Use verbs instead of nouns
Writers are more direct and concise when they use verbs instead of nouns. Instead of writing about "decision-making," a disembodied enterprise at best, write about people who decide.
A favorite example comes from Shirley Povich and the way he opened his Washington Post football column one Monday morning in the early 1960's. Instead of writing about "integration," Povich used the more powerful verb:
| Shirley Povich (pictured at Camden Yards in 1998)
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"Jim Brown, born ineligible to play for the Redskins, integrated their end zone three times yesterday."
Shirley Povich, in his Washington Post column "This Morning."
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