To think that 'Word' should realise that 'staff' can be plural as well as singular.

[MammaTJisWearingGold]

I am doing some coursework, in between MNin, and am doing my 'Placement Practise'. I have to write about policies and procedures at work. Every time I put something like 'All the staff have been through enhanced CRB before starting employment' it tries to correct me and tell me it should be 'All the staff has' or 'All the staffs have'. I have had to write about things the staff have to do a lot and that green wiggly line is beginning to get on my nerves!

[SilverBellsandCockleShells]

It's right though, technically speaking!

[complexnumber]

Do a spell/grammar check, the first time it flags it for whatever reason, just click 'ignore all' or something similar.

[ceeveebee]

I think staff is a collective noun so should always be treated as singular? Like management?

[ProudNeathGirl]

Staff is always singluar. It's a collective noun. Like "the herd of cows is" (not "are").

[MammaTJisWearingGold]

So should I be putting things like 'The staff is required to check the folder at the begginning of every shift'?

[SilverBellsandCockleShells]

Yes. Or 'employees are'

[DizzyKipper]

Or 'The staff member is' (which just feels a more comfortable way of saying it)

[HolofernesesHead]

'All members of staff are...' is grammatically correct, and sounds more natural than 'The staff is...' IMO.

[IloveJudgeJudy]

I think that staff is a word like police or government which can be either singular or plural in common usage. I don't think you're wrong Mamma, and I'm usually pretty hot on grammar. Things change, especially in English, through common usage.

You can put the staff are, it's not wrong. Only a real pedant would read your essay and think that.

[ProudNeathGirl]

SilverBells and Holoferneses have got it right.

[MammaTJisWearingGold]

I have changed a couple to some of your suggestions and it likes them!! Thank you.

[FairPhyllis]

It may be because the grammar check in Word was originally written for US English - in US English, you can't have plural verb agreement with nouns that are semantically plural but morphologically singular. E.g. you can't say "My family are coming to stay." It has to be "My family is coming to stay". But you can say it in British English. So the Word grammar check has probably not been modified enough in the UK version to deal with subtle dialectal differences between US English and British English. Microsoft should employ better linguists.

[linguist hat]

[MammaTJisWearingGold]

FairPhyllis that makes sense.

[SilverBellsandCockleShells]

Also a linguist FairPhyllis and I don't agree! To say 'the staff are' is grammatically incorrect. It is not something most people would pick on and it is definitely common parlance, but it is incorrect. And it is not a British/US distinction as far as I am aware.

[YokoUhOh]

Phyllis is correct - I know this as I checked with my lexicographer friend from the OED. US English is prescriptive about 'collective noun + 3rd person singular'; UK English is flexible, you can use 'is' or 'are'. Think about band names: Americans would say 'Talking Heads is my favourite band', which sounds ridiculous to our ears.

[YokoUhOh]

Also, sport: 'England is on the attack' is correct in US parlance but sounds clunky in our dialect.

[Ilovedaintynuts]

Totally agree. I write health care Policies and Procedures and I want to punch 'word' on the end of it's nose for not letting me write "the staff are..."
Whether or not it is grammatically correct it doesn't SOUND or LOOK it.

[notnowImreading]

You should also watch out because of the practise/practice issue: you are writing about your 'placement practice'. It's the same rule as advice/advise, which often helps people remember because of the sound change. 'Practise' is a verb, e.g. I practise/to practise; practice is a noun, e.g. the practice/my practice.

[Bilbobagginstummy]

Yanbu.

However, YABU to use Word's grammar check, which is rubbish and inflexible and cannot cope with anything even moderately complex. Turn it off for ever.

[MammaTJisWearingGold]

Ilovedaintynuts if it had a face I would punch it!!

notnow the title of the assignment is 'Placement Practise'. I checked and double checked before typing that.

Bilbo sometimes it is useful. I certainly need the spell check, though I teach it words all the time. A large part of this course is biology and it does not know medical words.

[notnowImreading]

That's bonkers - they've got that wrong.

[YokoUhOh]

It should be 'Placement Practice', 'practice' being a noun, not a verb. Whoever wrote the title in the specification has got it wrong!

[Bilbobagginstummy]

Yes, spellcheck can be useful. But grammar - no. It's just wrong too much.

[FairPhyllis]

Silverbells It is a real dialect distinction: I am British living in the US and have tested it out on my (US) undergraduates and they all judge it ('the staff are ... ') ungrammatical for US English. It might be used in some US dialects, but it is not judged 'Standard' US English (whatever that is, of course ... ).

I guess it depends how prescriptive your view of 'grammatical' is. It might not be correct according to e.g. a style guide, depending on which one you use, but it's a real feature of British English, and so is grammatical in that dialect, even if use of it may vary in context or even between different words.

I don't think it's a marked enough feature that you can't use it in formal writing - if it was something like the 'needs washed' construction I might say change it but this seems OK to me.