Many people with limited time – especially those busy with managing the work of teams of other humans – may wish to read as little as possible.
This makes it especially important that anything presented to them in writing gets straight to the point and is both comprehensible and digestible.
One near-universal problem in achieving this outcome is that not everyone has the same gift, comfort or patience with or care for written expression.
No matter how valuable their insights, many people write poorly, don’t like doing it, or record information in ways that may be imprecise and unsuited to use by others.
Moreover, as even the best writers’ original writing contains errors they can’t see, and they may make assumptions about the knowledge others reading it may hold, everyone – with no exceptions – needs a second reader to ensure that what they write is interpreted as they intended.
And, naturally, the more important that writing is, the more they need someone else to check the facts and to ask, before they press send or publish, such questions as, is that what you meant, or, if I interpret that in this way, is that correct?
About me
Some writers may be driven to write fiction and others poetry. And, as much as I’d like to be a great novelist or an accomplished screenwriter, I have to accept that I am not made that way.
(Those with a more discerning eye might also spot here that I am no graphic designer, either.)
As a former journalist and sub-editor – a key fact-checking, sense-making and quality control editorial role in all professional media – on the pages of The Australian Financial Review newspaper group in Sydney, I am, however, a very reliable, and picky, proofreader.
Indeed, in each week of its publication, I was entrusted by its chief sub-editor to give the final read to every page of the Australian Financial Review group’s BRW magazine before it was signed off and sent to the printer – the cost-critical moment in any printed publication’s production.
I have also worked in the same sub-editorial capacity on many more printed magazine titles at the former ACP Magazines (subsequently bought by Bauer Media), and for a range of other publishers.
Your own challenge as a writer
If you write, the worst thing that can happen is that an important document or bid you’ve created fails to achieve its objective – such as to win the business it was designed to secure – and it is discovered after the event to have included spelling or grammar errors that undermined its credibility or effectiveness.
And if you wrote it, or were ultimately responsible for its failings, your pain is likely even more pronounced.
Avoiding this is the best reason to put my proofreading and writing skills to the test.
Contact me:
By email, at cloudcitizenx@icloud.com
By phone, on 0416 171724
Or via Linked in, at: https://www.linkedin.com/in/grahamlauren/