JOB AID
WRITING SKILLS CHECKLIST
Use this checklist when you begin editing your work. Print out a copy of your document and read it aloud. Place a checkmark to indicate places or passages on your document where the idea or concept seems clear or “right,” and an X where the idea or concept seems to be misunderstood or “wrong,” or where something needs to be added. Write directly on your draft and notate areas that prompted you to place a checkmark on the checklist. Once completed, revise your document to eliminate the problems you noted and review your final draft, checking off the sections below to ensure that all problems were addressed. Use the “other” rows at the bottom for any additional issues.
| Content |  |
| Is your purpose clear? | |
| Is your content coherent and clearly understood? | |
| Are you communicating appropriately with your audience? | |
| Is your content well-organized? | |
| Is your content well-developed? | |
| Sentence/Style | |
| Have you avoided subordinate clauses? | |
| Have you avoided redundant modifiers? | |
| Are you using the appropriate voice (active or passive)? | |
| Have you minimized the use of “to be”? | |
| Punctuation/Mechanics | |
| Have you minimized wordiness? | |
| Is your punctuation used appropriately? | |
| Are you using the right word choice (its/it's, affect/effect, that/which, etc.)? | |
| Do you have accurate subject/verb agreement? | |
| Other | |
TEST YOUR WRITING SKILLS
Revise the sentences, changing only as much as you need to change to solve the problems in the sentence. Underline any subordinate clauses you see. Also, address redundancy.
1. I am invested in the idea that we can make improvements to our infrastructure.
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2. After you submit the results that you collected on your field assignment, I will interpret the data that we need and offer you payment for your efforts.
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3. If circumstances that are unforeseen arise, we should have a plan or idea of how to reassure our clients who are skeptical.
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4. When and if we can find recruits who are capable engineers, I feel that our company will find solutions to our deficiency which is primary.
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5. In the event that you misunderstand your supervisor's request, please make sure that you ask him or her for further clarification.
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6. If and when we can free up some capital to build and establish franchises in the Midwest, past history shows we can double our profits for even more growth and expansion.
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7. The company that I work for is initiating a new incentive program to increase our productivity while giving our workers who underachieve a chance to earn bonuses.
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Here are examples of how to best simplify the previous sentences:
1. I am invested in the idea that we can make improvements to our infrastructure.
Cut the metadiscourse and emphasize the key idea in the sentence—improving—by expressing it as a verb.
Revised sentence: We can improve our infrastructure.
2. After you submit the results that you collected on your field assignment, I will interpret the data that we need and offer you payment for your effort.
This sentence contains two unnecessary subordinate clauses. Cut the first clause but keep field assignment because that noun phrase can be used to modify the results. The second subordinate clause contains one important idea—the necessary data. Cut the rest of the clause. Also express payment as an action.
Revised sentence: After you submit your field assignment results, I will interpret the necessary data and pay you.
3. If circumstances that are unforeseen arise, we should have a plan or idea of how to reassure our clients who are skeptical.
This example also has two unnecessary subordinate clauses. Cut them as you did in the previous sentence. Eliminate the redundancy of plan and idea. Keep plan because it is a key idea and can be expressed as a verb. Also, you can put the introductory clause at the end so the action gets more emphasis.
Revised sentence: We should plan how to reassure our skeptical clients if unforeseen circumstances arise.
4. When and if we can find recruits who are capable engineers, I feel that our company will find solutions to our deficiency, which is primary.
Eliminate the subordinate clauses, cutting I feel that altogether because the reader can infer it is an opinion or belief. Eliminate the redundancy of when and if. Express recruits and solutions as verbs.
Revised sentence: If we recruit capable engineers, our company will solve its primary deficiency.
5. In the event that you misunderstand your supervisor's request, please make sure that you him or her for further clarification.
Replace the opening phrase with if. Remove the metadiscourse to emphasize the action. In addition, strive for gender neutrality over gender inclusion. Remove him or her because the phrase has no bearing on the sentence's meaning.
Revised sentence: If you misunderstand your supervisor's request, ask for further clarification.
6. If and when we can free up some capital to build and establish franchises in the Midwest, past history shows we can double our profits for even more growth and expansion.
Cut all of the redundancy in the sentence. Note that even is unnecessary because the doubling of profits modifies profits more specifically.
Revised sentence: If we can free up some capital to build franchises in the Midwest, history shows we can double our profits for more expansion.
7. The company that I work for is initiating a new incentive program to increase our productivity while giving our workers who underachieve a chance to earn bonuses.
The sentence is excessively word. To make the sentence more readable, cut the subordinate clauses and separate these ideas into two sentences. Replace initiate with a more straightforward term. Also, if the company is starting a program, its newness is implied.
Revised sentence: My company is starting an incentive program to increase productivity; it will also give underachieving workers a chance to earn bonuses.
