Consistency is key when you’re communicating, says 44 Writer and Senior Editor Bryan Jones – but creating a style guide can be a thorny business.
Maybe it’s connected with my status as the office elder statesman (I prefer ‘legend’ but no-one’s running with that), but I’m often asked for my opinion on things like tricky spellings, hyphenations and apostrophes.
Let me give you an example. Should ‘groundbreaking’ be hyphenated? I’d say no – your Microsoft Word spellchecker disagrees. Do we go with ‘benefitting’ or ‘benefiting’? Both are correct – I’ve always gone with a single ‘t’, but I know the Collins Dictionary prefers a double ‘t’.
And that’s the difficulty with the English language – and the challenge for writers. How do we make sure we get it right for our clients?
It’s all about style
Usually, the answer will be to check the style guide. Though, to be perfectly honest, it’s quite a challenge to produce a style guide – especially one that covers all (or most) eventualities.
We work with clients to create style guides for publications and intranets. It’s painstaking work – but worth it in the end.
A typical style guide will cover the basics and most obvious things, like when to use words for numbers or numerals, and whether to use ‘percent’, ‘per cent’, or ‘%’.
But the more obscure elements are going to rely on someone to make a judgement (should that have an ‘e’?) call.
Consistency is key
What I would say, is that if something isn’t included in a style guide, consistency is key. Your audience won’t be too upset as long as you make sure your ‘ground-breaking work’ is referenced in the same way throughout your document.
Over the years, I’ve learned not to be too dogmatic about things. We need to embrace our flexible sides.
In my newspaper days, the accepted form for writing a date was, for example, ‘Wednesday, September 25, 1974’. I’ve had to break that strict rule for most of our clients who insisted the ‘25’ comes before the month. It was madness – but (like Elsa in Frozen) I’ve learned to let it go.
Some things are just wrong!
Nothing is set in stone. Our language evolves – and however much we might strive to resist change, it’s futile. So please stop using ‘whilst’ – it’s a ridiculous word, and no-one should ever include it in their writing.
There are some things, though, that I’m not going to let go of.
Please put your apostrophes in the right place. Hot Dog’s, £2! And learn when to use ‘less’ and when to use ‘fewer’.
We’re not going to agree on all things style-related. My esteemed colleague Jonny – a proof-reader of such brilliance he’ll spot a rogue comma from at least 50 paces – insists I should be consistent with the way I write names and job titles.
But sometimes ‘Bryan Jones, 44 Communications Legend’ looks beautiful in my text, and other times ‘Bryan Jones, who’s a Legend at 44 Communications’ works better.
What do you reckon, Jonny?
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