Tighten This! Challenge Sentence 5 [game]

Welcome to the concise-writing game, Tighten This! Here’s Challenge Sentence 5, spotted by Cheryl Landes.

All original executed contracts and change orders are to be forwarded to the designated person in each office for filing in a central location.

Your revision: _______________________ [Scroll to the bottom and put your revision in a comment by Friday, July 3.]

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Last Week’s Challenge Sentence

In case you’re playing this game for the first time (welcome!), or in case you’ve had other things on your mind since you read last week’s Challenge Sentence, here it is again:

This institution reserves the right to refuse to accept a copying order if, in its judgment, fulfillment of the order would involve violation of copyright law.

Ray’s Pick

(Ray speaking) This week’s winner: Mary-Ellen Vogt.

We do not fulfill a copying order if we determine that fulfilling it violates copyright law.

Mary-Ellen’s entry succinctly captures every element of the original.

I would change if fulfilling it violates copyright law to if doing so would violate copyright law.

Ande (We will not copy copyrighted materials) and Pat Bradley-White (We do not violate copyright law) get points for rewrites that deliver only the core message.

Here’s how Mary-Ellen’s word count compares to the original (38% reduction in word count):

Marcia’s Pick

(Marcia speaking) I would love to go as far as several of the revisions go: “We refuse orders that violate copyright laws”—or, as Ed Marsh puts it most colorfully, “We ain’t gonna copy nothin’ that may be illegal.” Sooo temptingly clear and direct. Props to all of you who whittled that dramatically.

In this case, though, I can’t justify dropping the element of doubt—in fact, the two elements of doubt. The person working the copy desk might refuse to make copies that appear to violate copyright law. Eliminating those elements would imply an impossible confidence that people working the desk would both (a) recognize, unequivocally, instances of copyright violation and (b) refuse to copy those things. Have you ever had to determine what constitutes a copyright violation, especially when you had no way of knowing who owns the copyright, who is standing there asking for the copy, and what that person plans to do with the copy? If so, at best, you made an educated guess.

So I feel obliged, reluctantly, to pass over the tightest, most forcefully stated revisions.

Three similar revisions stand out as candidates:

Larry Kunz: “We can refuse a copying order if we believe the order would violate copyright law.”
Stella Robertson: “We may refuse an order if we believe it violates copyright laws.”
Shanker: “We might refuse any Copying Order that appears to violate the Copyright Law.”

All three of these revisions zero in on what strike me as the original sentence’s compressible elements:

Stella’s revision goes a smidge tighter than the other two in changing “copying order” to “order.”

We may refuse an order if we believe it violates copyright laws.

Can we drop copying without losing meaning? I think so. Order has to mean copying order. We know this because the sentence mentions copyright law and because the sign this sentence appears on is located in a place where people go to order copies.

What to do? Stella is my mom. In the spirit of this game—which is about fun and skill building—I declare all submissions, whoever submitted them, worthy of consideration. If I were to ask my friends and family members to recuse themselves, this game would become lonely indeed. So I welcome all players, and I pledge, to the best of my ability, to choose revisions whose analysis gives readers the most value.

Here are the numbers for Stella’s revision (a 54% reduction in word count):

How did I arrive at this translation formula? See “Write Tight(er): Get to the Point and Save Millions.”

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Again, Challenge Sentence 5

All original executed contracts and change orders are to be forwarded to the designated person in each office for filing in a central location.

Your revision: _______________________ [Scroll to the bottom and put your revision in a comment by Friday, July 3.]

Go!

Index of Challenge Sentences

38 thoughts on “Tighten This! Challenge Sentence 5 [game]”

Forward all original executed documents to the designated person for filing in a central location.

Send all original executed contracts and change orders to designated persons for filing.

I don’t belive that employees or customers truly care about a business’ internal process. Tell me what, who and where. 🙂

All original documents should be centrally filed.

Hi Marcia,

I loved your book “Word Up!”. It was delightful to read, and useful.

Here’s my attempt on this week’s sentence:

Send the original of executed documents to the designated person in each office for central filing.

I can’t think of a better way to say “executed documents”. It’s clearly jargon – who is the audience? What does “executing these documents” involve? Signatures? Completion of contract conditions? Maybe it doesn’t matter, or maybe it varies, depending.

Also, I’d love to do something with “designated person in each office”, but am not sure what. A bit more context might help with this one – or not!

Cheers Em

Give completed contracts and change orders to the person in your office who is responsible for filing them centrally.

Provide original executed contracts and change orders to the filing clerk in your office.

Send all original executed contracts and change orders to the person who handles them for your office.
………

(Readers don’t need to know where things get filed – that’s the job of the person who receives them. 🙂

Send original executed contracts and change orders to the designated person.

Forward all original executed contracts and change orders to office designee for central filing.

Forward all original executed contracts and change orders to the designated person in each office for central filing.

Send executed contracts and change orders to your local contact person for filing.

To maintain original executed contracts and change orders centrally, forward them to the designated person in your office.

Thanks, Donna.

Hi, Keith. Thanks for playing.

Thanks, Robin.

Thanks for all your notes, Emma.

Thanks, Marjorie.

Thanks, Linda.

Hi, Karen. Thanks for playing.

Thanks, Julian.

Thanks, Katie.

Thanks, Leigh.

Thanks for playing, Larry.

Thanks, Shanker.

Forward original executed contracts and change orders to the designated person in each office for central filing.

Send all original executed contracts and change orders to the person responsible for central filing at your site.

All original executed contracts and change orders are to be forwarded to the designated person in each office for filing in a central location.

“Forward original executed contracts and change orders to the office designee for filing.”

Thanks for playing, Christine.

Thank you, Jacqueline.

Thanks for playing, Patrick.

Forward all completed contracts and change orders to your office representative for filing.

Forward original executed contracts and change orders to your office’s designated person, for central filing.

Thank you, Martha.

Thanks, Nick.

Remember to give original copies of all contracts and change orders to your office filing clerk.

Thanks for playing, Fiona.

Forward all original executed documents to each designated person for centralized filing.

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