Page 110 - How to write effective business English your guide to excellent professional communication by Fiona Talbot

E-mail and instant messaging 99

Interestingly, the fairly traditional conversational style in
Example 1 is likely to keep the best currency across the
ever-changing generations in the workplace and across diverse
cultures. Once again, writers beware the possible pitfalls to
avoid! Everyone needs to understand your writing and not feel
alienated by modern-day slang or colloquialisms that (even unin-
tentionally) can have the undesired effect of putting up barriers:
‘you’re not in my zone’ – or that become dated without you real-
izing! Inclusive language works best in today’s and tomorrow’s
workplace.
A really useful exercise would be for you to have inter-generational
discussions in the workplace on this topic. Not enough companies do.
Have you also noticed how punctuation is changing in much of
today’s IM? Although language always changes, many observe that
since the internet arrived, it has never changed so fast.
For this reason, I can’t go into all the variations in punctuation
we now see creeping into our casual business communication. Best
you keep up to speed with what you see happening around you.
But I’ll outline some common variations we’re seeing.
Punctuation marks in IM can signify more than grammar fea-
tures: they can signify emotions too. For instance, now that hitting
enter shows when our instant message (or social media post) ends,
the period or full stop can be viewed as redundant. Many think
that inserting it signifies ‘discussion ended’ – which is harsh, even
angry.
An ellipsis, usually appearing as three dots in a sentence or
phrase, is another punctuation mark now used creatively in IM.
Originally, an ellipsis indicated that something had been left out of
the writing intentionally, that did not affect the overall meaning,
eg: ‘the government doesn’t intend to change the law…it’s for the
next administration to do this.’ The writer didn’t feel it necessary
to explain (presumably again) which law they were referring to.
Alternatively, an ellipsis could suggest a pause, eg ‘That’s a great
idea…we’ll implement it next week.’