Grammar Glitches

Good grammar is more significant than many realize. Grammar differentiates whether we are eating grandma, or if we are imploring her to serve dinner—the difference between ‘Let’s eat grandma!’ and ‘Let’s eat, grandma!’

In most cases, proper grammar won’t actually save lives but that doesn’t make it unimportant. If there were a typo or an improper usage of grammar on your résumé, your potential employers will be highly unimpressed with your excellent ‘witing’ skills. Résumés are a written first impression and the hiring team won’t give you the time of day if it contains errors.

Don’t assume punctuation and grammar only matter for professional writers; it’s for everyone from corporate executives to students.

My son had two points taken off a school assignment containing grammatical errors. “I can only blame myself for being ignorant enough to not review it,” he said. While most of us are not in school anymore, you can still lose IQ points in the eyes of people who matter, whether it’s a résumé for a potential employer or a simple email to your current boss.

Take the time to polish and refine your grammar. It is as important as the content because it provides nuggets as to who you are, and poor grammar can come across as sloppy and ignorant. Also, like driving, if we don’t all follow the rules accidents happen, which in writing can equate to misunderstandings.

A critical area of writing that often trips people up is homonyms: words that sound similar but have different meanings. Here are some common troublemakers:

Desert and dessert

I definitely don’t want to be stranded on a deserted island, but maybe a dessert island! A desert is the empty range of land with sand. A dessert is a sweet treat, like cheesecake. Yum!

There, their, and they’re

Possibly the most confusing triplet that exists: there, their, and there.

  • There is referring to a place or location.

  • Example: My room is in there.

  • Their is a plural, possessive pronoun.

  • Example: It is their cat.

  • They’re is a contraction that joins the words “they are.”

  • Example: They’re going to the zoo.

Who and whom

Who is a subject of the verb, the item that is doing the action, while whom is an object of the verb, or being acted upon. When who is replaced with he/she/they the sentence still makes sense. When whom is replaced with him/her/them it should still make sense.

  • Example: She is the one who asked the question.

  • Example: You wish to speak to whom?

Then and than

Then is used in relation to time. Than compares two items.

  • Example: We will let the dogs out, and then leave.

  • Example: The dog is bigger than the cat.

Affect and Effect

Another tricky set because affect and effect are both nouns and verbs.

Affect is almost always used as a verb meaning having an influence, but it can also be a noun when writing about a psychological condition.

  • Example (Noun): The patient’s affect changed with the weather.

  • Example (Verb): Her anger affected us all.

Effect is most often used as a noun: the result of an action. The verb effect is to cause something to occur.

  • Example (Noun): The effect of the fire will be felt long term.

  • Example (Verb): Organized advocacy efforts are the best way to effect change.

Bonus Personal Pet Peeve: Please don’t use ‘impacted’ as a verb to replace affected, which I suspect started with someone who wasn’t sure which homonym to use. Impacted is an adjective referring to a tooth.

All writing that is shared, especially professionally, should be reviewed. You don’t need a grammarian to do it for you either. My husband is my most regular editor these days. He can tell me as a reader what language he’s tripping over and spot typos. Some might consider asking someone to edit a presentation or an important email highlighting a weakness, but it’s actually demonstrating self-awareness and acknowledging that you’re human.

If you don’t have someone else around to help, step away from the piece. The more time the better but at least 15 minutes so you can look at it again with fresher eyes. If you truly don’t have that kind of time, read the piece aloud (another homonymic devil). That will help you spot grammatical errors and typos. Finally, always run a spell check after each edited version.

Accidents do slip through, but regular readers of your work can distinguish between the occasional typo that happens to everyone and consistent grammatical problems that leave a bad impression. And should you decide you need a professional editor, Cooke Consulting Solutions is here to help!