Voice

The voice, or tone of your work is important. If you want to avoid having your work sound limp and lifeless, aim for the active voice. Using active voice will give your work the ring of authority; it will come over as crisp and professional, direct and to the point.

When you write in the passive voice, the action is done to the subject, as in The ball was thrown by Mary to Rosa. When you use active voice, the subject of your sentence is the doer; Mary threw the ball to Rosa. To weed out all those passive instances, look for combinations of the verb 'to be' and past participles of another verb. For instance: was posted, are seen, is urged, were reported, has been completed. Strengthen your work by changing these to the active voice.

Of course, there are times when the passive voice is necessary. In technical writing for instance: The air is heated by being circulated over the coils. You will also use passive voice if the object of the action is more important than the subject: Our meeting was postponed. Sometimes, too, the subject is unknown, in which case the passive voice is the only one that will work. For example: The will was unsigned. The art works were stolen from the gallery. There may also be times that you want to avoid naming a specific person: The missing art works were returned.

Be careful that you haven't switched from active to passive voice mid-sentence, as in: Such a program costs little, and many are benefited by it. A better way to say this is: Such a program costs little and benefits many.

A work that is all passive writing will be boring, and vice versa, but your writing should be predominately active.