Three Ways to Tighten Your Writing

Writing today—a report, memo, or email—must be short if you want people to read it. But succinctly expressing yourself can be tough. Here are three ways to trim your writing and say what you want in fewer words:

• Refine it. Take a hard look at the structure of your writing. Only include sections that are necessary to support your points.

• Consider an informal tone. Just because you're writing a report doesn't mean you need to be formal. Writing like a bureaucrat makes you use longer words and a complicated sentence structure. Adopting a more informal tone often helps you be direct and concise.

• Cut and then cut more. Look over your document sentence by sentence. If a sentence doesn't serve an important purpose, get rid of it.