Citing & Sourcing Part II: Nuts & Bolts

Published on June 18, 2009 by Wendy in Plain Speak Articles, Writing & Editing

So, covered in Part I, you’ve found your reliable sources and you’re ready to share what you’ve learned with the world. How do you properly do so?

As a professional communicator, I’m fascinated by the many nuances of citing and sourcing. But as an investment advisor, you may find that fussing over these sorts of details is about as exciting as watching paint dry. And yet, the details can bedevil you if you ignore them:

Proper sourcing is invaluable if your documents undergo compliance reviews or similar challenges.

Improperly “borrowing” someone else’s creative capital can raise copyright and related legal concerns.

If you cite information incorrectly — or you cite incorrect information — it can damage your and your firm’s credibility. Your communications are like your for-sale real estate. If the welcome mat is unsightly, it can devalue your entire house.

Say It With Style

The importance of consistency should be easy for the passive investment advisor to appreciate, since it serves as a cornerstone to your own business strategies. When it comes to citing and sourcing, if you are consistent with industry standards as well as the style guides you have chosen or created, your mission is already nearly accomplished.

In addition to adhering to American English rules for grammar, spelling and punctuation, there are two style guides most commonly used in business writing for determining how to display your footnotes, quotes and just about everything else in between: the Associated Press (AP) Stylebook and the Chicago Manual of Style. As the names imply, the AP Stylebook originated in the media and the Chicago Style originated in academia, at the University of Chicago. Personally, I don’t feel that one is particularly “better” than the other. The main point is to choose one and stick with it for consistency.

Most writers also create rules for their additions or exceptions to the standard guides, especially for industry-specific jargon. Good writers (or department of writers) will create an internal document that lists their extra guides — again, to ensure consistency. For example, do you prefer “advisor” or “adviser”? Both are acceptable, but it’s best to consistently use one or the other.

Managing Quotes

Whether you are quoting two words or 200, it’s important to:

Make it clear that it’s a quotation.
Give credit to your source.
When appropriate, footnote additional sourcing information.

As a standard rule, as long as your quote is going to run less than five lines long, you indicate it’s a quote by putting quote marks around it. (There are special rules for longer quotes — no quote marks, ½” indent on both sides, single-spaced. But, frankly, if your quote is that long, you may want to reconsider it anyway.)

If you are going to include your sourcing information for the quote, you can provide it within your narrative or as a footnote. How do you decide which way to go? Choose the approach that will better support your purpose.

If the emphasis is on what’s actually being said, it’s probably best to keep your narrative clean by moving the details to a footnote. If it’s important who is making the statement under what circumstances, or you don’t want to have to mess with footnotes, then you can include the details within the narrative. Consider these illustrations and how their emphasis differs:

Stephen R. Covey once said, “We judge ourselves by our intentions and others by their behavior.”1

Managing Sources

I began the previous section with, “If you are going to include your sourcing information …” What do I mean by “If”?

Unfortunately, there isn’t really any popular style guide or ironclad rules on when you must provide detailed sourcing and when you can omit it. While there are gray areas, here’s the two-step process I typically use to determine how to handle my sources:

Step One: Does the statement require sourcing?

For quotes and data — You should always obtain, double check, file and have sourcing readily available upon request, even long after your document has been published.

For statements of fact — If almost everyone in your target audience would accept a statement without question, then you shouldn’t have to source it. The more specific or controversial your statement, the more likely you should obtain a source.

Step Two: Do I need to include the source in my document?

The answer is, it depends. The deciding factor is often the context in which you are writing.

If you are writing an academic piece — such as a white paper or educational article, it’s best to err on the side of including as much detail as possible about your sources for your data, quotes and/or statements of fact.

If you are writing shorter, jauntier pieces — such as newsletters or newspaper articles, where space and your reader’s patience may be limited, you may be able to omit sourcing, as long as you still have it available upon request. Do be careful on this one, though, to ensure you don’t run afoul of compliance-related disclosure requirements, regardless of the context.

If you are writing for the Internet — such as a blog, Twitter or your Web site — although this medium tends to be short and jaunty in tone, it also lends itself well to heavier citing since it can generally be done via convenient hyperlinks that do not interfere with readability.

When in doubt, it can’t hurt to err on the side of giving more than less credit when credit is due.

The Bottom Line

Clearly, there’s a lot more to quality citing and sourcing than may meet the casual eye. As discussed in Part I, perhaps the easiest way to establish robust practices for your communications is to turn to a seasoned writer/editor for support. Even so, it can be helpful to be familiar with the process, so you know what to seek in your communication service provider. I hope this paper provides a convenient snapshot of all the fun that we communicators have in a typical day.

Comments are closed.