First Draft No. 35 has just landed. Inside: Trump drops an F-bomb, the Bayeux Tapestry, and we wrestle with what it means to sound human. Join thousands of subscribers and get it here: thedraft.substack.com/p/first-draf...

First Draft 34 is here, where you can read my brilliant colleagues' writing, including a celebration of both Virginia Woolf and a railway line's recent decision to stop implying suicide. And then a little complaint from me, on politicians speaking like 19th c. foremen. @thedraftwriters.bsky.social

✒️"Perhaps more even than William Beveridge, Titmuss is the founding inspiration of Labour welfarism." On the legacy of chronicler of social justice Richard Titmuss and Labour's rebellion over welfare cuts, by our founder Philip Collins in Prospect Magazine 👇

✍️Word of the week: occasion An occasion is a special event, but not in the corporate world where it can refer to almost anything. A snacking occasion, for example, by which we mean a bar of chocolate. This is a word added to ordinary events in the illusory belief that it makes them sound exciting.

✒️Word of the week: no, not It has been said that the ability to say no is the true mark of good management. It is often the mark of good writing too. A sentence such as “there was a complete absence of strategy” would be much better as “there was no strategy” or “they did not have a strategy”.

✒️Word of the week: uptick You mean increase. Saying that something has “ticked up” is already a sign that something is the matter. Saying “uptick” is an application to be locked up.

"Victorian certainty gave way to modern ‘doubt and conflict’. And as daunting as that was, it was a liberation, too." The Draft's very own Lizzie Hibbert's essay in Engelsberg Ideas this week 👇

✒️Word of the week: catalyst Usually a fancy way of saying cause. Not that it means “cause”. A chemical catalyst provokes a change but remains itself unaltered. See this example, from Santander: “Innovation and digital/technological transformation are a catalyst in our business model and strategy."

✒️"Founded as a counterweight to New Labour, Blue Labour is socially conservative, economically leftist—and now allied with the populist right." Our founder Philip Collins in Prospect Magazine today: www.prospectmagazine.co.uk/politics/693...

✍️Word of the week: wordsmith Writers might object to the implication that they are tradesmen for words. They especially object to being told to wordsmith something. A blacksmith forges something and so does a writer, sometimes. A blacksmith does not blacksmith and a writer writes.

✍️Words of the week are also posted to Look, Stranger!, the Substack run by our founder, Philip Collins. Check out this week's edition below ⬇️ lookstranger.substack.com/p/blueprint-...

✍️Word of the week: purpose. Every business is now set upon defining its purpose in terms that never mention material gain. There is some nobility in this, but don’t lose sight of Peter Drucker’s insight that “there is only one definition of business purpose: to create a customer”.

Word of the week: monetise. Let's get this straight: you mean sell. There is nothing wrong with selling. To turn something into money sounds more vulgar than selling it, not less.

Today's Word of the Day: jump 🪂 The list of things on which you might jump is long. A bed, a pommel horse, or a sandpit, for example. A call, however, is not one of them. You don’t sound informal, casual and fun. You sound mid-Atlantic, wannabe and weird.

✍️You can find more Words of the Week on the Substack 'Look, Stranger!' by our founder Philip Collins. This week: Content, takeaway and gendered language. Read and subscribe ⬇️

Word of the week: Metaphor In one of his less distinguished moments Samuel Johnson once suggested expelling metaphors from the English language. That would be needlessly limiting. Try to keep control of a metaphor by thinking literally about what you are suggesting. So if your argument...

"The conjuring trick, rhetorically, for every successful candidate is the extent to which he can maintain outsider status after an emphatic victory. That was the conundrum of Trump’s second inaugural." ✍️Our founder Philip Collins in The Spectator today: www.spectator.co.uk/article/trum...

📖 Our word of the week is jargon. The philologist Wilson Follett called jargon “mere plugs for the holes in one’s thought”. Here is a tip for avoiding jargon. Write down every word you use at work that you would never dream of using at home. Then tear it up and never use any of these words again.

✍️"The problem is even vicarious and secondhand experiences are, by definition, lived." Jargon buster from a recent edition of our newsletter, First Draft. Read here — and sign up to get the next to your inbox: https://buff.ly/40d3hQI

"The conjuring trick, rhetorically, for every successful candidate is the extent to which he can maintain outsider status after an emphatic victory. That was the conundrum of Trump’s second inaugural." ✍️Our founder Philip Collins in The Spectator today: www.spectator.co.uk/article/trum...

✍️ Labour and the case for dispersing power Latest by our founder, Philip Collins, on Substack 🔗 Read more from Look, Stranger! here: https://buff.ly/3WjhNoX

🔊 Do you want your organisation and its people to communicate better? In our 'Mini MBA' programme, Philip Collins teaches the theory and practice of persuasive communication. 👉 https://buff.ly/4alBQst

📝 Sign up to First Draft, our free newsletter on language Latest issue: jargon buster, Rudyard Kipling, and populist truths 🔗 https://buff.ly/40d3hQI

We're a company of writers and experts in rhetoric: the art of argument and persuasion. ✍️ What we practise, we also teach – we train people to write clearly, concisely and persuasively. Find out more: thedraftwriters.com