Relocate

Question

Can someone please help me decide this argument....

My friend put on her CV that she travelled to Switzerland for a week or two to do a job. it said:

"When one of the people I worked closely with moved to a new position in Switzerland it became difficult to get work done quickly communicating only by e-mail and telephone so I went over there for a week to get as much done as possible and to plan what else needed to be done upon my return to Bristol"

I didn't like the sentence so I suggested she change it to:

"When one of my co-workers with whom I worked closely with moved to a new position in Switzerland, it became difficult to get work done quickly communicating only by e-mail and telephone. I therefore relocated to Switzerland for a week to get as much done as possible and to plan what else needed to be done upon my return to Bristol. "

However, all my housemates laughed at me for using the word relocate, because they thought it implied that she would stay out there for a long period of time.
My argument is that because usual social factors involving relocation usually are permanent doesn't mean that it is a permanent. Infact it has no relevance to time at all??

I looked it up
Relocate:

Move
change place
Put somewhere else
remain (Antonym)
Definition: to move to another country
Example: She relocated to another country
Hence: she moved to another county for a week

Therefore relocate is a sound sentence to use, no?

Mister Micawber · Accepted Answer

I certainly wouldn't laugh at you, but 'relocate' suggests a much longer move than a week, in common parlance. I think you have a tendency to overdo the vocabulary, as some of the other changes you made were not so good stylistically either:

ORIGINAL:

"When one of the people I worked closely with moved to a new position in Switzerland it became difficult to get work done quickly communicating only by e-mail and telephone so I went over there for a week to get as much done as possible and to plan what else needed to be done upon my return to Bristol"

YOUR REVISION:

"When one of my co-workers with whom I worked closely with moved to a new position in Switzerland, it became difficult to get work done quickly communicating only by e-mail and telephone. I therefore relocated to Switzerland for a week to get as much done as possible and to plan what else needed to be done upon my return to Bristol. "

MY REVISION:

"When one of my co-workers [HAVING CHANGED TO 'CO-WORKERS' YOU NO LONGER NEED THE ADJECTIVE CLAUSE] moved to a new position in Switzerland, it became difficult to get work done quickly ['EMAIL', 'TELEPHONE' ARE COMMUNICATION DEVICES SO YOU DO NOT NEED THE PARTICIPLE] only by e-mail and telephone; [NO NEED TO CHANGE THE 'SO', JUST ADD A SEMICOLON] so I went [THE PROBLEM WITH 'RELOCATED' HAS BEEN MENTIONED ABOVE] to Switzerland for a week to get as much done as possible and to plan what else needed to be done upon my return to Bristol. "

So it would look like this:

"When one of my co-workers moved to a new position in Switzerland, it became difficult to get work done quickly only by e-mail and telephone; so I went to Switzerland for a week to get as much done as possible and to plan what else needed to be done upon my return to Bristol."

In general, good revision consists of paring out unnecessary words rather than adding more.

Guest · Answer

This still all sounds rather muddled to me and really 'too much detail'. In England, at least, the advice is to keep CV's as concise as possible. Why would a prospective employer care about you co-worker had a new position, the fact that your company uses e-mails and telephones, or that you were in Bristol? If you put in too much waffle they CV ends up in the bin, employers may have to go through hundreds of these things, so cut to the chase.

I would say

I spent a week (working on strategic planning?) (liaising with colleagues?) at my company's base/headquarters/office in Switzerland.

Relocate

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