Kudos to Bob Greene

In a recent column entitled "Typos -- no big deal? Think again," CNN contributor Bob Greene explains why typos really do matter.

Career Advice from Carlyle Group's David Rubenstein

"Richard Neustadt wrote a famous book called The Power of the Presidency, and he said the power of the presidency is the power to persuade. That's true of all business activities. You're really persuading people through writing or oral communications. So learning how to persuade people, how to communicate, is very important."

Student Reading Skills Remain Poor

According to the latest National Assessment of Educational Progress report, reading skills among school children have shown little improvement over the past 17 years.

Specifically, fourth grade students scored 221 out of 500 in 2009, vs. 217 in 1992. Eighth graders scored 264 in 2009, vs. 260 in 1992. In both cases, the improvement amounted to less than one percent.

Reading is a critical skill in today's information-driven world. And, it is a prerequisite for good writing.

Guy Kawasaki's Words of Wisdom

In a New York Times interview, Guy Kawasaki of Garage Technology Ventures (and an early Apple employee) offers these words of wisdom:

Q: What should business schools teach more of, or less of?
A: They should teach students how to communicate in five-sentence e-mails, and with 10-slide PowerPoint presentations. If they just taught every student that, American business would be much better off.

Q: And what would you say to business school graduates?
A: Success in business comes from the willingness to grind it out. It's not because of a brilliant idea. It's because you're willing to work hard. That's the key to my success.

Lower Editing Standards for Online Magazines

A research project conducted by the Columbia Journalism Review found that many magazines apply lower standards when copy-editing and fact-checking the online versions of their publications.

According to the study, 48% of magazines copy-edit less rigorously for their online publications than their printed publications, while 11% do not copy-edit at all. At the same time, 27% fact-check their online content less rigorously than their print content.

One reason for the lack of rigorous standards is that online editions of popular magazines are provided free of charge -- including, we should note, the Columbia Journalism Review. Only 14% of online publications charge for any or all of their content.

Readers are getting what they pay for, and it's time for a change in this broken business model.

How Multitasking Impairs Writing

On a recent PBS "Frontline" program, Stanford University professor Clifford Nass discussed the impact of multitasking on today's students:

...You already hear professors and others talking about changes in the way kids write, so that instead of writing an essay, they write in paragraphs, because what happens is, they write a paragraph, and they say, "Oh, now I'll look at Facebook for a while." Or they write a paragraph and say, "Oh, chance to play poker," or whatever other activity they want, or to do all of these at once.

So what we're seeing is less of a notion of a big idea carried through and much more little bursts and snippets. And we see that across media, across film, across, in Web sites, this idea of just do a little bit and then you can run away.

This trend emphasizes the importance of books, which help foster an ability to understand -- and communicate -- complex thoughts.

Does Writing Matter to Employers?

Consider this letter to TIME Magazine:

An entry position at my firm has gone unfilled for months because young people applying did not turn up for interview requests, attended interviews inappropriately dressed or offered resumes full of spelling and grammar mistakes and text spelling. I might be old-fashioned, but it's people like me who are still doing the hiring.

Paul Rowney, Sarasota, FL

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