Business Schools Aim to Cure Bad Writing

Reading about business schools take aim at bad writing didn’t surprise me. When I was a MBA graduate student for one semester, we had to pass a writing and presentation section. The university conducted seminars followed by students giving presentations and writing a paper.
Students who didn’t pass received tutoring and presented again. Those who did received a notation on their student reports they passed the writing and presentation requirements.
As an assistant to an online graduate program, I read theses and Microsoft Word highlights many typos that the student overlooked. The red or green squiggly line shouldn’t be present at all when they submit the paper unless there’s a valid reason. Word isn’t perfect.
We have many students where English is their second or even third language. I admire them because they know it well enough to take graduate courses. I didn’t learn Spanish and French well enough to use it daily. Had I kept up with Spanish after completing three years of it in high school, I might’ve done more but not as much as these students.
Obviously, these students don’t write well in English and we understand. The professor recommends they get writing help and the school provides writing resources. Furthermore, they can have someone else proofread their paper.
I saved my English papers and a handful of other work from college. When I review them, I cringe at the stiff and formal writing. That’s the kind of writing the professors encouraged plus I improved on some elements with practice. If universities are going to help students improve their writing skills, they need to move away from the stiff and formal writing and save those for special research papers and theses. Taking this approach ensure students enter the real world with the writing skills they need.
Then again, should theses writing be stiff? Formal makes sense, but not stiff and dry. The titles alone can easily make a person’s eyes glaze over and even require re-reading. Look at white papers. Those tend to have a similar reaction, but it doesn’t have to be dry and boring as white paper pro Michael Stelzner explains in Writing White Papers: How to Capture Readers and Keep Them Engaged and articles.
Every university has its own rules for writing theses and research papers. There are also standard research paper practices. Don’t expect these papers to turn into interesting reads anytime soon. But should educational institutions change their practices? Maybe, just maybe, we’ll experience less jargon in the business world.