Clarity, conciseness, and readability in accounting communication writing

¶ … Clarity

Readers prefer clear and concise writing because it is easy to understand. Whether readers are highly or lowly educated, they do not want to struggle searching for the meaning of a sentence because of wordiness or complexity. Concise writing is not only comprehensive but also easy to locate certain information. Therefore, when writing any information, the writer should avoid unnecessary words in a sentence. This is the foundation of achieving concise and clearly written sentences (May and May 51).

A good writer must peruse the required text to verify the absence of errors. While doing this, all unnecessary words should be eliminated. This can be done by crossing out all words that are not required in a sentence. Long sentences complicate one's piece and create room for grammatical errors. According Claire and Gordon May (2012), a sentence should not be more than twenty words (p. 53). From the limitation of words, the writer should ensure that every word used is expressing the intended information.

Another way of being concise is capitalizing on simplicity. This means that apart from writing short sentences, the words must also be familiar. Using everyday words is convenient for most readers. It will mainly help those who cannot understand jargon or other difficult words in English. However, in some circumstances, it is not possible to avoid a difficult word. The meaning of the word should follow wherever possible. Using short sentences and simple words are successful ways of explaining complex ideas to a general audience.

Verbs and nouns in writing have always made a text concise. They are a preferred compared to adverbs and adjectives. Verbs and nouns will result to short sentences while using adverbs and adjective encourages wordiness (Sundem 55). A major cause of wordiness is hidden verbs. For instance, people commonly write, "we came to a conclusion," while the correct thing is, "we concluded." In most cases, such sentences cause wordiness and the extra words should be erased when the writer is revising the text (Sundem 25).

Clarity is also a factor of being concise and achieving simplicity. Every word used should be relevant to the content of the text. The writer should ensure the words are directly mentioning the theme or purpose of writing. However, this can only be achieved by using easy words to understand and short sentences. Therefore, a writer should learn to mention the point directly. Another related issue to clarity is avoidance of ambiguity. It can give a message several meanings, which was not the writer's intention. Eventually, the writer will not succeed in communicating his or her purpose (May and May 57).

Readability guarantees captivation to the text. No writer wants to write information, which will not draw anyone's interest (May and May 63). Evidently, a writer must choose the right words in his or her work. One strategy of making a text readable is dominating active voice. This form of speech makes the information sound lively. Inactive speech suggests the information is passive and may become unattractive to readers. It is always tempting to use passive voice, but readers must practice the use of the active one at all times.