When a student prepares a report for a teacher they are expected to proofread their work, in the business world this is also expected. What do you think an employeer or a customer would think of someone who doesn't proofread their work? What are some tips you have for others to help make proofreading and editing your work easier.
Be sure to post your comments by Friday Feb 4th, and you must also respond to at least one other student's comment by Friday Feb 4th at 11:59pm.
Shelby Fuchs
2/2/2011 09:34:54 am
I think an employer would think it’s unprofessional. This is also a sign that the person doesn’t care about the quality of the work and that mind set is probably reflected in everything that he or she does in the work place. A customer would think of the company has poor quality and in most cases go to a different company for service. Also the customer could complain, if the document is very important, you could get fired. Some tips I would give to the person is use spellchecker. Also maybe have two or people look over the work before presenting or turning it in. Plus the advantage to that is that the people reading could give you advice on what to change or add to the document.
Mrs. Miller
2/2/2011 12:35:18 pm
Great job Shelby, but if you go back and read your post you will find some errors. That is why I suggest as you do having someone else read it, and if there is no one around one great tip is to read what you wrote backward. Often times our mind reads what we think is there and not what is there. If you read backwards you will see the errors becuase your mind can't trick you.
Tori Sullivan
2/3/2011 05:08:16 am
From my perspective, being professional is not white-collar wearing, tame boots and your hair slicked back but it is fulfilling responsibilities and taking heat. Any employee, no matter what the job, has a contractual obligation to the employer to fulfill the requirements of his or her job description while giving the employer's interests high priority. Beyond that, working professionally generally means holding to more formal standards of performance and ethics than you might in your personal life. Conform to professional and/or industry standards in doing your job. Do it skillfully and well. Work hard; play fair. Represent your employer, your fellow workers, and yourself with dignity. Give the client and employer more than their money's worth. When you make mistakes in documents and other business documents it comes of to me as non-professional not only because you act like you don’t have two minutes to spell check your work but also because it seems that your business isn’t as “high-class”. If you have had a bad experience with a business usually it will put you in a bad mood. Therefore if you blog or search the internet you might find articles that say “Don’t shop at ___” This will give your company a bad reputation and may cause less clients. I believe that there are many easy ways to proofread. One way is to backtrack. By this I mean reading your report backwards. Another way to proofread is to simply use spell checker, though spell checker doesn’t always get grammatical errors. If you are unsure on a word you can use http://dictionary.reference.com/. Though there are many ways to proofread the best working one for myself is to have someone else read it. When you read your own paper you sometimes fill in words that you know are supposed to be there but are not always included. Therefore having someone else read it will benefit that aspect. As you can see, proofreading makes a big difference on the reputation and name of your company. P.S. Mrs. Miller you spelt employer wrong.
Dustin Roosevelt
2/3/2011 05:36:13 am
good advise Mrs miller about the reading the words backwards I am going to use that.
Mackie Monahan
2/3/2011 11:25:34 am
Tori- your advice is great. I belive you put a lot of time into your answer and it shows. I will use the advice you have provided to write my answer thank you.
McKenzie Uto
2/3/2011 11:39:40 am
In my opinion, showing that you are unprofessional in the work place is a huge let down to your employer. To the employer this shows a lot of bad qualities. If you got hired to be a secretary for instance, and you handed in multiple pieces of information to your boss that had a lot of spelling errors and grammatical errors, you aren’t doing your job well. Wasting time in the work place causes the business to lose money, and if you don’t spell correctly or make sure all of your grammar is correct you will end up wasting time in the long run because you will either have to explain what you met by what you typed or wrote, or someone else will waste THEIR time trying to figure out what your message met. This all leads back to being able to effectively communicate in the work place. Employers hire people because they find them the best fit for the job, if you hand in an application that has multiple miss spellings and you can’t use your grammar well, then you won’t be taken serious enough to even get hired! Clients will also see grammatical errors along with spelling errors as if you don’t care about your work. They won’t take you serious and they will think of you as unprofessional because you can’t even take the time for THEM to make sure everything you have typed, or written is both spelled right and all the grammar is correct. If you don’t seem to be doing a good job, then that will also reflect on the business, and your clients (much like Shelby said) will go to a different company that will treat them more professionally. A few tips I would use in situations where I need to check my spelling or grammar are: I will use Spell Check on Microsoft Word, I will have someone else proofread my work multiple times to make sure it is correct, or I will read my work, then do something else to get my mind off of it, then when it’s not as fresh in my mind I will go and re-read it CARFULLY so I don’t skip over words, because, like Mrs. Miller said, our minds like to read what they think should be there instead of what is actually there.
Mackie Monahan
2/3/2011 11:41:48 am
I think if you did not proof-read your work an employer would either overlook your application or you would end up without a job. If an employer notices a sloppy work area resulting in sloppy work I think they would think twice about asking you to do the assignment. I know that if I were the employer I would look for the best fit application, that is neat and shows the skills they would need for the job. Another thing I would do after hiring is watch the new employee and make the best choice for wether to rehire for the job or keep the current employee after a certain amount of time. Some advice I have for others on proof-reading is, 1. Make sure to meet all needed requirements 2. re-read your documents after they are written out 3. have another person read your document after it is written 4. if no one is around read the document to yourself outloud 5. Read your document backwards 6. spell check your answers then grammar check 7. use proper grammer and more. If you follow the directions givin and listen your superior then you should be a pro proof-reader. :D
Maria Meyers
2/3/2011 11:45:54 am
If you do not proofread your work, you will look very unprofessional. If you are typing documents, letters, e-mails, etc. for your company, you want them to reflect your seriousness about your job. Giving off a good impression of your company to clients and customers is very important. If you do not proofread your work, you will come off as unqualified, lazy, and careless. Customers like to think that they are working with someone professional and trustworthy. Proofreading is also very important when it comes to getting a job. You need your applications to be perfect, or your possible employers won't want to hire you because they want people capable of doing good work. Giving off good impressions is important to looking professional, so proofreading your work is a great start. Employers want somebody who can make them and their business look good. If you have trouble proofreading your documents, have a few people look them over. Be open to any changes and constructive criticism. When you are typing your work, make sure you use spell check. Spell check will not always catch your misspelled words or grammatical errors, so it is important that you do not rely on that alone. Reading your work out loud to someone else or yourself will also help you catch some mistakes.
Mackie Monahan
2/3/2011 11:46:16 am
Shelby- I agree with your advice, spell checking and having others proof-read is a great way to have good professional looking documents. Thank you for your advice.
McKenzie Uto
2/3/2011 11:46:51 am
I think Shelby has a great point! Using multiple people to proofread your work is very helpful, not only to make sure you have no errors, but to also get feedback as to what the quality work of your work is and to also help you improve your work.
Maria Meyers
2/3/2011 11:50:58 am
Mackie, I totally agree with you. The whole part about the employer's opinion was exactly what I had in mind. I never really thought about including "making sure you meet all of your needed requirements," into proofreading tips. That is a great pointer because I know I have made that mistake a few times.
McKenzie Uto
2/3/2011 11:54:23 am
Maria, you have a great point that I didn't really think of before! I didn't realize everything an employer may think, and you pointed out multiple things that probably do cross the mind of your boss if you did not display yourself in a professional manner. Reading your reply to this blog has made me think more widely as to how I should act in the future when I go to work or go in for an interview for a job.
Maria Meyers
2/3/2011 11:55:36 am
Hey Mrs. Miller, I totally used the backwards reading thing :D I typed my document on notepad on my laptop. Reading it backwards helped me catch some errors because my laptop didn’t have spell check. I decided to put it on my flash drive, transfer it to my other computer, and use spell check just to be safe.
Taylor R. Prince
2/3/2011 12:56:07 pm
Proofreading, is it really that important? In my opinion yes, it is very important. What you write is a reflection of who you are. If something is carelessly thrown together right before the work deadline it conveys a poor work ethic on the part of the writer. In order be a valued employee in the business world both oral and written communication skills are key. Written grammatical mistakes can greatly hurt the credibility of your text. Some grammatical mistakes can dramatically change or alter the entire meaning and the results could be disastrous. One tip to improve your proofreading is concentration. This means removing yourself from distractions such as your phone, television, and music. Also, I believe homonyms can be a big issue. Homonyms are words that have the same pronunciation but have different meanings. Spell checker may not always be able to catch these for you. Before turning in or submitting a document having a friend read it for you can be very helpful. A second person often catches mistakes that you may have missed. Over all, I believe that to be successful in the business world takes a lot of concentration and hard work. However, I think it can all begin with something as simple as proofreading your work.
Taylor R. Prince
2/3/2011 01:14:11 pm
I believe McKenzie and Shelby both had excellent points. You should strive for perfection in your written work because you are reflecting on your company as well as yourself. A poorly written document is being very unprofessional and you are giving your customer plenty of reason not to come back to you.
Taylor R. Prince
2/3/2011 01:20:24 pm
Mackie, I also think reading aloud is an excellent idea. It's often that your ear can catch a mistake that your eye has missed. I used this method in completing my own blog. Thanks for the tip!
Shelby Fuchs
2/3/2011 11:10:48 pm
Mackie- I thought it was interesting that you said to read it out loud. I also thought that meeting the requirements was on the list was great! Thats probaly the most important.
Shelby Fuchs
2/3/2011 11:13:51 pm
Uto- I like your idea to come back after a while and read it again. For example i thought i had my comment ready but i missed a few words when i looked at a little later when i looked at it again.
Tyler McGreevy
2/4/2011 12:10:15 am
I think the employer should tell him to learn how to proofread his work or he will get fired. Proofreading is so important because you could mess up the persons understanding what they were going to say. I agree with Mrs. Miller because reading backwards could really help. I also agree with Shelby Fuchs because it’s unprofessional to not look over you work before doing something with it.
Haley Thomas
2/4/2011 12:14:05 am
Proofreading in my opinion, is very important. Yes its a little time consuming but, if your doing it for your job, it should be worth it. Proofreading not only makes it so your paper looks good. If you don\'t do it, you wouldn\'t look very smart so the people above you in your work area, wouldn\'t think very well of you. After all, who wants to hire someone who can\'t even write a letter that isn\'t written properly. I mean i few mistakes every now and then like a misplaced comma shouldn\'t be that big of a deal because who honestly sits there and proofreads something that they don\'t have to. But you still shouldn\'t have a lot of things wrong. Sentences should be correctly written and make sense.
Katie Bohler
2/4/2011 12:20:03 am
I totally agree with you Shelby! I personally already (even though I have not quite entered the working world yet) find it unprofessional and kind of sad when people don\'t spell things correctly or have grammar issues. I guess I may have a slight OCD problem about that. But an employer or customer... the employer may just fire you for not taking enough care in your work to even check if you spell things wrong and such. And a customer may think it bad upon the company (as Tori said) and not use the company again.
Taylor Lewis
2/4/2011 03:22:29 am
I think the employer would think the person is not professional. Showing that you are able to spell words correctly shows that you know what you are doing. If it were a customer who saw this I also would think he would think the person or company was unprofessional. That may show that they have low customer service or that they do not care at all. A tip to give you to use is to use word and type it in there and use spell checker. You could also use a dictionary to check the misspelled words. Also ask people to read the document and ask them how to spell the word if you are having trouble.
Taylor Lewis
2/4/2011 03:25:47 am
Haley - I like how you showed misspelled word in you response. I think it will help them understand more about misspelled words in a document.
Taylor Lewis
2/4/2011 03:26:40 am
Tyler - I like the part were you said It might mess up there understanding. I think it is important to be able to understand what he or she is saying. If you don’t understand then you can’t get the job done right.
Consuelo Artega
2/4/2011 03:59:39 am
If I were an employer and I had an employee or someone who doesn’t read their work before they presented, I would think that they are not organized. That they are unprofessional. I would think that they weren’t really interested in what they were going to be saying or doing. Proofreading your work is very important because you don’t know whey you made a mistake until you read it again. I think that they should read the paper first. Then try to present it out-loud or re-read it over and over until they have no mistakes.
Carol Entrup
2/4/2011 04:00:20 am
If I were an employer and my employee or someone coming to me sent me a letter or email that wasn’t proofread and had a lot of mistakes, I would think that they were very unprofessional and didn’t really care about what they were saying. I would feel as if what they were saying was not important because they obviously didn’t care enough about it to proofread it and take the necessary steps to make it look professional. I would not hire that person or give them the time of day. If it’s not worth their time to do it right then it’s not worth my time to read it or even look at it. I have a few tips to help others proofread their work. Have others that you trust and know what there doing read your work. Have as many people as you can read it. Read your work out loud. This will help you find mistakes that your eye wouldn’t see. Those are some tips I have.
Dustin Roosevelt
2/4/2011 04:05:27 am
Haley you have good advise about how it can be time consuming but when it comes to a job interview you want to make it perfect and when it is done you can know that you did your best.
Wyatt Hyer
2/4/2011 04:09:32 am
I think that proofreading is just something you should do. If you don’t proofread it means you pretty much don’t care. If you are working for someone you should care if you are doing something for them and getting paid. Also as a student you should proofread it if you want good grades. If you don’t proofread it is just because of pure lazy-ness. I think that in the business world proofreading your work should be mandatory. There are many ways you can proofread a report to give your best. You can just give your paper to 2 or three different people and have them do it or you can do it other ways. Some of these ways are like using a dictionary to make sure that your words are spelled right. You can also read your assignment 5 times through and surely you will catch most of the errors. This is what I think about proofreading.
Wyatt Hyer
2/4/2011 04:11:31 am
Tori I think you have some good advise and totally agree with you. You give it your all and gibe them their money’s worth. I also like the idea about reading it backwards I will have to try that.
Dustin Roosevelt
2/4/2011 04:12:29 am
If I was an employer and I had a employee that could not spell very good I would pretty much drop the fact that he cant spell very good if this employee could make sales like no other employee ever could I would still hirer him because of his sales not because of his spell, that’s why there is a spellchecker.
Wyatt Hyer
2/4/2011 04:13:30 am
Wow Mckenzie your paragraph puts mine to shame. I agree with most of the stuff you said which would go the same for Shelby seeing as you agree with her. GOOD JOB!
Kelli
2/4/2011 04:26:59 am
I agree with mrs. miller and shelby and mckenzie
Carol Entrup
2/4/2011 04:35:24 am
Taylor- I totally agree with what your saying. What you present to others is a representation of who you are and your work ethic.
Carol Entrup
2/4/2011 04:38:09 am
Mackie- What a good point! I know that if I were an employer and I saw a letter that was unprepared I wouldn’t read it.
Torrie Koller
2/4/2011 04:53:30 am
I believe that if someone does not take their time to check their work, it can affect their job and what people think of them greatly. A tip to always checking your work would be proofread you things before you make them official or hand them in. Also possibly have a friend proofread things for you to help you out. However make sure you are doing most of the work not your friend. Also when you don’t proofread it shows you are not taking your time or caring about what you are doing. Wyatt- I totally agree with you! Not taking your time is defiantly not a good idea when you are working. And I also agree with you on the not proofreading is showing you don’t care about your work in a way. Haley- I agree with you on the fact that proofreading is and can be very time consuming! I know I hate taking time to proofread papers but in the end it helps a lot.
Mrs. Miller
2/4/2011 05:59:35 am
The crazy thing about our mind is that we can see things that are spelled wrong and still be able to read them. The worst is when we spell a word correctly but use it incorrectly. If you read through the blogs you will find a number of errors - so my concern is how many of you did what you said you should do. My favorite is when you talk about it shows a lack of caring or effort and then you have an error. If you don't spell check or re-read you may have errors. That is why you should write your blog in a word document and then re-read before you copy and paste to the comment spot. Maria – glad you used the backward reading, Haley and Katie B not sure the / marks in your comment, Kelli tell us why you liked our comments, Dustin if an employer can’t read what you wrote because of spelling would you be a top sales person? Wyatt did you read your comment 5 times? Taylor L, understanding is important but with that comes understanding what is written but also what is meant by it. Taylor P nicely put about the distractions needing to go away, that is one of the down falls about being a great multi-tasker. Mackie loved the point about reading out loud when you hear what you wrote it makes you see errors you might not find otherwise, but having someone else read it to you is even better. Tori - Great catch on my spelling error, I was hoping more of you would say something in regards to the fact that I didn't proofread.
Tori Sullivan
2/4/2011 09:43:51 am
Dustin, I totally disagree with you, though I do understand where you are coming from. The point of spell checker is if you can't spell it is there to help you. You also have many other resources such as a dictionary, online, and other people. I believe if they, as the employees, can't take two mintues to look up how to spell a word or ask someone to read their document or whatever they're working on, then they aren't worth my time. What makes you think you should just drop the spelling? Do you want your company to receive a bad name or be misunderstood?
Kelcey
2/4/2011 11:02:14 am
As a consumer or Business professional I would think that being presented with work that has not been proofread would appear not only negligent, but would also perceive it as them saying, “I don’t care about my boss, workplace, or the people who work here.” In my humble opinion, when you are an employee it doesn’t matter if you are tired, have other thoughts or plans, or just plain don’t like what you’ve been assigned to do. Your boss pays you to do the job right the first time, have it done on time, and in most cases, with a smile. There are going to be plenty of jobs that you are going to absolutely hate, and that will possibly make you stare open mouthed at you boss like, “DUDE! You can’t SERIOUSLY expect ME to do THAT!” However, as an employee, I feel that it is your duty to shut your mouth and do as your told. At least until you get home, then you can talk about it to your cat. (English Honors students will get this joke.) When, and if, a situation comes up like that you can ask yourself, “How would I want or expect my employee to act?” “Would I want them to treat their job, coworkers, boss, and most importantly their customers with respect rather then have them act put out and lazy.” I am sure that, like me, you have met plenty of both types of employees. I know which I like better, and when I am employed, I hope to be as good as they are. Some of those employees went out of their way, beyond what they were required to do, just to help. Others had been just been lazy and told me that wasn‘t their department. An example would be the one time when I went to a restaurant, an employee came into the to the bathroom. When she left her bathroom stall, she went straight out without washing her hands!. Yes, I’m pretty sure I know what kind of employee I will be. It is also important to show respect to your boss and coworkers. As the famous Golden Rule goes “Treat others how you want to be treated.” I believe your work reflects you and what you are about. Therefore proofreading your work shows your respect and commitment to your teacher, employer or whomever is reading your work. Oh, and the helpful advise I have for making proofreading is this; use spell check. It doesn’t get any easier than that people! ;)
Esther
2/4/2011 11:07:55 am
Proofreading is a very important skill that is not used enough. As American teenagers, we are so involved with friends and activities that we don’t take the time to proofread our work. We like to say as much as we can, as fast as we can. We need to slow down enough to take the time to reread our work, or to have a friend read it. Some times, we may like a line and think that there is nothing wrong with it, but when our friend looks at it, they see all the mistakes, and don’t care if it’s your favorite line. Also, if you have a favorite saying, which only makes sense to you, don’t use it. Nobody wants to read something they don’t understand. I am one of those people who are bugged a lot when their reading along and find a misused word or a word in the wrong ‘tense.’ To conclude, proofreading may not be easy or fun, but it is necessary.
Esther
2/4/2011 11:09:23 am
I agree with what Maria said, make the extra effort to use a spell checker. It can catch things easier and give you plenty of options on how you want to spell a word.
Kelcey
2/4/2011 11:11:58 am
Love your paragraph Maria! I totally agree that if you want to look professional, you should definitely spell check. Plus, it makes you feel good knowing that you tried your best, instead of being sloppy.
Esther
2/4/2011 11:14:18 am
I like what Uto, Maria and Shelby said about waiting a while before you reread something. I know that when I look at something that I wrote a year ago, I go, ‘Did I really write that? Or did some alien come write that while I wasn’t looking?’ I don’t enjoy that feeling, so I correct the problem.
Kelcey
2/4/2011 11:17:05 am
Well said Esther! Spellchecker is not used enough. If half of us, myself included, just slowed down a little to use it, we would be much better off.
Tori Sullivan
2/4/2011 11:18:15 am
Everyone, When you criticize others you should probably not make the same mistake as they did. That's a little bit hypocritical. If you were to use all the advice that you gave i doubt that that would of happened. "Before you go pointing fingers make sure your hands are clean" - Marilyn Monroe.
Harley Diener
2/4/2011 03:28:47 pm
What do people think when you don’t proof read. Well first of all, they don’t take you seriously as a working employee. They could think of you as lazy and not consider you for a job that you would be fully capable of doing. A good way to get your letters proof read is through other business people. If you don’t, you might come off as arrogant and pompous, not at all what you would want to appear like in a business situation. The best way to avoid sounding cocky and trigger ready is to go over your work and then have at least two other people in the business environment to go through it as well. You might accidently leave out an important piece of information and not even know it. That could really mess up a deal with a customer, which is not what you are trying to accomplish. You should highlight parts you wish to include in your work and make a list of key points. Next you should make a rough draft. That way if something doesn’t sound right, you can change it and rewrite it. Just make sure you always have a back-up copy so if your computer crashes, you wont lose all your hard work. After you get all the little things out, you print out a couple copies and ask some people to proof read. The key is to ask people with different views, that way you’ll reach out to a larger audience. Those are some ways to make proof reading easy.
Emma Woodland
2/4/2011 03:49:26 pm
What do people think when you don’t proof read. First of all, they wouldn’t take you seriously as a working employee. A good way to get your letters proof read is through other people in business. If you do people would probably not realize your full potential and brush you off and not hire you for that job or things like that. You would want to know if you accidently forgot to put in a crucial piece of information that without it, it makes no sense. That could really mess up a deal with a customer, which is not what you are trying to accomplish. You should highlight parts you wish to include in your work and make a list of key points. Next you should make a rough draft. That way if something doesn’t sound right, you can change it and rewrite it. And to be sure you always want to safe constantly so if your computer decides to shut down or something and you haven’t saved a lot of hard work had gone to waste. After you get all the little things out, you print out a couple copies and ask some people to proof read. A good thing to do is to get people with different opinion proofread because the way some people speak may not make any sense to other people so you would want to try to have it make the most sense to everyone.
Emma Woodland
2/4/2011 03:51:36 pm
Harley- I think you did a good job. Especially getting your point across and I agree that you should have people with different opinions proofread it.
Harley Diener
2/4/2011 03:53:21 pm
I agree with you Emma. Multiple people reading is better than just on eperson. They could overlook a mistake
Harley Diener
2/4/2011 03:55:41 pm
I think you were very right Shelby. An employer-or potential employer- would believe that if you had a lot of misspellings it wouldnt be professional
Emma Woodland
2/4/2011 03:58:00 pm
Kelcey-good job on yours. It seems very professional. And nice and neat.And very good job on explaining about the proofreading.0_0
Mrs. Miller
2/7/2011 12:49:44 am
Emma and Harley - I like that you reminded each other to make sure to do your DQ, but I want to know what you each think not what you think together. Your initial posts are very similar in words and thoughts, as a teacher I would give credit to Harley because her post came first, so next time, I want your own thoughts and not a shared response.
Kayla Beale
2/7/2011 12:54:11 am
People who don't proofread their work make me think that they don't care about what they are doing. People who don't care about what they are working on don't make a good company. So I don't think I would be a consumer or work for that company if they didn't proofread work. They would loose their service and make themselves look bad. Some tips that I could give to people who are proofreading is to know all proofreading marks so when you do proofread you can mark yourself then go back and correct all the marks you made. Also learn great grammar so when you do proofread you wouldn't have to correct so much. These are some of the best tips I have. Comments are closed.
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