Your #NSTPR pros are tapping their feet to Weird Al Yankovic’s latest ditty “Word Crimes” about the pain word nerds and grammar cops endure when reading – well – almost anything these days.
Do I think it is rude to judge poorly written social media posts? No! Should you proofread every email you send – whether it’s to your boss, clients, friends or family? Yes! Yes, you should! Why? Because in a world where we communicate more and more by written word – email, Facebook, blog posts, etc. – rather than face-to-face or by phone calls, each word you type represents you and your abilities.
And on the job, you’re representing your company and your clients. Let’s be real, would you want to hire someone who can’t write a complete sentence and doesn’t know the difference between “your” and “you’re?”
When I read poorly written emails or Web content, all I think is, if this person cannot master elementary school-level writing, can he or she do the job well? And, perhaps just as important, it concerns me that the writer doesn’t know – or care – that he or she comes off poorly!
So listen to Weird Al and don’t commit #WordCrimes. (And sorry, Al, but there is no dash (-) in email. AP Stylebook made that change in 2011.)
