Instructor Blog #1: Welcome to Professional Writing
Submitted by tghering on Sun, 06/08/2008 - 09:52.
in
Welcome to English 420Y. This is a writing intensive course designed to introduce students from various fields to the principles of professional writing. Professional writing will be defined as the writing used to maintain and support institutions, including businesses, governments, non-profits, and the university itself. The course and its principles are grounded in rhetorical theory that students will be introduced to throughout the semester.
Rhetoric, briefly defined, is the use of symbols to produce an effect; in professional writing specifically it is the use of audience and context awareness, concise and clear writing, persuasive images and graphics, and well-designed documents to facilitate cooperation between people within and beyond specific institutions. Though rhetoric has acquired negative connotations within political circles and contemporary media, it has a rich history as one of the oldest intellectual pursuits in the western world. Because of the focus on audience, context, ethics and persuasion inherent in every professional document, rhetoric will greatly assist the purpose of this course.
Rhetoric is complex, but these are a few of the key concepts of rhetoric that will inform the class:
- Audience: Every text is produced for a specific audience. Therefore, knowing that audience is crucial for producing a successful text. As you produce texts for the course, think about the audience who will be reading them. What do they need to know? How do they feel about the subject under discussion? What expectations or biases do they bring to the document? What will they need to be persuaded about? What do they value? What vocabulary do they use? Knowing all of this is crucial to producing a successful document. This course defines three kinds of audiences: Primary readers to whom your document is addressed; Secondary readers who advise primary readers; and Tertiary readers who may have an interest in your document, such as a supervisor or a legal team. Most professional writing documents have all three types of audiences.
- Context: Every document is produced within a specific context that affects it. For instance, producing a resume as a college grad for an employer who doesn't know you is different than producing a resume as a senior level employee for a hiring committee who knows you well. Understanding how context affects a document and how the document can reflect that effect is critical. In the textbook, and in this class at large, context is often called "rhetorical situation."
- Ethos: Ethos is the credibility the writer or writers have in a document. Incorrect spelling on a resume helps construct an ineffective ethos in a professional document. Great design, conversely, helps construct an effective ethos. Ethos is also the persona created by an institution and conveyed through its writing.
- Kairos: The Greeks had two conceptions of time: chronos, which represented linear time, and kairos, which represented quality of time. Having good kairos means capitalizing on the right time to do the right action. The classic scenario of bad kairos is getting insulted and thinking of a great comeback hours later, like George Costanza. Great kairos is delivering the comeback then and there. Like comedy, professional and technical documentation often rely heavily on karios.
Much of this class will focus on how to communicate with distant audiences. The online nature of the course is therefore ideal for professional writing. Just like professional writers, this class will require the presentation of complex material and the coordination of complex projects using only writing and images. This experience will hopefully help equip you for the workforce, and therefore professionalization should be a major component of the course. Because I want you to thrive in a job environment that demands quick and excellent writing, I expect everything written in this course to be treated as though it were for a professional environment, and I will grade accordingly. This is a high standard, but it is designed to make you marketable and effective in your career.
This course also emphasizes that writing is a crucial aspect of business that tends to get overlooked. People often downplay the role of business texts, believing that they don't serve all that much of a function or that it is just corporate nonsense that makes work more complicated. While there is some terrible business prose out there, writing is crucial to any organization. In fact, modern corporations and organizations (including Purdue) could not exist without writing. Imagine trying to run a business without writing a word (including the laws, contracts, and inventories that writing comprises). It simply couldn't be done.
Those heavily involved in corporations usually know how important writing is. Some case studies show that engineers and other professionals spend up to 60% of their time on the job writing—and that the higher they climb in the ranks, the more writing they do. Corporate CEOs are often English majors because they can express themselves and communicate well.
Because of the importance of writing to corporate America, recruiters and business schools are now placing more emphasis on writing. Career Journal reports:
More M.B.A.s who can compose a cohesive memo or letter would make investment banker Darren Whissen of Ladera Ranch, Calif., happy. "I have found that many seemingly qualified candidates are unable to write even the simplest of arguments,' says Mr. Whissen, who is director of research at Waveland LLC. "No matter how strong one's financial model is, if one cannot write a logical, compelling story, then investors are going to look elsewhere. And in my business, that means death."The Seattle Times reports:
Business students at Miami University's Farmer School of Business in Ohio work on rhetoric and are reminded to tailor their writing style to the purpose. They are told that conciseness and understanding one's audience are more important than ever. "People have been complaining about the quality of student writing since Plato," said Kate Ronald, an English professor who runs the school's Howe Writing Initiative. "But I think businesses are paying more attention to it. Businesses today are doing so much more writing, and doing it so much more publicly—because so much of the discourse is discussed on the screen rather than on paper."Despite these accounts, it seems that many students in non-liberal arts majors still feel that writing skills aren't relevant to their work. However, the ability to express yourself clearly and communicate well is always an asset, and usually one that gets noticed. Therefore, one of the goals of this course is to prepare you for writing on the job—specifically persuading audiences to participate effectively in the operations of an institution, whether it is customers purchasing products or engineers building them. Professional and technical writing needs to be clear, concise, and informative. It needs to consider and satisfy every potential audience.
Because good professional writing is always appropriate to the document's audience and context, rhetoric influences every professional document. Every document, even something as straightforward as instruction manuals, also has a persuasive purpose. Science scholar Bruno Latour writes: "An engineer has to stimulate interest: that’s the long and short of it. And [(s)he] also has to convince; that’s the Law and the Gospel.” Every document in this class has a persuasive function as well. Reading Responses are partly designed to persuade us that you have read and understood the materials. Work blogs and activity reports inform us about what you have done AND persuade us that you and your group are working hard. Documents on the job also must be persuasive to their audiences—to supervisors, engineers, investors, lawyers, clients, customers. When they are not, businesses flounder.
Good professional writing also needs to quickly conform to high standards. It needs to be great, and it needs to be fast. It needs to get the big rhetorical moves right and pay close attention to details. It needs to provide a professional ethos for the author and the company. Writing not up to professional standards can cause a business legal and financial trouble, and can cost people jobs. Therefore, I want to emphasize effective work habits this semester so that you get comfortable writing professional level prose at a quick rate. It will be hard work now, but I hope you'll be grateful later.
Welcome to Professional Writing Online. I hope the course is enjoyable now and useful in your professional lives.
- tghering's blog
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Ross Allen Reply to Instructor Blog #1
Being able to effectively communicate, especially through writing, is a skill that one must have to succeed in the business world. Being in a non-liberal art major, writing is not emphasized nearly as much as it should be. The focus is set more on the non-written communications that will be done. I feel that writing skills are very relevant to my field of construction management, especially since a majority of my time will be spent communicating through e-mail to many different people. In construction, time is everything, and being able to communicate clearly, concisely, and in the shortest way possible is crucial to succeeding in the corporation. During the past few summers as an intern, it is easy to see how important good professional writing skills are. I have noticed that those who hold the upper management positions possess very good business writing skills. Those employees that are not as strong in their writing skills usually don't succeed as quickly or sometimes even lose their jobs.
Reply to Instructor Blog #1
In order to be a successful writer in the business world, one must understand the principles of rhetoric. A few of these principles are audience, context, ethos, and kairos. I believe that most of the time people, including myself, write without even thinking about these principles. If people were to spend more time focusing on these principles, their professional writing would be much better. I also agree that many times the importance of business text is "downplayed." I work at a very large corporation and constantly find that emails and reports do not seem as though they were written by a professional. When this occurs it causes one to lose their credibility, which once again refers back to the principles of rhetoric (ethos) that are extremely important to business writing. Surprisingly, I find the statistic that professionals spend 60% of their time writing relatively low because I feel that the much more of my time in the workplace is spent writing emails, reports, thoughts, and many other items. My thought is that writing is the key to success in the business world because much of the workplace is based on this form of communication.
Andrew Burkhardt's response
In our world of ever-changing technology, it has become crucial for us to learn not only how to write, but also for us to remember simple rules for writing as well, such as grammar and spelling. All too often with our instant messaging and text messages we get lazy. This invariably impacts our professional writing, and since it was stated that professionals spend 60% of their time writing, we must be aware of our rhetoric while we are writing. I have seen very often in the agricultural industry many professionals who lack the appropriate writing skills to convey their message. With several corporate documents being easily accessible by the public by internet, it is imperative that we express our intent with the greatest clarity.
Response to Instructor Blog #1
Every job in today’s society has to do with writing skills. Ever since the computer was invented, professional writing skills in the business world started being overlooked dramatically. We don’t even have to know exactly how to spell, or the correct grammar, the computer will fix it. People need to be able to communicate well with others, and in a professional way. The writers need to know who their audience is. This is crucial for knowing exactly how detailed they need to be with what they are talking about. If a CEO has horrible writing skills, their company will be looked down upon because of the nonprofessional writing skills.
Jimmy Gaffney's Response to Instructor Blog 1
What's the point of going through school to get a degree in something, liberal arts or not, if you cannot effectively explain your thoughts and work through writing? One could be the smartest scientist in the world, but if they cannot write their thesis or their research project in a clear manner, then no one is going to understand their work and thus their effort becomes wasted. As a student in the sciences, it is rarely stated that we have to be able to work out side of a lab. What if any famous scientist was unable to communicate through writing with other people? How many important discoveries would go unnoticed? Where would the world be? I agree that writing is very often overlooked and many people do not realize that it is a necessary tool of any trade.
Blog #1
I enjoy a variety of online games that incorporate the realm of chatting with other players, and time and time again, I have seen how a not-so-carefully-though-out comment can very easily offend another person. Unfortunately, because all of "business compositions" are written, it is incredibly crucial that the writer be very explicit in what the point is they are trying to get across, as well as say exactly what they mean to say with the right attitude so as not to cause other readers to speculate on the intent of what was written. Because these compositions are textual in nature, the writer has very little room for error, and thus must/should think very carefully how they wish to word whatever the document is, because they will not have the benefit of vocal inflection or emphasis or other vocal sounds to signify the nature of their comment, whether it be serious, sarcastic, or otherwise. Working in the Operations department of an airport, I can see very clearly how some emails or notes or memos should be worded to avoid such confusion. Not only can the meaning be misconstrued due to poor wording, but punctuation can also play a major role in a formal composition, as I have seen it affect the meanings of peoples' comments numerous times.
Professional writing should include only what the writer means to say and should be said exactly the way they would speak it aloud to the reader. If sarcasm or another mood is intended, then the writer should take care to hint as such, whether by an emoticon or by an "expression", I.E., "The report isn't going to write itself."
Reply to Instructor Blog #1
Writing effectively is a skill necessary to succeed in business today. I thought the blog made several good points about the importance of writing skills. I particularly liked the comment made about non-liberal arts majors thinking that writing is pointless, but that many CEO’s are often English majors. It proves that good writing skills are not useless but in fact highly needed and respected. I do believe that climbing the corporate ladder and achieving professional degrees require a vast knowledge of writing skills. Take a lawyer for example. They spend the majority of their time reading and writing legal documents, and if they could not write effectively they would not be taken seriously and maybe lose their job. I think the point on Kairos was well made and it can be paralleled in the legal field as well. A lawyer needs to have the right action at the right time in court cases because a comment thought of hours later will be ineffective when the case is over and the verdict is final. Finally I think having the proper target audience is critical. The content of the text would differ greatly if you were writing to your grandmother or the President, therefore knowing your audience is an important factor in determining the success or failure of a document.
Reply to Blog #1
I believe writing is a crucial part of the corporate world that is generally overlooked. If one cannot clearly express and communicate thoughts, opinions and demands to others when writing letters, email, and memos then very little is going to get accomplished. Being able to understand and persuade your audience is extremely important when creating successful writing. As society is becoming more and more technologically based, email is becoming one of the main forms of communication. Paying attention to the simplest details, such as proper grammar and punctuation is essential for one to be able to convey ideas and emotions and to properly get a point across.
Bethony Vernaglia
Jacob Henderson response
The way we use our words is one of the best ways to make a first impression in business, although, many do not realize this and therefore are not prepared for the business world. Many college students use the limited writing skills that they learned in high school to get them through college, but these skills do not cut it in the real world. Students graduating college, no matter what field they are going into, need to have a good understanding of how to write to a certain audience and use correct context. I will use myself as an example. One of my goals is to start my own CPA firm. To do this I will need my own building and supplies to run the business. I will have to write a business plan to a bank in order to get the loan I need to pay for the material things to start a business. If I write my business plan like a children's book (like I might have done in high school) I probably will not get the loan. Writing is an important part of business today and understanding how to write can make all the difference in the future.
Morgan McDonald's response to blog #1
It is true that professional writing is an essential element in all industries, not just those careers with a liberal arts background. While studying the fashion industry, my professors are constantly discussing how globalization is affecting the skills required from a company’s associates. The associates are not only expected to communicate to people within their office, they are also expected to converse with people all over the world. With that being said, one must be able to effectively communicate mostly via e-mail. This task can get difficult due to language barriers and common slang, which is exactly why one should be aware of his or her audience and always remain professional when composing business e-mails. For example, I interned in the visual department of a fashion company in its New York City office. We received all of our instructions through e-mail from our corporate office in Germany. On one particular occasion, the instructions weren’t communicated thoroughly enough for us to understand completely. For this reason, we had to re-do three entire windows we had just installed on the previous day. This mishap could have been easily avoided if the visual managers in Germany would have taken their audience into account and been precise with the professional writing of their instructions.
Jon Markee's response to Instructor Blog #1
I have to say that I agree with your post wholeheartedly! I’m glad to see the key concepts of rhetoric listed so clearly. These are aspects of my writing that I have subconsciously worked to harmonize with since grade school. However, I never comprehended the exact concepts until now. To see them listed so bluntly helps me realize all the key things I need to focus on in the future. I feel that many business people do not realize these concepts and are not able to master accordance with them. This could be why their writing is lacking and their organizations suffer. I liked Geoff Aschberger’s point about being careful with online comments. The same is true for corporate written communication. Sometimes things that are understood through face-to-face conversation are misunderstood through emails and memos. This can lead to endless amounts of unnecessary drama that could have been avoided if someone would have put more effort into their writing. People underestimate the power of writing to communicate effectively. Honestly, it’s sad to see organizations struggle because their writing is not effective communication.
Response to WebBlog #1
As I enter my second demanding summer internship, I truly understand how effective business writing can be. Certain tasks may call for personal writings and without proper attention to detail in such writings, it may alter the message that goes out to one's coworkers. Such tasks may include memos, reports, and simple letters. By having an indepth understanding of high quality business writing, one will effectively illustrate concepts, ideas, and opinions through their own words.
Elizabeth Bruinsma's Response to Instructor Blog #1
I believe that this blog is important for all students to read, whether one is a liberal arts major or not. As a student who plans on earning a degree in Management, I can clearly see the relevance of professional writing. Often overlooked, writing is one of the most crucial building blocks in achieving success. One mistake in a person’s writing may cause confusion, which could cost a company a lot of money.
One overemphasized topic in my past COM 114 class was making your speech audience-centered. Like making an effective speech, I agree that one’s writing must also be audience-centered in order to achieve success. One might communicate differently to a co-worker who knew of a new business procedure than they would to a person outside the company that they wanted to persuade the new procedure to.
I consider being able to communicate professionally an accomplishment for anyone to achieve. Coming from Michigan Tech University, a primarily engineering school, I definitely see the need for rhetoric. So often companies would complain to the University that the students knew their material well, but were ineffective communicators. This can be a severe problem for a company who has just invented a new technology, yet doesn’t know how to explain it well enough to even make it marketable. More and more, people are beginning to realize the importance of proper ethos.
One example Morgan Mc Donald used was a narrative of her internship at a New York City fashion company. In her narrative, she mentioned how the company would converse with their corporate office in Germany via e-mail. As globalization continues to increase, there will be much higher expectations for people to be able to communicate professionally. Therefore, as Instructor Ghering says, the online nature of this course is ideal for professional writing.
“Kevin’s Response to Instructor’s Blog #1”
Proper business writing in necessary in every business, and it must be done right to have the maximum effect that you want it to. It makes great sense that a lot of C.E.O.’s were English majors. This shows the great importance of being able to express oneself clearly and assure that others understand exactly what you are saying. As an OLS major, I feel that good business writing skills will enable me to more efficiently and effectively mange a team and enhance my communication with other businesses. Additionally, in today’s world one will most likely conduct business with someone they never actually meet face to face and their main source of communication will be through written documents. Overall, the better your writing skills the better chance you will have of being successful in whatever you do.
Response to Instructor Blog #1
I agree that having excellent writing skills are necessary to be successful in the business world. With the fast pace of today’s global market, communication is key. The business man or woman who is best able to express themselves and promote their products will be the most prosperous. Thus creating the need of being proficient in writing a necessity to just compete with other businesses. I must say that before I read this blog I believed that some careers did require a greater amount of writing than others. I was very surprised when it said that engineers spent sixty percent of their time writing. Now I see the importance of exceptional writing skills in any career.
Ashley Rooney Response
Ashley M. Rooney
It's reassuring to hear many CEOs hold degrees in English, perhaps there is still hope for me if I don't get into law school. I find it odd that for the most part English majors such as myself are seen as useless and without practical skills. Seems to me that many business majors are without the skills of basic communication. This summer I worked temporarily in a business setting and found out first-hand how valuable I am. The combination of my writing skills and computer literacy made me the best thing since sliced bread and eventually led to an offer of full-time employment. One thing I did struggle with was the format of business letters which I consistently screwed up. I was struck by the formality and the necessity to have certain margins and spaces. I thought, who cares as long as the document successfully communicates the information i want it to? Hopefully I'll learn the answer to that question by the end of this course, if not, oh well at least I'll know how to write a killer business letter.
Elizabeth Day Instructor Blog 1 Response
I agree with this post (and the many replies that follow) that strong writing skills are important, especially as online communication becomes more and more common. I am very curious to see how all forms of communication will be shaped in the future as written communication becomes increasingly cheap, quick, and popular. Will people soon lack verbal communication skills as email and text messaging become the preferred means of interaction? It was interesting to me to read that “…writing is a crucial aspect of business that tends to get overlooked”. I was honestly a little surprised by this statement. In my experience, the importance of written communication skills has never been neglected. I think this has to do with my major and my past experience as an intern for a non-profit agency. During my internship, I became very aware of the fact that communication can ‘make or break’ relationships with the donors on whom the organization relies to function.
Blair Luscombe for Instructor Blog #1
I agree with what you have to say about writing, in business. I think that writing skills are one of the fundamentals in todays business worlds. You really need to be able to know how to communicate well through your writing, and be able to get your point across in a written document. Especially with how advance our technology has become. We are sending e-mails every day, to get our point across, or even to ask a question. E-mails and the internet aren't only important to the business world but to every part of the world. Having the ability to e-mail someone within the organization, or someone outside of it, or outside of the country, or in a different state, it makes it easier to get a hold of someone quickly. Especially in this day and age everyone is using the internet/e-mails and all of the ever growing technology, every single second of every single day.
email vs. phone
Ashley M. Rooney
Definitely agree a great thing about email is the speed with which info can be sent especially entire documents and presentations. But what about quick things like a date or time change? Phones ring instantly while emails may be left unattended for awhile. I guess audible notices that you have an email eliminate that advantage the phone has. I think email is so seductive for several reasons: people are scared of interaction, it leaves a paper trail (no he said she said), and you usually write down info you get on the phone anyway to remember "Got a paper and pencil ready?"
Sheila Miller Reponse to Instructor Blog #1
I never realized how important writing is in the corporate world until I joined it. As I sit at my computer for eight hours everyday and deal with multiple issues at the same time it's no wonder email is the first choice in communication. Email is not only a fast communication tool but it allows people to share files, pictures, documents, etc. This is especially important for a company or corporation that is located all over the globe. Its funny how people will hardly pick up the phone anymore to contact someone but are certainly ready to shoot off an email. I have experienced that emailing back and forth multiple times over the same issue because someone misunderstands is usually not resolved until one or both parties pick up the phone. At this point, a somewhat face-to-face conversation is needed to sort out the issue. This "final straw" phone call would never have to take place if the writing did its job. A person's writing should clearly state the objective in order to get a task completed in a timely manner. If it does not people run into time taking over as the email string continues to grow until both parties agree and understand. This results in lost time and money which no business can endure and still succeed. I hope to not only improve my own writing but also to comprehend professional writing as a whole for interpretation and context.
Response to Instructor's Blog #1
From my experiences working on various different internships, I have come to realize that effective communication, both verbally and through writings, is an extremely important skill that one must posses to be successful in the business world. I am a technology major, and as we all know most of technology people are introverts and people often associate us as poor communicators. I am grateful that Purdue requires so many credit hours of technical writing and speech classes to graduate with computer technology degree. Through these classes, I've gained better understandings of the rhetoric principles. Every single writing/speech classes have always reminded me of the importance of audience analysis, document contexts, credibility, and timing.
I really feel that writing skills are important in my career in IT because I spend the majority of my time in written communications -- either through emails, office messengers, written reports, or solving open tickets. According to the reading, most professionals spend up to 60% of their time writing. However, in my opinion this number is relatively low since through my experience I could honestly say that I spend about a good 80% of my time writing and communicating with others rather than doing actual computer programming. Because of this, I believe that the success of my career will be determined with my ability to communicate with others since sometimes what's inside my mind and the way I communicate it to others could totally mean different things and may cause future problems. It is also important to do a spell check and proof read the documents because a poorly written document with grammatical errors and misspelled words may harm one's credibility.