Reports and Other Longer Documents

-Reports can be purley informative, persuasive, or argumentative
-Formal reports (multi-part format primarily used to present results, contains an abstract, table of contents, glossary, intro, detailed discussion, set of conclusion and recommendations)
-Informal reports (format is less complex, has introduction, discussion, set of conclusions, tends to be shorter)
-Reports should be approached like any other business or technical document and should be planned out carefully
-Lengthy reports can intimidate readers
-Every audience has a different background that must be taken into account
Internal proposals - changes policies and procedures within an organization
External proposals - aimed at seeking grants or funding, more complex

Audience Analysis: The Problem and a Solution J.C. Mathes and Dwight W. Stevenson
-Writer, a message, and an audience
-Inexperienced reports writers often fail to design their reports effectively, the writer should stop and analyze the audience component
-Reports have value only to the extent that is useful to the organization
-A report is often useful over an extended period of time so the writer must design his report for a dynamic situation
-The reader wants the useful information clear and succinct-most of the time they will not read the whole thing the first time
-The writer finds it easier to concentrate on their own concerns than the needs of the reader
Audience Components and Problems They Pose
-Determine who your audiences are as related to the purpose and content of your report
Audiences - Horizontal, Vertical, and External
-Horizontal audiences exist on each level
-Vertical audiences exist between levels
-External audiences exist when any unit interacts with a separate organization
-Important reports usually have complex audiences, vertical and horizontal, sometimes external
-There are differences between the audience and the writer (training, background, politics, personality)
-The report will have audiences in addition to the person addressed
-The writer should not assume that his audience has technical competence in the field
-Differences between the writer and the audience are magnified when addressing vertical audiences
-Reports directed at vertical audiences have horizontal audience components as well.
External audiences=complex vertical audiences
-Audiences in different divisions of the same company may be "external"audiences

A Method For Systematic Audience Analysis
-The writer does not view from outside the total communication system modeled by the company organization chart
-Each bloc on the organization chart represents one or several human beings with distinctive roles, backgrounds, and personal characteristics
-The outsider's view does not help much to clarify the specific routes of communication
-The conventional concept of report audiences derived from organization charts so a more effective method for audience analysis is needed
Prepare an Egocentric Organization Chart
There are four different degrees of distance

• Audiences in own group (office or project group)
• Audiences in close proximity to your group
• Audiences elsewhere in the organization
• Audiences outside the organization

-Using the egocentric organization chart, the report writer is able to see himself and his potential audiences from a useful perspective

-The writer sees himself as a center from which communication radiates throughout an organization

-Examining the audience with an egocentric organization chart, a report writer can see that audiences have functionally different interests, but also the nature of those functional differences

-The writer can then classify the audiences for each particular report

Characterize the Individual Report Readers

-When you think of your audiences as individuals you consider things such as reader's age, academic degrees, and background in the organization

-Then you can characterize each person identified in the egocentric organization chart

-If you can further identify someone's past professional experiences and roles, you can anticipate their first hand knowledge of your role and tecnical activites

-Differences in age can inhibit communication

-Also note personal concerns that could influence reactions to your report

-The best way to conduct the audience analysis and to store the information it yields is to use an analysis form

Classify Audiences in Terms of How They Will Use Your Report

-Think through the total impacts of your report on the organization

These impacts define your actual communication

• Why was the investigation made?
• What is the significance of the problem it addresses?
• What will it cost?

-These questions must be considered when writing a report

-Classify audiences in terms of how they will use your report

Primary audiences - who make decisions or act on the basis of the information a report contains

secondary audiences - who are affected by the decisions and actions

immediate audiences - who route the report or transmit the information it contains

-The report overall should meet the needs of the primary audiences

-Secondary audiences activities are affected when a primary audience makes a decision

-The immediate audience might be a supervisor or other management person

What to Report Richard W. Dodge

-Technical reports can be a useful tool for management as well as a valuable aid to decision making

-The question on audience has received little attenton in terms of ways to achieve better reports

-When a manager reads a report, he looks for pertinent facts and competent opinions that will aid him in decision making

-Summaries should be placed at beginning of report

-The kind of information a manager wants in a report is determined by his management responsibilities

Subject Matter Interest

Manager interested in five broad technological areas:

1. Technical problems
2. New projects and products
3. Experiments and Tests
4. Materials and Processes
5. Field Troubles

Level of Presentation

-Managment readers are interested in the significant material and general concepts, there is little justification for a highly technical and detailed presentation

Management Responsibilities

-An engineering report has to be designed to fill a particular need and to achieve a particular purpose within the specific situation

Four conferences at selected times can help a manager get the report he wants:

1. At the beginning of the project
2. At the completion of the investigation
3. After the report is outlined
4. After the report is written

The Writing of Abstracts Christian K. Arnold

-Most important section of the report

-Creates the first impression of your report

-The abstract must summarize the results and conclusions and give enough background information to make the results understandable

-The abstract is a complete report in itself and must include specific information about the project or study

-Must be short, fluent, and easy to read

Ten Report Writing Pitfalls: How to Avoid Them? Vincent Vinci

1. Ignoring your Audience - answer who, why, and how on your audience, clearly define these answers
2. Writing to Impress - turns off the reader, it can hinder communication, fancy vocabulary is often misused so remember the goal is for your reader to conprehend your thoughts
3. Having more than one aim - it can prevent you from knowing where the report is heading
4. Being Inconsistent - be consistent in terms, numbers, abbreviations, etc. to smooth the path toward understanding and appreciating the content of the report
5. Overqualifying - eliminate excessive modifiers, avoid obscuring facts and ideas
6. Not defining - determine what to define and how to define, consider audience so you know which terms to choose
7. Misintroducing - write intro after the body of the report, intro should state subject, purpose, scope, and plan of the report
8. Dazzling with Data - know what to put in the report and what to leave out, remove what you can without destroying the meaning
9. NOT Highlighting - attention should be called to key elements needed for the understanding of your material
10. NOT rewriting - once you have written first draft, you can analyze and refine the report as a whole and focus on your purpose. Rewrite until you are satisfied with flow and cohesion

Proposal

Executive Summary

The topic and land trusts and conservation easements have grown in popularity in the recent years in the preservation of green space competing with increasing urban sprawl. American Forest Management Inc. is a forestry consulting and real estate brokerage firm. I will be working through them to write a report informing South Carolina landowners of the benefits of land trusts by describing what a land trust is and how they work. This will in turn be of the company’s advantage by hopefully convincing the landowner to sell or donate conservations easements to American Forest Management Inc. Selling a conservation easement means that American Forest Management Inc. will have to rights to manage the timber on that specific property.

Land Trusts and the Landowner

By defining what a land trust is to the landowner in a non-intimidating way using simple language will help prevent them from turning away the idea. Since land trusts may be something a lot of landowners don’t know about they will be inclined to turn it down in the first place. It is important to get a sufficient amount of information across but not introduce a massive amount of small details at this point. This would only confuse the reader in the beginning.

Why Choose Land Trusts?

This section is devoted to most of the convincing of the landowner to why a land trust would be worth their while. It will include the many benefits that landowners will receive from a land trust with financial benefits and land management being the main two. An example or two a “land trust success story” if you will may be included. They will include what the landowner achieved from it and why they are glad they did it.

How they work and how to start one?

The final step is to explain how these land trusts will physically work and the necessary steps to starting one. The steps will include first going through American Forest Management Inc. and getting their ultimate guidance from them on what to do. It will explain what the company will do to assist them and what the landowner needs to do on their own.

Business and Technical Correspondence

Business and technical writing has taken on two different forms: the letter and the memo
-More recently the ever so popular e-mail has made the list
-Although tempting, it is important not to take shortcuts in your writing
-Letters and memos are good for their intended purpose but they are often misused.
Sometimes a structured letter or memo isn't sufficient and you must be original when required
Emails are abused with sloppy writing creating a bad image for the writer.
-Jobs have been loss over cases like these, no matter what form the writing is in it should be approached with equal importance.

Making Your Correspondence Get Results David V. Lewis

-Letters reflect your company’s attitude and shape the personality of the company
-Write about the benefits of the recipient and not the benefits of the company
-A good sales letter should persuade your reader that it is worth their while
-The most powerful letters appeal to basic needs and emotion as well and clear and to-the-point. Basically, it should be written in conversational language.

Mastering Tone
-When writing a “rejection letter,” let the reader down gently, leaving the door open for future business
-Don’t make it a negatively phrased letter pg. 123
-It doesn’t take much to offend your reader when using negative language

How to write the way you talk
-Communicate in plain English using technical terms when absolutely necessary
-Contractions will make your writing sound more conversational and make it appear more natural.

“I Have Some Bad News for You” Allan A. Glatthorn

-Letters containing bad news are among the most difficult to write
There are a couple guidelines to follow:
1) The successful manager is able to empathize with others
2) Bad news is best delivered face to face
-People value honesty and forthrightness

Indirect Bad News Message
-Surround the bad news with positive expressions and appreciation

Direct Message of Bad News
-No non-sense statement that gets right to the point
-Could be used to discourage any more communication from that individual

How To Write Better Memos Harold K. Mintz

-Memos are informal and very versatile
-They can simply inform, set responsibilities and deadlines, or establish a file record of decisions, agreements, and policies.
Organization:
· What are the facts?
· What do they mean?
· What do we do now?

-Memos longer than a page need an introduction preventing the reader from searching the entire memo to find the purpose of the writer
-A good memo is clear, brief, and relevant with clarity being the most important

How to use bottom-line writing in corporate communication
-DO NOT write “wordy” memos and reports
-Be brief!

-The problem in corporate writing is not the length of writing but the lack of efficiency.
Comprehension is the Key
-You will read a memo containing general information differently from one that requires you to make some sort of decision.
-Managers in information industries spend 60% of their time reading and writing.
-A waste of productivity caused by inefficient communication
-Taught people to use a direct organizational pattern and stay away form a circular pattern
-People’s inefficiency in writing is sometimes because of their social upbringing and educational programming
-A young person entering a large company will have a hard time writing in a blunt and direct way to their superiors

Email: Presenting a Professional Image Janis Fisher Chan

-Extremely wordy emails and short sloppy emails that abbreviate every word are equally as bad and makes a poor impression.
-The emails you send say a lot about yourself and whether or not you will be taken seriously.
-Use active language that is energetic and clear
-Active language gets the message across clearly, passive language weakens your writing
-Emails should be easy to read and free from inflated language
-Don’t use too many words since people like to read their emails quickly
-Avoid repetition-goes back to wordiness and use gender neutral language
-Use short, simple, focused sentences and good grammar

Rhetorical Situation

Exigence - the private landowner will either start his or her own land trust or they will continue as they always have. We should speak up on the subject in order to let landowners know we should create land trusts so that our future generations will have natural resources to use.

Constraints - one of the biggest constraints for the project is obviously time. Other constraints are geographic since I will be writing to private landwoners in the Pee Dee region of South Carolina.

Audience - my audience will be private landowners in the Pee Dee region of South Carolina. I will be writing to the landowners because they are the ones with potential to start land trusts but it is also good that everyone is aware of the subject and the importance of it. Even though landowners are of main importance it would only be beneficial that others read it as well.

Proposal Outline

I. American Forest Management Intro
A. Introduce the company I am working through
1. What their main consulting business consists of
2. What is the main portion of their business
B. Explain the land trust and conservation easement process
1. What exactly a land trust is
2. What is their purpose and how do they work
3. Name several large companies that deal with land trusts
4. Talk about how land trusts are becoming more of an issue with urban sprawl
II. Advantages and Disadvantages of Land Trusts
A. Advantages of Land Trusts
1. Why should landowners put their land in a trust
2. Financial Benefits
3. Protection for commercial or residential development
4. Continue utilization of natural resources on the land (timber, crops, etc.)
5. Provides green space among the urban sprawl
6. Will provide natural resources and aesthetic quality for future generations.
B. Disadvantages of Land Trusts
1. Financial benefits do not compare to those of what developers would offer
2. Development around your tract of land if you are the only land trust in the surrounding area
3. If you change your mind and decide you want to develop the land
III. How to become a land trust
A. Gather resources
1. Have ample knowledge on your land such as land area and the resources present
2. Have the information in some sort of document
B. Select Board of Directors
C. Create a mission statement
D. Apply to IRS for non-profit status
E. Natural Resources Census-when you come up with actual numbers and volumes
F. Create Community Awareness
G. Know the reasons for why you are doing it
IV. Conclusion
A. Give examples of successful private landowners who have started land trusts
B. Emphasize the increasing urban sprawl and we must ensure a source of natural resources for the
future

Ethics in Writing

Nature of Ethics
-Recent awareness of ethics is mostly influenced by technology
-Making judgments about values-The general public is becoming more involved in decisions made about technology and society where ethics are overlooked and the outcome could affect them Ex: radioactive waster disposal
-The ethical responsibilities involved in technical writing are simply to relay faithfully information between transmitter and receiver, compared to a transparent windowpane providing a view of a scene.
-Technical communication has expanded in the way that one must present information in various formats specific to the audience you are presenting to.

Why Study Ethics?
-"The unexamined life is not worth living" - Socrates
-If we can't reason why we make certain "ethical" decisions how can we persuade others to support our decision

What is Ethics?
-We are bright, sensitive, earnest people who often face real ethical dilemmas and we must weigh our actions and become our own ethical experts
-Ethical burdens fall on each individual and no one else can face your specific circumstances
-History of ethics says that social considerations outweigh self interest.
-Need to know how others feel about ethic responsibility so that eventually we can better understand ourselves.

Our Expectations
-Ethics is problematic and the situations will not be absolutely clear such as in logic or science
-Social circumstances must be included in ethical decisions and without the input of others you cannot say you have arrived at a truly ethical decision.

Terminology
-Values- the intentions or ends that guide an action
-Absolute-definite, unchanging, and inflexible (they way we think about laws)
-Relative- changing in relation to circumstances (when ethical guidelines become so flexible that eventually there are no ethics at all).

Survey of Ethics in Communication and Rhetoric
-What we write has consequences so we must portray ethics and values in our writing

Limitations of History
-History and theory can help clear up a situation but cannot make decisions for us. We cannot take past decisions and apply towards present situations.


Ethics and Rhetoric Linked
-Those that believe technical communication is not a for of rhetoric also believe it doesn’t involve ethics because your only relaying factual information.
-Technical communication is ethical when the information presented is accurate and factual.

Plato and Socrates
-Plato has a very absolute view on ethics and thinks of it as a matter of pleasing God.
-Practicing ethics will get us closer to God which is the ultimate goal
-Socrates believed in constantly examining and reflecting on all aspects of our lives so that we can determine what is right for us to do.
1) Insisted on doing the right thing regardless of the consequences
2) Ethics is a matter of pleasing God
3) Ethical behavior requires active social involvement
-Good communication must be ethical and deal only with what is true, good, and right.

Aristotle
-The right course of action in any given situation cannot be known but instead we rely on human judgment.
-In a contest between two sides the one that is true and factual will naturally prevail over the other.
-Believed in certain knowledge and uncertain knowledge
-Viewed ethics as virtue

The Sophists
-Made up of freethinkers and teachers
-Plato attacked the sophists as representing the worst sort of values and communication.
-Believed there are no absolutes and values depend on the circumstances
-There is no single, absolute, true reality
-Relied on the power of language to shape thoughts and minds
-Language is everything and even molds our ethics and values depending on the circumstances

Recent Times
-Ethics dealt with truths and rhetoric dealt with what was false
-Ethics was a religious matter

Hegel
-Values arrive from social forces that were trying to preserve their own self-interest
-All knowledge, especially about values was absolute

Perelman
-There is no absolute basis or authority for values
-Purely logical reasoning is rhetorical because is aimed towards persuading an argument.
-Nothing absolute exists in rhetorical language

Burke
-Language use should be guided by carefully weighed judgments
-Power of language to negotiate knowledge and value judgments

Weaver
-All language involves expressing some values
-Believed even the so called neutrality of science and scientists is actually a value system
-Values serve as the foundation for rhetoric providing the substance toward which the audience is persuaded.

Rhetoric, Knowledge, and Values
-Scientific reports are only as good as the values they adhere to.
-One of the elements of reasoned arguments is that they are not absolute but socially relative because our differences in time, cultures, and communities.(Toulmin)
-Societies and their hierarchy of different social levels is formed through language. (Foucalt)
-Beverly Sauer uses example of a governmental investigation of a mining accident and that voices of the wives of the victims were ignored because they were not technical experts but in reality they knew of the danger before any indications became apparent.

Problems with Language

Technical and business writers can sometimes communicate to their readers in a language that is hard to understand. They often don’t keep their writings simple enough to make it easier for the reader. There are two main principles that technical writers should abide by:

-they should write everything as clearly, straightforwardly, and simply as possible
-they should write in a manner or style with which they would be comfortable speaking

Some common terms dealing with bad communication amongst technical writers are jargon, gobbledygook, legalese, and sexist and biased language.

-Jargon is a language specific to a certain profession or occupation
-Gobbledygook is words or phrases that writers’ use it sounds the way they think it should sound regardless of if it’s right or not
-Legalese is an overreliance on legal terminology when plain should have been used

Gobbledygook-Stuart Chase
In its most basic terms is trying to send a message using fancy terminology that is so excessive that it confuses the point trying to be made. It is present in our government, our law, and even our own universities. A longer word does not necessarily carry meaning better just because it is a long word. Most of the time it is easier to get your point across using “short clear words.” As a language grows and develops the need to keep your message short and clear increases as the occurrence of gobbledygook increases.

One example given is that of a woman with two small children and a husband who is unable to work. She wrote the FSA asking about drawing benefits. Instead of receiving a simple return message that could easily be understood she was sent a writing of pure gobbledygook that could have easily been simplified. The survey proved that office documents could be cut 20-50% while improving clarity.

William Zinsser explained in his essay “Writing in Your Job” that no matter what profession you are in that you need to know how to write clearly even if it’s just a simple office note. In your writing it is important to use language similar to human conversation so your reader doesn’t lose interest. Obviously documents such as newsletters will need to be more formal but the message should still be clear to your audience. Parents, customers, and corporations want to hear “plain talk.” Alan Siegel talks about the term legalese in his essay “The Plain English Revolution.” It is a movement that legal forms and documents could be understood by ordinary people. The movement claims that professional jargon is acceptable as long as lawyers use it toward other lawyers and doctors use it with other doctors. When this is not the case then the language should be simplified. The movement basically states that the consumer should be able to understand the legal documents they receive. Technical documents should be simple but not but not with a simplemindedness attitude. It is not necessary to use “baby-talk.” Professionals should not use simple language in a cynical manner.

There are important points to remember when making sure your writing comes off in a nonsexist way:
Would you say the same thing about a person of the opposite sex?
Would you like it said about you?
Good communication should respect the individual and treat people fairly when concerning sex, age, and race. Avoid stereotypes and use real people and real stories.
The essay on “International Communication and Language” by Gwyneth Olofsson explains the importance of recognizing cultural and social differences when writing to citizens of other countries. Even if someone knows the grammar and vocabulary of another language does not mean they understand the culture and social norms of that country. This could lead to insulting a potential customer in the business world. It is also good to remember even the type of attitude that is common among different countries so you can adjust accordingly.

Purpose Statement

My objective is to write through American Forest Management Inc. which is a forestry consultant informing private landowners in South Carolina about the advantages of conservation easements and becoming a land trust. The purpose is to provide enough information to the landowner where they would want to put their own property in a land trust. The audience would be private landowners in South Carolina primarily in the Pee Dee region because this is where American Forest Management Inc. has a good portion of their clients. The audience will consist of landowners who own land with potential to be developed that should know the real facts about land trusts. The format would be some type of report but I’m not sure exactly how it will be laid out and the information will be presented. The evidence will come from research on mainstream land trust companies about what exactly a land trust is and how they work.
The organization will consist of first presenting the definition of a land trust and what it is in basic terms, the benefits and advantages of a trust, and finally how to become a land trust yourself. With the recent increase in urban sprawl around our major cities, the topic of land trusts and conservation easements have become an increasingly popular topic. Basically, a land trust is where a private landowner is paid by the acre by a land trust company to never have his tract of land developed for residential neighborhoods or industrial purposes. The landowner can still perform his routine management practices such as cutting timber or growing crops except in the end it can never be developed. In other words the land and resources can still be utilized and at the same time provide forest and green space that will remain for all future generations.