Style Guide for the Harvard Business Review

The following style guide will help you understand how to write consistently for the Harvard
Business Review. For any rules not covered, refer to the most recent edition of the Chicago
Manual of Style.
HBR style is informal and reader friendly. We incorporate em dashes freely to set out
additionally interesting facts, and we emphasize fluid syntax rather than rigid sentence
structure.
Here are three examples of our casual writing style:
 Use contractions.
 Begin sentence with a conjunction like “and” or “but” if needed.
 Use approachable, plain language when it’s an option.

Abbreviations and Acronyms

Well known acronyms are not spelled out beforehand.
 STEM
 IP
 R&D
If an acronym is not well known, it needs to be spelled out before an acronym is used.
 Venture Capitalists needs to be spelled out before VCs is used.
You can use the term e.g. in place of “for example” if it helps with readability.
 “e.g.” should be used as written, always lowercased and with periods.
Plural acronyms do not use apostrophes.
 VCs instead of VC’s
Acronyms will be used with or without periods on a case-by-case basis.
 U.S. should be used with periods.
 VCs does not have periods.
United States is spelled out as a noun, but it’s hyphenated as an adjective
 I live in the United States.
 I am a U.S. citizen.
Punctuation
Colons
If what follows a colon is a complete sentence, capitalize the sentence. If not, keep it lowercase.
 A new study explores one way to reduce this aversion: Let people tinker with the
machine’s results.
 For a broad assessment of the executives’ propensity to worry, they turned to third
parties: spouses, families, friends, and close colleagues.

Serial Commas
The serial comma is the last comma in a list that precedes a conjunction like “and” or “nor.”
Always use the serial comma.
 X, Y, and Z

Hyphens
Hyphenate two-word modifiers before a noun, but do not hyphenate them after a noun. This
isn’t necessary with an “ly” adverb.
 A math-driven decision was more likely to be accurate than a human’s prediction.
 The decision was math driven, so it was more accurate.
Use nonhyphenated versions of words instead of their hyphenated counterpart in most cases.
There are some exceptions listed in our preferred terms list. This is true for prefixes as well.
 Postmove instead of post-move
 Nonnative instead of non-native
 Decision making instead of decision-making

Numbers
Dates
Do not use apostrophes when making years plural.
 1990s instead of 1990’s
Years with prefixes are hyphenated
 Mid-1990s
A range of dates is created using “to” instead of a hyphen
 1990 to 2010
Fractions
Fractions are spelled out and hyphenated if necessary
 Roughly Three-quarters
 Compared with just a third of those

Numerals
One through nine are spelled out; ten and above are in numeral form.
 The algorithm’s forecasts were limited to adjustments of two points.
 They examined financial data for more than 200 firms.
When using dollar amounts, million should be spelled out and thousand should not be.
 $7 million
 $5,000

Percentages
Do not spell out percent. Use %.
 37% of new firms are started by at least one immigrant.

Preferred Terms
decision making (n.)
multinational (adj.)
nonnative (adj.)
postmove (adv.)
reorganized (v.)
restructuring (v.)
risk taking (adj.)
social buffering (n.)
start-up (n.)
workspaces (n.)
worldwide (adj.)