Internal Language

Parasol Island Language Style Guide

Target

From 01/2016 we switch to English as our first internal language

Style

Do’s

• 70% of our collegues are non-native English speakers. Our language must be accessible

• Means: Language accessible to non-native English speakers; short sentences, toned-down tone

• Use a journalistic approach: cover the whys, the wheres, the hows. Relay the useful, relevant information succinctly

• If you talk about Parasol Island internally refer to first person plural: „we …“

• Use „Parasols“ to adress the staff in internal communications

Don’ts

• Advertising/marketing-style text: ‘an elegant oasis of calm’; ‘the last word in modern comfort’

• Filler, e.g. ‘this is a must-see for…’: Ask yourself if every sentence serves a purpose

• Superlatives (‘the best’, ‘the coolest’, ‘the freshest ingredients’ etc.)

• We are a team. Do not just mention names of single indivduals.

Grammar & Form

• Spelling: Use British English spelling e.g. ‘colour’ not ‘color’, ‘customised’ not ‘customized’, ‘ageing’ not ‘aging’

• Punctuation: Final period: Omit final period in intro text, info text and photo captions. Include final punctuation if it is a question mark or exclamation mark, though…

• Exclamation marks: avoid except in actual exclamations

• En dash – the one on either side of this clause – to be used with spaces in body text, not hyphens (-) or em dashes (—)

• Quotation marks: Single quotes always unless it’s a quote within a quote

• Numbers: Write out numbers from one to ten. For larger numbers use digits, except when starting a sentence

• Times: No periods, no spaces, colon e.g. 2pm, 3am, 12am, 12pm. For time ranges, use a hyphen and skip first ‘am’ or ‘pm’ unless it changes e.g. 3-6pm, but 10pm-1am

• Measurements: No periods, no spaces, colon e.g. 2pm, 3am, 12am, 12pm. For time ranges, use a hyphen and skip first ‘am’ or ‘pm’ unless it changes e.g. 3-6pm, but 10pm-1am

• Decade: Use full four-digit year, plus ‘s’ with no apostrophe e.g. 1960s

• Books, films, etc.: Italicise book, film and album names and individual artworks. Song, poem, article and essay titles should be in single quotes