Why is the active voice preferred in business writing?
What will be an ideal response?
Answer: The active voice should dominate in business writing, as it leads to clear and lively writing. The passive voice is usually wordier and leads to a weaker style. However, there are special circumstances where the passive voice can come in handy. Stating, "The deadline was missed," instead of, "You missed the deadline," avoids placing blame on an individual. The passive voice deemphasizes the role of the participant, and focuses instead on the issue of the deadline itself. Saying "A great new website was designed," instead of "Our tech department designed a great new website," again deemphasizes the participants' role. In this case the situation is positive, and wording it in the passive voice does not single out an individual or group for praise. Depending on whether you want to focus on praising the people responsible or on drawing attention to the completed project, you could use either passive or active voice. So while the active voice is preferred in business writing, the passive voice can be useful when you don't want to assign blame, or when you want to emphasize the action instead of the actor.
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