Having been a court reporter in San Diego since 1981, I have seen changes in writing styles by court reporters who want to “save time” or write fewer strokes.  One of the habits I have seen lately is court reporters leaving out punctuation.  I assume the goal is to be able to write testimony faster if you don’t write in the punctuation.  Leaving out commas, semicolons, and paragraphs is a dangerous habit to get into, because sooner or later a court reporter will need to pass a speed test, certification test, or write realtime.

One trick I use is to global punctuation into phrases.  If you global , in fact, (including the commas) and hit the phrase in one stroke, voila, you are saving three strokes.  FAICT can be the brief.  A court reporter can do the same thing with (no space); is that correct or (no space); is that right?   

One of the brilliant tricks is to write a brief for dashes A. Yes. Q. dashes.  For instance,

Q.  Were you at the house when –

A.   Yes. 

Q.  – the people came in?

I have a client that constantly says:  Strike that.  Let me start over again.  I write SLAIG.  (And that includes a new paragraph in the brief.)

I used to write everything out.  I was wasting energy and time.  I never left out punctuation, but I would get exhausted after writing 250+ pages (more exhausted than I do now anyway). 

My advice to all court reporters, keep working on saving strokes and writing cleaner.  You will have a much better life.

@rosaliekramm  Twitter

I just attended the STAR (Society for the Technological Advancement of Reporting) conference  in Savannah.  Many highly respected and important court reporting firm owners were there from all over the USA and Canada.  What I heard over and over again was, “I need another court reporter, not a regular court reporter, but a realtimer that can get out quick rough drafts and expedites.”   The firm owners were describing talented, clean writers that could hook up realtime.

When I hear from a reporter trying to find work, I look at their resume, how long they have been in the field and what version of their CAT software they are on.  I find out what model of machine they are writing on.  I ask the reporter to send me their raw transcript before any editing so I can see if they write clean.  I find out if they have taken the CCRR or CRR and/or if they’ve passed any speed tests or gotten advanced certifications. 

Some people are trying to make court reporters out to be another commodity implying, “All court reporters are the same.  Let’s make a deal at these low rates, and whatever court reporter we send you, or machine we set you up with, will be good enough.”

As my mentor Tony Hsieh says, “Good enough is not great.”  The survival of our profession depends on great court reporters.  I would hope no one strives to be “good enough.”  Being good enough is not going to cut it in the future.  We have to be great.

@rosaliekramm (Twitter)