Posts filed under 'Major Assignments'
Process Explanation Blog
For this assignment I chose the Process Explanation genre. I began this assignment by thinking about the position of an Early Childhood Intervention Specialist. This is a position I am very interested in pursuing after my graduation in May. At my present job I have had the opportunity to visit with an ECI Specialist who does home visits for one of the children I baby sit. I have had the opportunity to talk with her about the position. One of the aspects of this position is the large amount of travel they do each day. ECI Specialists are reimbursed for some of their expenses and that is how I chose this particular scenario. I felt that this scenario is one that I will encounter on the job.
I determined that a process explanation would be the best genre for this scenario. Even though this is a procedure, I wouldn’t exactly classify them as instructions. The Expense Report Process includes some instructions on how to complete the form, but that is only a part of the entire process. My procedure conformed more to process explanation than instructions for that reason. The process explanation genre fit my scenario best because I could describe each stage of how to get your expenses reimbursed, including filling out the expense report form.
As a part of the job, an ECI Supervisor would prepare written process explanations when training employees in new procedures. I determined my audience to be the Early Childhood Intervention Specialists that I supervise. Prompt reimbursement of expenses would be something important to ECI specialists. To receive reimbursement, employees are required to provide proper documentation promptly and that is why they need to know the details of this procedure.
Instructions and process explanations do have similarities in that each provide a systematic way of performing a task. Each genre has stages or steps which provide important information to their readers. Instructions are for a specific task where process explanation describes the stages of a procedure. In my scenario I determined the reader of my process explanation to be a supervisor of employees who would need to understand the entire process and not just how to complete the form correctly in order to properly train her employees.
I think I have mastered some of the course goals after completing this assignment. I have analyzed communication contexts by understanding my audience and the purpose and situation in which an expense report process would be used. When writing this process explanation I was writing specifically to ECI Supervisors who would train employees on how to use the new expense report procedure. I think I have also designed a convincing document that is easy to understand and a form that is user friendly.
This assignment was interesting in that it caused me to think about a specific procedure that I could actually encounter as an ECI specialist. Each time I read through my process, I put myself in the role of ECI Supervisor and asked myself if I could adequately train my employees to use this process correctly. PuettProcessExplanation.doc
Add comment October 31, 2006
Multicultural Revision
This assignment was interesting, but a little more difficult than I expected. Revising the claim letter to an Indian audience was challenging but it made me realize how important it is think about who your audience is when writing letters, reports and other correspondence.
I wish I had done my original claim letter a little differently. As Mr. Boettger told me in his critique of my original letter, I followed the template he had given us too closely. This made revising this letter more difficult. My original letter was short, direct and to the point. I stated the facts of the purchase and then stated the problem I was having in clear, concise wording. The tone of the letter only addressed one person, the manager and did not take into consideration the company as a whole. The power distance relationship was not a factor as I wrote the claim the first time. My first claim letter was written to a male manager, but I did not write the letter in a gender-specific way. The letter could have just as easily been written to a female. I was given the country of
India for this assignment. In researching
India, I learned that the Indians are religious, family oriented and philosophical people. Indians traditionally value simple material comforts, physical purity and spiritual refinement. Indians view hardships as the will of God or fate. The Indians are a grateful people. Their expressions of gratitude are reserved for important things and are not given routinely. Most Indians have a deep respect for Gandhi and his ideals, which include humility, nonviolence, self-denial and religious harmony. The Indian culture places a high value on their families. Their family units hold much more importance than that of the individual. After reading and researching the Indian culture I rewrote my claim letter to an Indian manager using the four identifiers of culture by Geert Hofstede. The four dimensions as described by Hofstede are Power Distance, Individualist vs. Collectivist, Masculine vs. Feminine and Uncertainty Avoidance. Comparing the power distance of
India and the
United States,
India’s score is almost twice that of the
US. I took this into consideration in my rewrite by emphasizing the company and stating the good things about the company and the positive relationship I had with them over the last three years. I addressed Mr. Patel formally in the new letter and used the familiar Indian greeting to create good will. I used direct language throughout the body of my letter and used words that would hopefully be easily understood. The second dimension of individual vs. collectivism required some changes in my letter. The
United States score was in the 90’s while
India’s was just above 40. As I learned through my research,
India does not put emphasis upon the individual, but on their family. Extended families often live together or near each other. Elderly people are revered and cared by their family members. I changed the tone of my letter so as not to focus on my needs so much, but rather I tried to focus on the problem of the product and what Worlwide, Inc. could do to resolve the problem. I limited my use of the word “me” and “I” and tried to put the focus on the product rather than myself. The third dimension of masculine vs. feminine did not require any major change in my letter. The use of words which include the word man or men such as chairman or fireman should be addressed. Also the tone of the letter whether direct or neutral is included in this dimension. The third dimension score on the Hofstede scale showed the
U.S. score just slightly higher than the one for
India. In my revision, I tried to show respect to the manager by addressing him and Mr. and by using the word Sir. These two words show respect and convey good will to Mr. Patel. The fourth dimension of uncertainty-avoidance addresses whether a country puts emphasis on details that are uncertain or unknown. In my example the Hofstede scale showed that
India scored twice as high as
America in wanting to know details. In my revised letter I gave the specific dates pertaining to the transaction and my specific request for a resolution to this issue. The reader of my revised letter would have no question as to how I anticipated this issue to be resolved.
I also revised one of my paragraphs to use plain English. This is where I ran into a little trouble. My first letter was simple in format and therefore already used plain English. If I hadn’t followed the template as closely in the first letter, then the revised letter would have been significantly different. The paragraph I selected from the first letter is as follows: “I am disappointed because your MP3 player has not performed like it is supposed to. Every time I try to use it, the screen goes blank and I cannot see the songs I am trying to play. Because of this it is impossible to use. I have read through the user manual that came with the player but I am unable to solve this issue on my own.” I changed the paragraph as follows: “There is a malfunction with the MP3 player and I would be very grateful for your assistance in resolving this problem. The model 512 MP3 has not performed up to the standards of my previous purchases from Worldwide. The specific problem is that the screen on the MP3 goes blank when I try to use it. This prevents the menu of songs that I have downloaded from being viewed. I am certain you understand that this makes it very difficult to use the MP3 player.” In the revised version I tried to take the emphasis off of myself and put the emphasis on the defective product. I believe I stated the problem clearly and tried to create empathy with the manufacturer. The use of the word grateful was intentional for them to see my gratitude even before the problem has been resolved.
This exercise was one of the most challenging we have had to date. It made me stop and think about my audience and how diverse cultures hear the message. Anytime we read words printed on a page, we read the words with our culture as a backdrop. We must remember that readers of our messages are doing the same thing. To be effective we must always know and understand our audience to the best of our ability.
Works cited:
1. CultureGrams World Edition 2005. www.culturegrams.com
2. Geert Hofstede Cultural Dimensions. http://www.geerthofstede.com/hofstede_dimensions.php?culture
Add comment October 23, 2006
