Writing: style guide
These simple writing guides are intended to create consistency across Catalpa. Our goal is to communicate clearly, concisely and with purpose.
Before beginning any piece of writing, take a moment to consider:
Who am I writing for? (audience)
What do I want this piece of writing to achieve? Is it to inform, persuade, or something else? (purpose)
How can I best engage the reader? Can I choose the format (channel/medium)? Can I structure the information in a way that makes my point clearer or more interesting?
Style tips:
We use Lora font for headings, and Montserrat for body text.
Keep sentences short! Ideally, most sentences should take up no more than two lines of a Google doc (three at most). Break 👏 it 👏 up 👏.
Always remember that we want to write for as wide an audience as possible, and that many of our audience do not speak English as a first language. Try to avoid jargon and use simple language where possible. Whenever there is an easier way to say something, go with that. ‘Use’ instead of ‘utilise’, ‘while’ instead of ‘whilst’, ‘to’ instead of ‘in order to’.
Use active voice not passive voice 👊. That means you should put the subject who is doing something at the start of the sentence, not after what they’re doing: Active: ‘Our engineering team will create a Minimum Viable Product (MVP) version of the product’ ✔️ Passive: ‘A Minimum Viable Product (MVP) version will be created by our engineering team’ ❌
The first time you introduce an acronym into a piece of writing, write it out in full with the letters in brackets so that the reader knows from there on what you’re referring to, e.g. “Catalpa is working with the Ministry of Health (MoH). We are supporting the MoH in...”. If you’re only using an acronym a few times in the piece of writing and it’s not commonly known (e.g. the UN is commonly known vs. DIMS which is not), it’s better to just write the name out in full. Too many acronyms disrupt the flow and make writing inaccessible (and boring) 🥱.
We use Australian English 🇦🇺, not American English (so “organisation”, not “organization” and “centre” not “center” and so on). But if using a name, keep the original spelling (e.g. World Health Organization).
We don’t capitalise every word in a title unless they’re major titles (like on the cover page of a report) so instead of Titles Where Every Word Is Capitalised, you’d write a Title that might be bold, but only with the first word capitalised.
We also only capitalise proper nouns, i.e. the names of things, so while we may capitalise “the Hamahon Program”, we don’t need a capital when talking more broadly about how “the program achieved A, B, and C”. Same goes for talking about ‘the platform’, ‘the policy’, or ‘the government’.
When writing reports, think about how to ‘hook’ your reader in at the very start. Ask yourself, ‘Why is this project important and something that the client should be excited about?’ Then try to answer that question in the first few lines. Spot the difference:
“This Quarterly Progress Report is prepared for and submitted to MFAT and covers the period from August - October. It outlines the progress made against the work plan and complies with the funding agreements set out between MFAT and Catalpa International.” 😴
vs.
“The Pacific eLearning Program is aiming to help create the next generation of leaders in Pacific science. It is changing the way that science is taught to Year 10 students in four countries through Pacific Learn: an app which provides teachers with tools to make lessons relevant to the real issues facing the Pacific. This Quarterly Progress report is prepared for...” 🤩
Often we will still need to include a dry section like the first option which responds to the exact wording in the contract. But where possible, let's try to engage the client so that we can better get our message across.
The Hemingway App is a fantastic free tool which will tell you how to make your text more readable! Run important text through it for advice on how to make your writing easier and more enjoyable to read.
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