Some people may wonder why I am such a stickler for proper grammar. In the Internet age, many users assume that if their message is being understood, then it’s not really necessary to use perfect English. That may be understandable when you are engaging in a casual IM conversation with a friend, but it is not as acceptable in the public arena of a blog or in the context of a business.
You may have encountered some of my Grammar 101 posts in the past and you may remember the Twitter-Up Your Grammar Skills Contest that I’ve been holding these past few days. Well, one of the first lessons that I learned from Booher’s Rules of Business Grammar
Symptom of Other Problems
You see the chipped coffee mug above? In the grand scheme of things, that small chip isn’t going to ruin your meal, but it may tarnish your view of the restaurant. If they have no trouble giving you a chipped mug, it’s possible that they are just as careless with ingredient selection, food preparation, and so on. It has been demonstrated that when people receive poor service from a flight attendant, they extrapolate that the engineers may not be properly maintaining the aircraft either. This same kind of inductive reasoning can take place with your grammar as well.
If there are errors with less and fewer in your professional correspondence, your business contacts may think less of your ability to perform other tasks as well. If you’re so careless as to use incorrect plural forms, you may also have sloppy quality assurance practices, poorly built products, and unacceptable customer relations.
Professionalism and Respect
Further to this previous point, it is difficult to fully respect a high-ranking business official if their grammar isn’t up to par. It can demonstrate a lack of education and a lack of prestige. You need to respect yourself first, but if you want to succeed, you also need to command the respect of others. Unless you are exceptional in some way, you won’t receive that kind of respect if all of your correspondence is riddled with errors. Your reputation is at stake.
Professional business correspondence (including press releases) needs to be impeccable, but you should also take a similar level of care to your blogging. Just because the book is called Booher’s Rules of Business Grammar
Speak Well, Write Well
Far be it for me to say that I have perfect grammar — I have received my share of negative feedback in the past — but I am constantly working to improve my writing ability. Choose your words carefully and work on your unique voice, but be mindful of those little nagging grammar problems too. It may start as a small chip on a coffee mug, but that small chip can tarnish the image of everything else.
Well written Michael, and true. I’ve read blogs and commented to myself “do they understand what they are saying” because they were not careful with their grammar and spelling.
You bring up a good point about perception with the restaurant analogy. How much does that affect a person. The 80-20 rule probably comes into play here. Eighty percent of your comments come from twenty percent of your business. On top of that, a person from that twenty percent with a negative comment will propagate that negative comment twice as much as a positive commenter will.
So, which comment would you like? The geometric negative growth or the normal growth from a positive comment?
The downside of using proper grammar is that sometimes people don’t understand what you’re saying!
People have gotten so used to poor grammar that something written correctly may not make sense to them.
Mind you, I agree that people should use good grammar. Or at least make an effort to do so. So many people don’t even try or care.
I beg to differ. Just because you’re using proper grammar does not mean that you need to use complex or lofty language.
Good grammar should make the meaning of your words clearer. Poor grammar and wording can result in a lot of ambiguity.
The style of writing is quite familiar . Did you write guest posts for other blogs?
Excellent Michael Kwan.
Good advice, worth following.
A discussion has come up in a technical forum and some professionals claim that if people can understand each other, syntax and other conventions do not matter. I consider it absurd.
Is there any international or national standard on the level of perfection of grammar one has to follow for different business / professional purposes?
Thanks
putchavn@yahoo.com
Following dcr’s comment, yes, somethimes people seem not to understand good grammar. Some lady was arguing with me in a bus that why did I say “insulting,” that I should have said “insultive.” … I was frozen when she said it, notting how ignorant people are towards use of good grammar.