What Is The Challenge Of The Reading Discussion

Improved Essays
Reflection 1

Soloman Jones

What is the challenge of the reading discussed? The reading presents challenges related to how work communication differs from other communication, ensuring communication is written for the correct audience and watching how you format communication for text, email, and other digital mediums.
What is the opportunity of the reading discussed? I found that the reading framed up how technical communication can be done efficiently and effectively highlighting how tone in writings and the layout/format really impact how the readers consume the material.
What did I learn?
• Planning – Prior to the reading I thought I did a good job of planning and striving to convey a concise message in my workplace communications. One aspect of planning that stood out in the reading was the process of doing a dump of the message that you need to convey then revise and editing it to tailor it based on audience and meaning.
• Quality versus quantity – I confess that some of my emails tend to be longer than needed. I learned in the text that people really don’t want to read what I write just as much as I look at an inbox and don’t want to comb through emails. This is an immediate change I will make in my communications. I will strive for clear concise communication. This point is further proven in the example of the homeowner’s subdivision letter. When I read the review version of this letter it made me want to contribute to the fund in contrast to the first draft which made me now even want to read it. • Formatting, formatting, formatting – In the cases presented in the text I seen the power of proper formatting in written communication. I learned this technique not only makes technical communication tolerable it also gives readers the option to skim. This concept is key for me because I often skim read. A simple change in adding bolded titles with simple straight forward sentences worked wonders in the examples in the book • Preparing based on audience – I have a good understanding of this concept having spoken in front of audience and fine tuning my message for the audience however the text showed how that concept can translate in written communication. I plan to use one the examples, particularly, the example on seeking feedback like the “survey” example. • Email and text messages – The concept of writing with a professional purpose based on position was new to me. I have been mentored on how to prepare emails and presentation for executives in leadership roles. I never really paid too much attention to my professional tone and role base on how my peers and subordinates view me. I disagree with a portion of this concept, as I think those who are working with me should be viewed as team members and at times
…show more content…
As an example, the format of emails for corporate communications which at times try to convey important messages don’t give users the ability to skim the message to get key details. They are often written in the form of three to four paragraphs sharing the data. One area of improvement would be to use bolded titles and at times bulleted lists to communicate information. In my workplace we have a corporate communications team and I plan to make a suggestion based on the examples I have seen in the text. I plan to use templates in the text to enhance my communication with the team I

Related Documents

  • Improved Essays

    The central message of writing should be found within the first three or four sentences of the email, and the writings should not be more than half size of the business document. The most important information should be found at the beginning of the document, to allow the recipient to gather as much…

    • 695 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    Com/295 Week 3 Assignment

    • 1816 Words
    • 8 Pages

    It has reformed the world of traditional lengthy and respectful communication to the increased usage of abbreviations and low mannerisms, because of its limited character usage. It does support making a point early on, and expressing ideas without the rubbish that people add for formality, but it also destroys the essence of communication. For instance, “to be honest” can be expressed as “tbh”, “never mind” can be expressed as “nvm”, and etc. Although it has its upsides and downsides, it is the only way to break through the communication barrier between high profile individuals and working-class citizens. .…

    • 1816 Words
    • 8 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Great Essays

    Chapter 8, Writing E-mail, Memos, and Letters. Business…

    • 1308 Words
    • 6 Pages
    Great Essays
  • Great Essays

    The academic system of current society attempts to prepare students for working in the real world. The majority of students are encouraged to pursue studies in areas such as business and technology because it will ensure a high paying job and promote economic growth. Lately, students have begun to question whether studying the humanities are worth the tuition costs, and if a technical or science based major is a better option. Martha Nussbaum, in her essay “ Education for Profit, Education for Democracy”, brings attention to how “the current focus on education as a form of career training fails to teach students the skills necessary to participate in the political process” (61). Liberal arts schools aim to strengthen a student’s range of knowledge through the studies of arts and humanities.…

    • 1546 Words
    • 7 Pages
    Great Essays
  • Decent Essays

    Lynda Mcdanil

    • 407 Words
    • 2 Pages

    Summary: In the article “What’s in it for me?” by Lynda McDaniel discusses how keep the reader’s attention when you write. Lynda McDaniel talks about how we have the tendency of writing without thinking about having readers’. McDaniel also talks about five tips that will help anyone keep their reader’s attention and communicate your message.…

    • 407 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Decent Essays
  • Decent Essays

    I am proposing to carry out a study of the email communication across the squadron. I want to study how everyone from the lowest ranking airman to the commander sent out emails to the squadron. I want to study the format and the intention of the emails. Then interview a few of the airmen and senior leadership to find out what they understood from selected emails. I am proposing this study to see the email communication to help with a solution to the misunderstandings across the squadron.…

    • 649 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Decent Essays
  • Improved Essays

    Aristotle discussed three major forms of rhetorical proof, these three forms are ethos, logos, and pathos. There are nine ways referenced in the textbook for how these rhetorical proofs can be expressed. I am going to focus on five. First, I would like to discuss tone.…

    • 705 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Great Essays

    Subway And Hortons

    • 1447 Words
    • 6 Pages

    Through this assignment, I will address different research methods to solve the miscommunication problem at my workplace. This report will focus how effectively both the primary and the secondary methods of research will be used to get rid of this issue. Primary Research As a part of my primary research, I will interview the individuals at the management level and the staff members. I will also observe the working environment i.e. the organizational culture of the company which will assist me in understanding the relationship between the two groups.…

    • 1447 Words
    • 6 Pages
    Great Essays
  • Improved Essays

    This proved that the mistakes I made were affecting how my audience reads my writing and I realized I needed to make changes. Although sometimes I wouldn’t change everything that was suggested, I would still take all the feedback I received in consideration when…

    • 1028 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    For the first major assignment for Professor Julia Green’s Communication 211 for Spring 2016, I partnered with classmates Lori Rainey and Sarah Beattie to “analyze how the different forms of communication yield different results when it comes to communicating” (Green, Week 4 - Major Assignment 1: Blog). By going through the exercises, I have reconfirmed that the form of online communication best suited to me is email versus social media such as Facebook, or texting. Unlike some people, I find texts are more difficult to respond to for many reasons, including the limitation of the touch-screen keypads, as well as the synchronicity of the communication, depending on the user’s attention to their phone. As an example, I routinely forget my cell…

    • 1190 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    Course Outcome: 1. Analyze the audience, purpose, and context of technical communication projects, including cultural and ethical considerations Throughout the course of the semester, the course objectives were reached and produced an increase in my ability to write valuable technical communication documents. The major projects that contributed to the achievement reached within each objective were the job application, memo proposal, instruction sets, formal proposal, and presentations. The audience, purpose, and context of technical communication projects were evaluated through cultural and ethical considerations.…

    • 1496 Words
    • 6 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Decent Essays

    Would I be able to do it? That’s the first thing that came to my mind when I was looking into all the English levels I had to take for my Associates certificate. The reason for my reaction is because my first language is was so the reader can have a better view point of what I’m talking about, instead of waiting until the end of the essay to see the picture. Spanish. So far I can say I had learn so much in all my English classes, but this one has taught me many different ways on how to improve my writing like from summarizing, to comparing and contrasting to write a good essay.…

    • 392 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Decent Essays
  • Decent Essays

    To: P. Gregory Gibson, Assistant Professor of English From: Rebecca L Johnston RLJ Subject: Project 5 Self-Evaluation Date: 6 May 2017 The purpose of this memo is a detailed overview, reflection, question/answer response and self-evolution conclusion of things I learned in Technical Writing class. Overview: I feel the purpose of technical writing focuses on the specific details of writing resumes, technical instructions, memos and accurate reports. This includes how to format and layout these documents.…

    • 576 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Decent Essays
  • Improved Essays

    Wolfgang Iser’s essay The Reading Process: A Phenomenological Approach, delineates the author-reader relationship in completion of a literary work, where the author plays the ‘artistic’ role, which is that of the creator of the text, and the reader plays the ‘aesthetic’ role, which, he mentions is the process of the ‘realization’ of the text . (Iser 279) He refers to Roman Ingarden’s “Intentionale Satzkorrelate” (Intentional sentence correlatives), where the interaction of the otherwise incoherent sentences forms a coherent whole of a piece of art work. This, along with the role of the reader to form the ‘gestalt’ of the literary text can be co-opted to closely frisk the writing technique of Virgnia Woolf’s Mrs Dalloway, where she employs…

    • 808 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Great Essays

    The Saint Mary’s seminar classes are so unlike traditional teacher-centered learning. The Western Tradition II focuses on three learning goals; shared inquiry, critical thinking, and written and oral communication. These three learning goals really help students explore the Western Tradition by examine the themes written by the authors we discussed. De Las Casas, Rene Descartes, and Voltaire really influenced the way I thought about how our culture started and the major flaws we stay face today within our society. If everyone read and discussed the themes that these authors purposefully wrote in their text maybe people would have realized the underlying issues that have been around for forever have solutions.…

    • 1371 Words
    • 6 Pages
    Great Essays