Liberate Your Writing. Remove Fake Verbs.

If you suspect your business writing voice sounds stodgy, check whether you're over-using camouflaged verbs. Meaning, you convert verbs to nouns, and with that, create wordy, pompous-sounding constructions. (I don't recommend this tone, if you want to remain popular at work.) This post defines camouflaged verbs, provides a few edited examples, and offers tips to replace them.

Defining Camouflaged Verbs

The Plain Language Institute describes camouflaged verbs—also known as ‘hidden or fake verbs’—as a verb the writer converted into a noun. Typically, hidden verbs require extra verbs—and other words—to make sense. Two forms exist including:

-Nouns ending with –ment, -tion, -sion, and ance.

-Nouns linked with verbs like achieve, effect, give, have, make, reach, and take.

Some examples follow (and I’ve italicized the fake verbs):

• Please make an application for the job vs. please apply for the job.

• Please check your email for order confirmation and detailed delivery information vs. We’ll confirm your order (and delivery) via email.

• I must make an assumption here: we don’t have your cooperation for this proposal vs. I assume you won’t cooperate...

• You do not have permission to access this item vs. you’re not permitted to...

• I place a lot of importance on the strong management of my team vs. I value managing my team well. (Or, you can keep management for brevity. E.G. I value strong management.)

Analyzing when to Change Camouflaged Verbs

When ought we convert these nouns back to verbs? In some cases, converting a hidden verb back to a real one makes no sense—and can even add more words. (Brevity always must rule, as I showed in the last example.)

Also, certain camouflaged verbs must remain that way for a sentence to make sense. Examples include: management, operations, or, any other technical term your team/audience might feel lost if they no longer see in writing.

Others feel worth tackling, in my view, because even if writers use the hidden verb, it might remain unclear, pompous, and vague sounding.

Anyone who's worked with me knows I dislike the popular camouflaged verb: ‘solutions.’ I often request the writer recast the sentence to include the real verb: ‘solve.’ Why? Because everyone uses the word ‘solutions’ and without telling us what problem your service or product solves, you miss an opportunity for interesting specifics.

Bravely change ‘solutions’ to ‘solve’ and then tell us specifically— using plain, clear language— what issue/challenge you hope to solve with your approach. You’ll sound much more strident (and clever) with this writing style. You’ll also stand out.

Weeding the Garden

Now we know how (and when) to spot camouflaged verbs in our writing, let’s look at ways to fix them. These few short steps have helped me change my ways:

-Block off a few moments for a line edit and diligently look for those endings (-ment, -tion, -sion, and -ance) in your words.

-Determine the real verb.

-Re-write the sentence using the real vs. the hidden verb.

Ta-da! Now you've another tool in your tool kit for warming up the tone of your writing and reducing the risk of alienating your reader. Good luck with replacing fake verbs with real ones. Share the trick with your team and you'll look (and sound) like a star.

More blogs on writing (and speaking) in ways that others want to listen live here.