Booher's Rules of Business Grammar - Dianna Booher 2009

Separation anxiety
Verbosity about verbs: The big blunders

SUBJECTS AND VERBS THAT GET SPLIT APART

Consider the sentence a long shoelace, with the subject on one end and the verb on the other. No matter how many eyelets you snake that shoelace through across your foot, at some point those two ends of the shoelace (the subject and verb) must meet and tie together.

Most often, subjects come at the beginning of a sentence, followed closely by the verb. “Dilbert danced.” “The manager signed the check.” But sometimes talkers and writers begin with the subject and then get sidetracked, tossing in other descriptive words and phrases before they finish their main point about the subject.

These extra words that separate the subject and the verb confuse things. People choose the wrong verb form to match a word that’s not the real subject.

Incorrect:

The secret to hiring the best people as marketing and sales team members for small mom-and-pop organizations are finding people who have once been in business for themselves. (Members and organizations are not the subjects; they’re objects of prepositions.)

Correct:

The secret to hiring the best people as marketing and sales team members for small mom-and-pop organizations is finding people who have once been in business for themselves.

Occasionally, you may even flout tradition and flip your sentence so that the subject comes at the end of the sentence. Again, who am I to stand in your way? Writer’s choice. But if you flip, flop the correct verb in place:

Incorrect:

After our analysis of the results of the customer satisfaction survey was several suggestions submitted by the board of directors. (Analysis, results, and survey are not subjects. They’re objects of prepositions.)

Correct:

After our analysis of the results of the customer satisfaction survey were several suggestions submitted by the board of directors.

You can catch this error quickly by cutting the flesh off the bone, leaving just the sentence skeleton: subject and verb. Make the subject and verb match, either singular or plural.

Memory tip

No matter where they fall, find the two ends of the shoelace (subject and verb) and tie them together.