BASIC Grammar for Business E-mail Correspondence

No Slang or Abbreviations

Write “thank you”, not “thanks”.

No Exclamation Points

This is what writing to your friends is for!!! 🙂

Dear / Hello / Good Afternoon / Good Morning

Do not write “Hey” for ANY business correspondence.  If you must, use “Hi”  sparingly and only when writing to a co-worker or collaborator to whom you interact with on a regular basis.  Do not use “hi” when writing to a client.

Do Not Use Apostrophes

Spell out the words; “do not, will not, they are”, etc.

Do Not End A Sentence With A Preposition

This is a giant pain in the ass, but it really does distinguish whether or not you graduated the third grade.

Use Proper Basic Grammar

Use “may” not “can”, use “he or she”, not “their”.

oberynisbae-blog:

Sometimes, when I want to be really passive aggressive, I end my texts with a period.

And when I get really serious, I use proper grammar.

Proper Grammar for Gender Pronouns

Genders (the sexes) are singular pronouns.

“He and she.”

“He or she.”

“This is he.”

“This is she.”

The pronoun has to agree with the noun. If it’s one person, then grammatically you must say “he” or “she”. Period.

You don’t say, “They moved over there,” when referring to one person. You say, “She moved over there.” Or “He moved over there.”

Because we’re lazy, whenever we don’t know the gender of the subject, we often substitute his or her for “their”.

This is incorrect.

“The boys stole it,” agrees with its plural pronoun counterpart, “They stole it.” Therefore the plural pronouns correctly apply here.

“He or she” refers to the person.

“They” refers to a group of people.

To speak proper grammar, you need refer to the individual as HIS or HER gender, not with a plural pronoun.

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your an idiot

grumpyfacedegalitarian:

It’s ‘you’re’.

let us not forget..

livesoundgirl:

(reblog to save a life)