It will be signed by the manager (passive)

The manager will sign it (active)

By themselves, passives don't look too bad. But when you have a lot of them together, they make writing very dull, bureaucratic, impersonal and occasionally ambiguous.

Sometimes you will want to use a passive. But to keep your writing lively, aim to make 80 - 90% of your verbs active.

Visuals in Writing:

Some things just don't lend themselves to word-explanations. They need visuals plus some words to explain them. All of us from tiny children, learned to understand language using pictures, for example:

• the 'picture' alphabet;
• comics and weeklies;
• illustrated books and magazines, etc.

Visuals in report writing help to paint a picture and save valuable time.

Photographs, diagrams, plans, sketches and maps help the reader see the point.

Charts, bar charts, tables and graphs make comparisons, argue a case, or present complicated subjects.

All too often writers forget that their audience are not mind readers. Reading someone else's words is like trying to make a journey through their mind. So present your ideas in a way that will prevent your reader from getting lost!

Clear Layout:

Here are a few general suggestions on clear layout - just as important for clarity as clear writing.

Don't use LONG STRINGS OF CAPITALS. Because they are all the same height they are much more difficult to read than lower-case letters. And they are much more unfriendly.

If you wish to emphasise something use bold. For headings, use bold, larger type, or a mixture of both.

Line length is important for speed and accuracy of reading. If your lines are very long, people get lost reading them all the way across, they often go to the wrong line when moving down the page and they get sick of reading faster.

But if you
make your
lines too
short it makes
reading very
jerky and
again, tiring.

Layout of documentation:

As well as clear writing, the layout of a document can affect how it is received by the reader. A well laid out document:

• will be easier to read and therefore more likely to be noted and appreciated;
• will indicate the relative importance of the information it contains by the layout design;
• reflects on the professionalism of the individual, department and organisation that produced it;
• can give aesthetic pleasure in its design.

Why produce something that is unbalanced and unattractive when the means are available to create something which is appealing to the eye?

The use of space:

Space is as important as the words on the page. We have all at some time abandoned books and documents with densely written pages and few paragraphs. We feel unable to take in so much information at one time. Try never to have a paragraph which takes up more than one quarter to one third of the page. If a series of points are being made, separate them out so that each piece of information can be seen and understood in isolation.

Would the information best be shown as a table with clear divisions between each statement? Remember that the lines of a table do not need to be shown but its structure can be used to create an attractive format.

Headings:

Use headings to divide up information to make it more accessible and easier to assimilate. Numbering, when it exists, should be clear and unambiguous and is best done in the descent which allows for easy reference.

Headings should be embellished as an aid to reference, but they need to be consistent. It should be obvious at a glance whether the division is a major block of information, a sub-paragraph or minor point of fact.

Centring is a layout option for major headings such as titles but it should be used very cautiously as it is now somewhat outdated and can give a document an amateur appearance. Most headings are left justified for the simple reason of consistency. If there are other sub-headings within the document these will be left justified and to have the heading centred will spoil the balance of the page. Centred headings are best confined to one paragraph 'poster' or 'public notice' documents when the text can also be in a centred format.

The page:

It is a matter of taste and subject matter whether line justification or ragged edge is used. Sometimes the layout creates short lines which look ugly when justified and this should be spotted by the writer. Generally full justification looks good on formal documents such as reports. However, a letter can look contrived and 'processed' when justified and a ragged edge gives a more personalised and informal style. Use your judgement. Also remember that right side only justification can be used and sometimes is a useful layout tool.

Try not to divide words at the end of the line and sentences and paragraphs at the end of the page. Sometimes it is impossible to avoid dividing a paragraph, but this usually happens when paragraphs are too long, so keep this in mind. Remember that you have the ability to justify vertically on the page as well as horizontally - use it.

Punctuation:

Punctuation does have importance in the layout of documents because it helps the reader to make sense of the writing. In speech, a listener is helped by pauses, the rise and fall of the voice and changes in emphasis. In writing, punctuation performs some of these functions.

Full stop (.)

These are, of course, used to split sentences. But make sure your sentence is a sentence. It should have at least one verb, it should make sense and it should be making one or more statements.

Comma (,)

It is not easy to lay down rules about commas because their position is often just a matter of personal taste. But a good principle is to use as few as you need and only use them when they make the sentence clearer. For example, use them:

To show where you would have a short, natural pause if you were speaking:

'You may not think this is good idea, but it has worked well in every other area'.

To show where something extra has been put in, when you would use a pair of commas:

'This booklet must, if possible, be given back to the owner'

To divide strings of adjectives:

'The reference book was informative, interesting and visually attractive'.

Semicolon (;)

Semicolons can be used instead of full stops where you have two closely related sentences and a full stop might be too blunt:

'We have studied this problem for several days; more work is necessary'.

Or it can be divided in a list:

'The difficulties are: failure to produce the goods on time; reluctance to keep the costs down; poor standards of work'.

Layout punctuation:

Sometimes punctuation is an important part of the layout. If a number of facts or statements are emphasised by separating them into a list the punctuation is as follows:

a) the items in the list will start with lower case;

b) the end of each item will have a semicolon;

c) the last item will finish with a full stop.

The reason for this is that 'follows' is followed by a colon, not a full stop. Therefore the three separate items are not discrete sentences, but phrases within a sentence which is finished at the end of the last item. This would apply if items in the list were indicated by letters as above, by roman numerals or simply by dashes or 'bullet points'.

Quotation marks:

There are two different quotation marks, double and single and they have different meanings. They are used correctly below.

Mary remarked to her colleague, Susan, "The last time I saw Mr Farrell he was hoping to exchange contracts within the week. Have you any news of what stage he is at?". Susan answered, glancing at the daily printout that she used as her 'calendar', "He exchanged contracts last Wednesday and we are billing him today".

In other words, double quotation marks denote speech or direct quotes from documents such as:

Jane Austen's most famous saying is "it is a truth, universally acknowledged, that a single man in possession of a good fortune must be in want of a wife".

Single quotation marks are used to show that a word is being used out of context as in 'calendar' or for indirect quotes from documents such as:

Thomas Hardy's belief in 'the drama and tragedy of rural life', is the cornerstone of his biographer's assessment of his work.

They can also be used for quotes within quotes, e.g.:

Fred said to Tom, "Mary telephoned yesterday and said 'how are you getting to the party?' which meant that she needed a lift".

Spelling:

Spelling mistakes give a bad impression and can make the reader lose concentration. Keep a dictionary handy and use it. Often the simplest words are spelt incorrectly; so don't be embarrassed to look up anything that you are not absolutely sure of.

Sexism:

There is a problem in English that, for example, 'Everyone must do his work' is grammatically correct but obviously sexist. And of course it is easy to slip into a 'he' style when writing.

There are three answers. Let's take the sentence 'Every officer must do his best'.

Use 'their'. 'Every officer must do their best'. This is grammatically incorrect but doesn't sound too bad.

Use 'his' or 'her'. This is safe but can't be used all the time as it is clumsy.

Make the person you are writing about plural. 'All officers must do their best'. This is the best solution but again can't be used in every case. You need to change the whole passage from what 'the officer' can do to what 'officers' can do.

It is probably best to mix these three techniques.

THE GOLDEN RULES:

To write or not to write - before you start writing, check there is a reason for doing it. Would a phone call or an e-mail do instead?

Once you have decided to write, make sure you know exactly why you are writing. This will help you to keep it short and clear.

Stop and think before you write.

Imagine that you are talking to your reader. Write sincerely and personally, in a style that is appropriate.

Use short words. Long words will not help your writing or impress your reader.

Use everyday English whenever possible. Avoid jargon and legalistic words and explain any technical terms you have to use.

Keep your sentence length down to an average of 15- 20 words. Try to stick to one main idea in a sentence.

Use active verbs as much as possible. Say 'we will do it' rather than 'it will be done by us'.

Be concise.

And always check that:

• your meaning is clear, and

• the tone is of one ordinary human being communicating with another ordinary human being!

HAPPY WRITING!

If you would like to test a piece of your own writing for clarity, then try this Fog Test!

THE FOG TEST:

This test was invented by an American, Robert Gunning, as a yardstick to measure how readable a piece of writing might be.

Measuring the amount of mental fog in a piece of writing is not an exact science, so you can't expect a score produced by this test to be anything more than a rough indication of how difficult the writing will be to read. But the score will at least be an objective thing, and with practice you will be able to apply the test very quickly.

If the document is a short one, test the whole of it. If it is a long one, a test of short passages selected at random will be enough.

To get the score!

1. Find the average sentence length. In the margin, jot down the number of words in each sentence in the passage. Assume that a colon or semicolon makes a fresh sentence. At the bottom of the page, add the total number of words. Divide this total by the number of sentences to get the average number of words to the sentence.

2. Find the percentage of long words.

Go through the same piece of writing, ticking off each word that has three syllables or more when spoken. But do NOT tick any long words that:

(a) Begin with a capital letter such as the name of a person, place, body etc, e.g., 'Robinson', 'Manchester', 'Maintenance Department', 'September'.

(b) Are made up of short words run together, e.g., 'however', 'understanding', 'waterproof'.

(c) End with '_ed' as a third syllable, e.g., 'reported', 'protected', 'supported'.

Count the total number of long words you have ticked, Then work out the percentage they represent of the total number of words in the passage (which you know from step 1).

Number of long words x 100 = percentage of long words
Total number of words    1

3. Add the figure you get from step 1 to the one you get from step 2. The result is the "FOG Index" of the writing.

To evaluate the score:

Check the fog index figure against this scale:

Above 40:

Almost unreadable for most readers. They may think they have understood it, but a comprehension test would probably show that they have taken very little in.

35 - 40

Very heavy reading. Just about acceptable if it's technical stuff for a technician - but there are probably a lot of unnecessary abstractions and complex sentences.

30 - 35

Moderately heavy reading. Acceptable for many Research and Development reports and for an occasional report to senior management on a highly complex subject. But this is too high for normal paperwork. (This is the norm for 'Times' and 'Guardian' leaders.)

25 - 30

Fairly easy reading. About right for most paperwork passing between managers and staff. But still too high a score for sales writing or messages on the notice board. (This is the norm for 'Express' and 'Mail' leaders.)

20 - 25

Easy reading. This is the range for personal writing such as business letters, for hard-hitting selling copy or for notices to be read by all levels in the company. (This is the norm for 'Mirror' and 'Sun' leaders.)

Below 20

Very easy reading. If you can get your ideas over as simply as this, you are in some good company. A lot of great literature scores less than 20 (for instance Antony's "Friends, Romans, countrymen" speech scores 17, the opening of the story of the creation in Genesis scores 15.)

This guide was produced from many different sources. I am indebted to the Metropolitan Police, The London Fire Brigade, the 'Clear Writing' campaign and various other publications. Whilst you may use and copy this Guide however you wish, please do acknowledge the sources. Thank you.

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