Bonus Quiz

A Communication Briefings Test
Of How Tightly You Can Write

By Jack Gillespie

Tight writing equals clear writing because it strips away the clutter that obscures meaning. Also, tight writing saves time--yours when you write and others’ when they read what you write. And time saved often means money saved. Here are some exercises to help you find out if you, your staff or those you plan to hire can write tightly enough to save time and money.

Part I

Directions: Replace each word with a one-syllable word.

1. expedite
2. substantiate
3. modification
4. indication
5. possibility
6. initiate
7. utilization
8. impediment
9. ineffective
10. characteristic

11. proficiency
12. erroneous
13. alternative
14. evaluate
15. determination
16. confirmation
17. exaggeration
18. magnitude
19. comprehension
20. indecision

Part II

Directions: Rewrite to cut excess prepositions.

1. In the United States, only 20% of eligible customers received the promotional mailing.
2. All of the employees are in need of training to improve the level of their telephone skills.
3. We plan to use the high level of acceptance by members of this prestigious group in the promotion of the software.
4. In the development of our future marketing materials, we'll use these comments made by customers.

Part III

Directions: Rewrite to delete the weak there is, there are or there were structures.

1. There were occasions when they could attend.
2. There are no standard definitions of fraud and abuse that we know of
3. There is always something to learn, something to shoot for.
4. In a given week, there are five representatives covering five zones.

Part IV

Directions: Rewrite to remove all the redundancies.

1. It's absolutely essential that your future plans take into consideration that the new site is 25 miles distant from my office.
2. So it seems apparent that I’ll have to shuttle back and forth between here and there if I continue to remain in this position.
3. In my personal opinion, this won't be a large sized problem in the summer months.
4. But I think we need to plan in advance for when the distance and the road conditions in the winter months could combine together to put an obstacle in the way of speedy travel.

Part V

Directions: Rewrite to purge unneeded passive verbs.

1. A maintenance schedule will be provided by us outlining what should be done by each department.
2. Telephone experts were involved in helping us to formulate the selling-skills sections in this guide.
3. The kind of behavior that can be disruptive to the team process cannot be ignored or accommodated by managers.
4. Supervisors should ensure that employees are instructed as to the proper method of filling out forms to be used by them when the employees make application for overtime pay.

Part VI

Directions: Tighten the sentences by rewriting to change nouns to verbs.

1. Some in the group did not have high expectations, but they became believers when they experienced success.
2. The new law states that once we send an application to the department, we can provide notice to the public and begin to make use of the trademark.
3. The regulations make it a requirement that the insurance company give an explanation of the discrepancy.
4. We are of the opinion that he has the capability to take whatever action may be required to make an improvement in sales.

A Communication Briefings Test Of How Tightly You Can Write