Here we are, back at our way to long body paragraph. In Module 4, I'm going to teach you specific techniques for self-editing that will really improve you final writing product. But before we even get there, I want to point out to you how much you can do if you just keep the principles of clarity and waste no time in mind as you edit your writing. As I look at the second part of this paragraph, I notice that this sentence and this sentence basically say the same thing in two different ways. One's negative and one's positive. I don't need both. And I'd rather focus on the positive. I could be more clear and save my reader time by cutting this sentence. Our paragraph is getting a little shorter, but just by looking at it, I can tell I still have work to do. It's still too long. Now, I'm going to look at these last two sentences. Again, these two sentences say much of the same thing, don't they? So, I need to cut one of them. This is really hard, because I actually like this first sentence a lot. But I know it's repetitious and I know I need to save space and save my reader time. So I'm going to make my writing about my reader's experience and I'm going to cut this first line. This is looking a lot better and as I reread the paragraph, I don't feel like I've lost any of my key points. But, I have to tell you, it's still too long. So now I need to bear down and ask myself, what else can I cut? I can make a small change to the first sentence by combining the phrases about professional success and achieving success to about achieving professional success. Then I also notice professional career. Isn't every career professional in some sense? So really those two words are redundant. So I'm going to cut professional. Then I can shorten every career hinges on the ability to write, design and present ideas effectively to every career hinges on writing, designing and presenting ideas effectively. Finally our last sentence, someone worth getting to know and keeping an eye on in the future, is also a little redundant. If they're an exceptional person isn't that enough? Remember, I can always put things back in if I cut them if I go too far when I edit. But I have to tell you, I never do. It actually always turns out to be better when I really hone my writing. Lastly, the word person is fine here. But we're talking about business, so I'm just going to make a slight change and make that professional. Now our paragraph looks like this. I notice that the first sentence and the second sentence sound repetitious because I talk about writing design and presentation in both of them. So I'm going to cut it from the first sentence and change it to effective communication is a three course specialization about achieving professional success. I really like that because it's hard hitting and direct, but then as I read through our draft I notice another problem. I feel like our first sentence could be a lot stronger. Right now I have effective communication is a three course specialization about achieving professional success. This isn't a very active sentence. I'm describing the specialization, but I'm not saying what it does. I want to focus on what it does. So I'm going to try effective communications gives students the tools they need to achieve professional success. We've now got a really nice, tight body paragraph for our pitch memo. This is great. We've gone from this, to this. It's taken us a lot of work to get there, but we've put in the time to save our reader time. We've got a nice, crisp, clear start to our memo. In the next optional peer review exercise, I'm going to give you a chance to write the second paragraph of our memo. I'll give you the outline and your peers will give you feedback. Then, in another peer review exercise, I'm going to ask you to edit that first introductory paragraph that I wrote. I'll give you a hint. It's going to take just as much work as we just did in this lesson. You'll learn so much from the peer review exercises. Remember, you can't get better at what you're doing without constructive feedback. Not only that, but giving feedback to your peers, teaching them and working on their writing will teach you so much and will really solidify the principles of this course. I urge you to really dive right in.
