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Irregardless, I Could Care Less
- by: Hank Berkowitz
- February 7, 2024
No CommentsMost of you are armed with grammar apps, spell checkers and AI. But we’re still seeing plenty of grammatical fumbles in your submissions. Take the word “irregardless.” It’s frequently misused because it appears in most dictionaries and sounds more imposing than simply saying “regardless. ” By adding the prefix “ir” (which means “not”) to a
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Don’t Set Resolutions Yet
- by: Hank Berkowitz
- January 5, 2024
Ahh the Holidays. We ate, drank and spent too much. We let too much work slide. We let family relationships fray. It’s natural to want to get back on track and make amends. But our minds and bodies aren’t ready for significant behavioral modification yet. Instead, use this time to test-drive your resolutions so you
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Does Word Count Matter?
- by: Hank Berkowitz
- December 14, 2023
Rarely a week goes by when a nervous financial professional doesn’t reach to me for help with a last-minute guest column for the business media. With a deadline bearing down, the thrill of being a guest contributor has been replaced by the anxiety of “what am I going to write about and how will I/we
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When to Use i.e. Instead of e.g.
- by: Hank Berkowitz
- November 18, 2023
Sometimes I regret that I didn’t take Latin in high school. But there was only one Latin teacher to choose from in our small school. Supposedly he was a monster, i.e., he was a brutal grader, with a bad temper and breath to match. Still, it would have been good to know the derivation of
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Where vs. In Which?
- by: Hank Berkowitz
- October 18, 2023
A well-known financial professional seemed to be hedging her bets in a recent piece she sent to us for review. Right off the bat, three sentences rubbed me the wrong way (but apparently not her Marcom team): It’s a win-win situation where the firm can provide higher-quality services, and the clients achieve better financial outcomes.
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That or Which?
- by: Hank Berkowitz
- September 29, 2023
A well-known financial advisor recently asked us to update the manuscript for a book she published a few years ago. In the opening acknowledgements, three sentences using the word “which” didn’t seem right to me: “There are still a myriad of products which simply must be purchased through traditional selling methods.” “We can only sell
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Are You Getting These Common Words Wrong?
- by: Hank Berkowitz
- August 18, 2023
Not to embarrass anyone on this distribution list, but I came across this in a client’s guest column the other day. He was a big proponent of AI, Grammarly and SpellChecker, by the way: “In principal, the judge’s decision should not effect the outcome.” Affect vs. Effect: These homophones confuse many, especially when writing quickly.
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Do You Struggle With ‘For Example’ When Writing or Presenting?
- by: Hank Berkowitz
- June 12, 2023
Smart people often have difficulty explaining things simply. They may have a deep understanding of the subject matter and find it difficult to distill that knowledge into layman’s terms. They may be so familiar with the problem that they assume others understand it as well, and fail to realize that they need to explain it
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You Don’t Have Writer’s Block
- by: Hank Berkowitz
- May 29, 2023
Over the past week, I’ve had several conversations with clients about why they haven’t been able to get the ball rolling on their next content piece. I get it. You’re busy closing out the month. You’re trying to get some R&R over the Holiday weekend. Just don’t tell me you have “writer’s block.” Most of
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Test Drive Resolutions Now (or they won’t stick in ’23)
- by: Hank Berkowitz
- December 5, 2022
Oscar Wilde once said: “Good resolutions are simply checks that people draw on a bank where they have no account.” As humans, we’re not very good at keeping promises to ourselves. Take New Year’s resolutions. Year after year we promise ourselves: “After the Holidays I’ll get my fitness/finances/waistline/relationships back on track.” And what happens? They