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Shorten Your Sentences

Stretched out sentences that go on forever are an e-mail no-no. Case in point, the long, laborious sentence following.

Sentences that make point after point can really strain the reader’s patience and make you look like you don’t know how to say anything with the brevity and conciseness required in today’s short-attention-span world, which is a big problem if you want to be seen as an effective professional.

If you find yourself face-to-face with such a run-on sentence, use the following tips to shorten it.

Eliminate conjunctions. A conjunction is a word that joins together words and phrases. Words such as for, and, but, or, yet, and so are common conjunctions. One way to shorten your sentences is to remove them, and turn one long sentence into two shorter ones. For example:

• Long sentence with conjunction: I thought it might be fun to go out to lunch on Wednesday and to discuss where to hold our next company off-site, or just get caught up.

• Shorter sentence with the conjunction and removed: I thought it might be fun to go out to lunch on Wednesday. We can discuss where to hold our next company offsite, or just get caught up.

Remove transitions. A transition is a word or phrase that holds your various ideas together. Common transitions include: To point out, with this in mind, although, for instance. Too many transitions can create run-on sentences and confusion. For example:

• Long sentence with transitions: We all need to study the new safety rules instituted at work this week; with this in mind, we will be having a meeting on Friday.

• Shorter sentence with the transition with this in mind removed: We all need to study the new safety rules instituted at work this week. We will be having a meeting on Friday.

Say it simpler. The use of too many words can make a sentence lose focus and cause a reader to lose interest. One way to prune your prose is to be more direct and to the point.

Exercise

Take the following long sentence and break it up into three separate, shorter ones.

“Whenever our supervisors bring in pizza or take us out for lunch it’s often a sign of us either having to put in a lot of unexpected overtime or that we are going to be given bad news and they want to soften the blow as much as possible so that we don’t all start complaining and talking to each other instead of working.”

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How did you do? Check out the following suggestions.

Sentence #1: Whenever our supervisors bring in pizza or take us out for lunch it’s often a bad sign.

Sentence #2: It can mean a lot of unexpected overtime or some other bad news.

Sentence #3: Our bosses try to soften the blow as much as possible so that we don’t all start complaining and talking to each other instead of working.