Business Communication for Success Chapter 6
6.0.1
What are the most important
aspects of business writing?
6.1.1
How do you develop and
organize content in patterns
that are appropriate for your
document and audience?
6.1.2
In written assignments how do
you order, outline, and
emphasizes one or more main
points?
6.1.3
In written assignments how do
you compose logically
organized paragraphs,
sentence, and transitions.
6.2.1
What types of writing increase
understanding, retention, and
motivate action?
Knowing your place in the context of the business and how your
place relates to the business as a whole. Considering your words
carefully because “your words will represent you and your
organization when you are not there to clarify, defend, or
correct them.” Your goal should be to reduce
misunderstandings with the words that you choose in your
writing.
To develop appropriate content for your audience you need to
keep in mind the who, what, when, where, how, and why of
each document. By keeping these ideas in mind you will be able
to organize your documents in a way that does not lead to
misunderstandings, and if you leave any of these elements out
they will be easily fixable. Another way to organize your writing
is to follow the classical appeals of ethos, logos and pathos .
An outline is a framework which organizes your document into
main ideas and subordinate ideas. Within a business document
you will have a topic sentence, body sentences and a conclusion
sentence similar to a five paragraph essay.
There are many ways to construct logically order paragraphs the
most common being Time, comparison, contrast, and cause and
effect. By ordering your document in any of these ways you are
letting your reader what will happen next. In the text it reminds
us to “remember your audience and avoid long drawn -out
paragraphs that may lose your reader’s attention” (McClean
112). There are four different types of sentences, declarative,
imperative, interrogative and exclamatory. In business writing it
is important to be very specific in order to avoid
misunderstandings. Transitions are often described as bridges
between ideas or thoughts. It is the way you create the
relationships between each of your main points.
In the business industry today documents are often written in
what is known as “Plain English” in this type of writing the
writer is active, cleat, and concise. Being aware of how to use
emphasis to it maximum power, “the information at the end of
the sentence is what people often recall, and is therefore
normally considered the location of the maximum emphasis.”
Most readers understand more when a writer uses active voice
because the subject carries out the action.
6.3.1
How do you form a clear
argument with appropriate
support to persuade your
audience?
Jonathon Swift says, “Argument is the worst sort of
conversation.” In an argument you want to support your claims
with logical points, and support these points with appropriate
evidence. You want your audience to perceive you as honest
and trustworthy and they will be more willing to be open to
your argument. You also need to make sure your evidence has
three traits, that it is supportive, relevant and effective.
6.3.2
Fallacies while a well-known rhetorical trick to deceive your
What are inherent weaknesses audience, they can actually detract from your effectiveness,
in fallacies?
because these tricks can be used against you.
6.4.1
What is the difference
between summarizing or
paraphrasing and plagiarism?
Paraphrasing is to rewrite information in your own words, while
summarizing is to reduce a concept, idea, or data set to its most
basic point or elements.
6.4.2
How do you give proper
citation to sources that are
quoted verbatim and sources
whose ideas are paraphrased
or summarized?
6.4.3
In a writing assignment what
would paraphrasing look like?
When quoting a piece of writing or data verbatim one must use
APA, MLA or CMS citations. In class we use MLA citation when
quoting works verbatim. When paraphrasing or possibly
summarizing one might list the source such as “a Wall Street
Journal article dated July 8, 2009.”
There are some rules to follow when paraphrasing a passage,
read the passage out loud, explain the concept out loud to a
friend, write the passage in your own words, use a visual to
explain or show the passage, re-read the original passage and
compare it to yours, remember you are trying to translate the
passage, when your expression can stand on its own include it
in your document.