In addition to struggling for the right words, business writers often wrangle with the letters of the alphabet, wondering what to capitalize and what to abbreviate. These issues lead to three common problems in business writing:
1. Overuse of capital letters
Sentences like the following are common in business writing:
John Smith, Vice President of Water Cooler Maintenance, will be accepting applications for Computer Engineers all Summer in the Conference Room.
Writers know that capital letters add emphasis, so they tend to capitalize everything to make everything important — or to be politically correct and make it seem important.
A few general rules:
Titles
If you’re loath to lowercase an important title, pick up a major newspaper or newsmagazine and find an article about the president of the United States. You’ll notice that some major news organizations refer to him as “the president,” not “the President.” Some stylebooks say it’s acceptable to use “the President” when referring to the leader of the United States, but that’s the only exception. The president of your company doesn’t get the same courtesy from press association stylebooks or grammar books.
Still hesitating at using little letters for a big title? Then change the sentence around. Write “President John Smith spoke at the meeting” instead of “John Smith, president, spoke at the meeting.” President Smith will appreciate it.
Job descriptions are never capitalized. The mailroom clerk has to accept that he will never see capital letters in his job title, even in front of his name: “Mailroom clerk John Smith eventually became the company’s president.”
Company terms
Things you think should be capitalized
Seasons and directions are not capitalized. To make up for fall and summer being in small letters, all holidays are capitalized: President’s Day, Fourth of July, Thanksgiving.
Directions — east, southwest, north — are capitalized only when referring to specific regions of the United States: “Manufacturing firms dominate the business landscape in the South.” But “Pittsburgh is north of Lexington.”
Of course, there are always exceptions. Southern California has become known as a specific region, and most people capitalize it. Also, if a direction is part of a proper name — like Southwest Wacker Drive — it is capitalized.
So assuming the company has a Water Cooler Maintenance Division, the sample sentence at the beginning of the section should look like this:
John Smith, vice president of Water Cooler Maintenance, will be accepting applications for computer engineers all summer in the conference room.
2. Overuse of acronyms
Some business documents look like alphabet soup because of all the initials:
Donna Reynolds, VP of HR, will meet with all CSRs.
Acronyms should be written out on first reference:
Donna Reynolds, vice president of Human Resources, will meet with customer service representatives (CSRs).
If you plan to use an acronym throughout the document, put it in parentheses after the first reference. If you’re not going to use it again, don’t bother! Some stylebooks say that if you think the acronym is clear, you don’t even have to use the parentheses: just start using the acronym on second reference.
In an informal internal document, writing “HR” is fine — it’s an example of the time-saving jargon described in an earlier post.
Most acronyms don’t need periods, and common ones don’t need to be written out on first reference. If you don’t trust your judgment on whether an acronym is commonly known, check your dictionary. You’ll find that FBI, CIA, FAA, FCC, and many other government agencies have their own entries. If it’s in the dictionary, it’s probably common enough to stand without explanation.
3. Inconsistent Abbreviations
Do you abbreviate “October 12” as “Oct. 12”? Should you write “Asheville, North Carolina” or “Asheville, N.C.” or “Asheville, NC”?
There’s no right answer. It depends on which style guide you’re following. The Associated Press Style Book and other journalistic style guides prefer the standard abbreviations. The Chicago Manual of Style and others want you to write out the names of states and months. If your company doesn’t have its own style manual or a recommended style guide, use whichever style you prefer. Just be consistent. If you abbreviate “Jan. 1” in the first paragraph of a report, make sure that 100 pages later you abbreviate “Dec. 31.”
A note on postal abbreviations: The two-letter codes developed by the U.S. Postal Service to expedite electronic mail processing should not be used in formal writing unless an address, complete with ZIP code, is being included specifically to guide readers to send mail. So you might write “The Bread and Milk Company’s processing plant is at 900 Spring St., Chicago, Illinois.” In another context, you might write “Receive a copy of these delicious bread recipes by writing to The Bread and Milk Company, 900 Spring Street, Chicago, IL 50037.”
Here is a list of state abbreviations. Note that the standard abbreviations use periods and the postal codes do not:
Alabama Ala. AZ
Alaska Alaska AK
Arizona Ariz. AZ
California Calif. CA
Colorado Colo. CO
Connecticut Conn. CT
Delaware Del. DE
Florida Fla. FL
Georgia Ga. GA
Hawaii Hawaii HI
Idaho Idaho ID
Illinois Ill. IL
Indiana Ind. IN
Iowa Iowa IA
Kansas Kan. KS
Kentucky Ky. KY
Louisiana La. LA
Maine Maine ME
Maryland Md. MD
Massachusetts Mass. MA
Michigan Mich. MI
Minnesota Minn. MN
Mississippi Miss. MS
Missouri Mo. MO
Montana Mont. MT
Nebraska Neb. NE
Nevada Nev. NV
New Hampshire N.H. NH
New Jersey N.J. NJ
New Mexico N.M. NM
New York N.Y. NY
North Carolina N.C. NC
North Dakota N.D. ND
Ohio Ohio OH
Oklahoma Okla. OK
Oregon Ore. OR
Pennsylvania Pa. PA
Rhode Island R.I. RI
South Carolina S.C. SC
South Dakota S.D. SD
Tennessee Tenn. TN
Texas Tex. TX
Utah Utah UT
Vermont Vt. VT
Virginia Va. VA
Washington Wash. WA
West Virginia W.Va. WV
Wisconsin Wisc./Wis. WI
Wyoming Wyo. WY
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