Tuesday, March 9, 2010

Test your Knowledge--Chapter 10

page 250 1-5

1. They provide feedback and other information for decision making (plans, operating reports, and personal activity reports)

2. new research is done specifically for a new project and secondary research is research done previously for a different purpose

3. It is reliable if the results can be repeated identically and valid if it meaures what it's supposed to

4. recommendations are useful when readers want to know what to do in a given situation instead of what they should conclude

5. some organizations prepare for formal invitation to bid on other contracts (RFP) which includes instructions that specify exactly what type of work should be performed or what products should be delivered

Tuesday, March 2, 2010

Writing Persuasive Messages--3/2/10

Test Your Knowledge Page 216 1-5

1. Who is my audience? What are my audiences' needs? What do I want them to do? How might they resist? Are there alternative positions I need to examine? What does the decision maker consider to be the most important issue? How might the organization's culture influence my strategy?

2. You must take into account their cultural expectations and practices so that you odn't undermine your persuasive message by using an inappropriate appeal or by organizing your message in a way that seems unfamiliar or uncomfortable to your readers.

3. emotional appeal calls on feelings or audience sympathies but a logical appeal uses 3 types of reasoning (analogy, induction, and deduction). Emotion and logic should be used in tandum

4. Analogy, induction, and deduction are 3 types of reasoning for logical appeals

5. The AIDA model organizes your presentation into four phases (attention, interest, desire, and action); it is tailor made for using the indirect approach which allows you to save your main idea for the action phase; it can also work with the direct approach. Some limitations are that AIDA is a unidirectional method that essentially talks AT audiences not WITH them. It is also built around a single event (such as asking an audience for a decision), rahter than on building a mutually beneficial, long term relationship.