Page 143 - How to write effective business English your guide to excellent professional communication by Fiona Talbot

132 How to Write Effective Business English

For the record, BHAG (pronounced bee-hag) stands for ‘Big, hairy,
audacious goal’. It denotes a strategic and visionary statement that
teams are likely to find emotionally compelling.
Would you agree the director made a key mistake here? His
unexplained acronym became a business peril. If anyone didn’t
quite know what it meant, they either would have to:

● ● stick their neck out and ask its meaning; or

● ● remain in the dark because they didn’t dare ask!
Even where you explain an acronym at the outset of a document,
it helps to repeat the words in full from time to time. Have you
noticed that although I explain the acronym ‘non-NE’ earlier in
this book, I write it in full – ‘non-native English’ – on many occa-
sions, to help reinforce it for you?

Active and passive

Most companies today favour the active over the passive voice in
business writing, so it’s good to understand the difference.
The active voice is where the subject does the action. Sentences
that show this are:

The committee took action as a result.
The minute-taker handed the notes to the director.
The passive voice is where the subject of the active clause becomes
secondary, where it is acted upon or receives the action. Often the
word ‘by’ is added, as we can see in the following sentences:

Action was taken by the committee as a result.
The director was given the notes by the minute-taker.
In both these examples, we can still see the subjects (the committee
and the minute-taker) but they are easier to see in the active sen-
tences, as they appear first. That alone is why it’s better practice to