Engineering Writing Tips

In the summer of 2013 while driving with kiddo down to Disneyland, I taught at the Golder offices all along the way (7, or 9 of them, that trip, I forget how many). We had 8-9,000 people writing reports and everyone was keen to to talk about their pitfalls and procedures. So many wonderful conversations and information gathered when I worked with the engineers at Golder! I'm still grateful for their open friendliness and problemsolvingness. Here are a few of the best gems to improve engineering reporting writing that we pondered on that particular trip.

1. Search your writing for –ing words. The reason that -ing words are often nice to get out of your writing is because they can be particularly confusing, especially for English second language readers.

In the running: running is a noun

a running man: running is an adjective

I am running: running is a verb.

I often edit these -ing words out. Again, though they are not exactly incorrect, it's often clumsy, and writing may be more elegant without them.

2. Remember to use an active, positive tone instead of the passive voice. An excellent example: It's better to say "we obtained the data" than “we received the data” (or even worse, "the data was received"), because saying that we obtained it implies that we went out and got it, which is more impressive to clients than sitting in our offices waiting for things to happen.

Every little word helps to build our reputation.

3. How often do you use "of the" in your writing?

We sat down and looked at it as a group in Reno and discovered that often you can rewrite sentences more elegantly by eliminating the "of the."

Particularly problematic are "-ing of the" type constructions.

Give it a shot. Search "of the" in a recent document you've written and see what results you get.

4. While you are at it, search for "that." Some writers overuse this word (I've heard repeated complaints from various quarters, mainly American ones, but this is not something that is a problem everywhere). Be aware, it is not always right to get rid of "that"s -- they add specific clarity in some cases that would be more general without. But it's instructive to take a look at your own writing.

5. Some good Word tools.

* Turn on the reading level indicator under spell check and see where your writing is at. Newspapers are often written at a grade 4-8 level. For technical reports, we might aim for Grade 10-11, but not much higher. Longer sentences and longer words increase the level, so if you are consistently getting high levels, take a look at those two things.

* There is also a passive/active voice indicator. Eliminate much of the passive voice in your writing with help from Word! Excellent. (I am still seeing a great deal of passive voice in our reports, sentences such as “the research was done” or “the analysis was done” instead of “we ran the field trial,” which is much preferred.

6. General things several people have mentioned:

"Comprise" is probably the most misused word. You know, even if you get it right, someone down the review chain is quite likely to wrongenate it. So just replace it with another word. You do not need to use "comprise."

Do not use contractions of words in reports. Reports are formal writing. Use do not instead of don’t, I will instead of I’ll, and so on.

Please don't use utilize or utilization, which are just inflated versions of "use."

My favourite quote from a Principal down in southern California who we recruited from New Zealand: He learned plain language writing early on in his engineering career. "Once you learn it," he says "simple, clear writing is faster to do."

Alison Amratlal

Director of Communications at BC College of Nurses & Midwives

2y

These are great. I need to employ more of these techniques in my own work. (I almost used writing instead of work but I eliminated the “ing” word!)

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