Dunno about private industry, but some twenty-five years ago I was working as a technical writer for a government agency that was involved in residential weatherization. I got to looking through one of the "boilerplate" sections that we were supposed to write our reports around.

It was supposed to say something important if you were going to have some clue as to what the report was supposed to be about, but it was filled with governmentese, and it was downright opaque!

I didn't have anything on my desk at the time, so I took a whack at it, first, deciphering the bloody thing so I knew what it was trying to say. Once I got the damned thing sorted out, I settled down and rewrote it in plain, understandable English! And it said what it was supposed to say. And in the process, I managed to cut the wordage down from around 1,200 words to about 900.

I was bloody proud of myself!

I used it on the next report I submitted.

It came back like a ricochet, and I got my ass chewed for messing with it. Barbara Hickey ("Picky Hickey") upstairs admitted that it was much clearer, easier to read, and was clearly understandable.

But—it was a government document, and that's the way they wanted it.

And don't do it again!!

Don Firth