Develop a coherent argument

Writing a purpose statement
Good introductions and conclusions
Some things to avoid
Make effective transitions
Using headings

Writing a purpose statement

In an interview given on this site, John Peters, Emerald Editorial Director and Editor of Management Decision, had this to say about how to counteract the vagueness and lack of clarity in some papers:

In other words, be very clear what your paper is about so that you could articulate it to anyone who asks. In these pages we give some hints about how you can make your language clearer, but the most important thing in getting your message across is that you fully understand your message.

Good introductions and conclusions

Your introduction is your chance to get your reader interested in the subject. First impressions count, in research as in life. A good approach is to:

• Establish the importance of the research area.
• Establish a reason why your own particular study is important - because it is particularly important for the industry, as in corporate brand partnerships, or because there is a gap in the literature and is would be dangerous or inappropriate to apply existing knowledge.
• Having outlined the territory, you can now stake your research claim directly: 'The purpose of this article...', 'This article investigates...'

Likewise, the conclusion of your piece should be a summing up of the methodology and the findings, but also a bit about why they are important, and in particular what is the importance to research and to managerial practice. Look at how the author concludes the article in the co-branding study quoted above.

Some things to avoid

There are some writing habits which are easy to fall into but which are inimical to a clear style. Here are some of them:

Don't use undefined terms

When using terms with which the reader may be unfamiliar, always give some explanation, as in the following definition of 'grounded theory':

Note how in the above example, the author does not explain 'inductive': if you are writing for an academic audience, it is reasonable to assume that they will know basic terms.

Temper generalisations

Never make general claims unless you really can prove them - qualify in some way. Words that can temper generalisations include: as a rule, for the most part, generally, in general, potentially, normally, on the whole, in most cases, usually, the vast majority of, a large number of, it is likely that, have tended to.

Giving examples is also a good way of backing up generalisations (bold mine to indicate tempering words, and examples).

Use analogies with care

Make sure that analogies really do work - in the second Irak war, there were many comparisons of Saddam Hussain with Hitler.

Avoid faulty logic

Logical traps to avoid falling into include:

• if you are developing a general argument, make sure that the statements on which you base the argument are valid. Take, for example, the case of research into language acquisition that assumed that the development of vocabulary was natural to all children. Is this really true?

• non sequiturs. Here, the author makes sudden jumps in the sense, with the effect that a point raised in one paragraph is followed by a completely different point in a subsequent paragraph, or even within the same paragraph. This leaves the reader confused and unable to hold onto the gist of the argument! A research article should not be like a conversation between old friends which by its very nature roams over everything and anything.

Make explanations coherent

The 'flow' of your paper should be consistent: when providing descriptive or explanatory information, as in a literature review or report of research, or a case study, make sure that you avoid either giving too much information or too little. Avoid jumps in the logic (where you require the reader to understand certain things which are obvious to you but not necessarily to them), or repeating information.

Make effective transitions

Any piece of writing tells a story - in the case of a research article, the story concerns a contribution to research, with an outlining of territory with your literature review, then an outline of your methodology followed by your results with their implications. With any story, it is important to fill in the necessary steps so that the reader has all the facts. This sounds too obvious to mention, but it is surprising how often people neglect to do this with the result that the article is not very clear.

The chances are that if when you read through a draft of your article, if you become aware that there are uncomfortable gaps in your narrative, then you may well have left out some important steps, so it is very important that you check that you have included everything, and look to see whether in fact you have neglected to explain causality, or failed to explain an important fact.

However, assuming that the correct logic is in place, your draft can still read 'jumpily' but can be easily fixed through a gracious transitional sentence, which connects the subsequent point with the previous one. Such sentences will probably use a transitional word or phrase such as the following:

Using headings

Using headings is another very effective way of guiding your reader through your material, and making it more readable, because it forces you to divide up your material into chunks.