01 Introduction

Proof reading isn't rocket science, but it is an essential task if your work has to maintain a professional appearance.

While your work has to be accurate, it also has to appear professional. It has to have a consistent presentation, layout, and details.

Careless mistakes (such as mis-numbered directions, repeated words, skipped words, odd spacing or incosistent font sizes) undermine your professional appearance. These incidental errors may not be wrong, but they do distract from your main purpose, communicating information.

Finding even a single typo, numbering mistake or duplicate word may cause your reader to break concentration, to stop thinking about the process you're describing and look at the irregularity instead.

Stumbling over multiple simple mistakes may lead your reader to question the writer's ability, and even the professionalism of the organization the writer represents.

And proof reading isn't limited to paper formats either. You could be asked to proof a word file, a text message, a PDF document or a web page. Even a phone script can be 'proofed'. Formats keep expanding all the time. What is essential is that the documented item about to be released, published, posted, read or otherwise transmitted contains the approved information in the intended format - and nothing else.

Nothing added, and nothing taken away.


PROOF READING:  01 Introduction