Business Writing Skills

Required Reading

• Chapters 15, 16, & 17 in Writing well for business success
• Pages 55-62 in Workplace Writing
• Lentz, P. (2013). MBA students’ workplace writing: Implications for business writing pedagogy and workplace practice. Business Communication Quarterly, 76(4), 474-490. doi:10.1177/1080569913507479
• Li, X. (2012). Weaving social media into a business proposal project. Business Communication Quarterly, 75(1), 68-75. doi:10.1177/1080569911432629
• Shear, J. (2011). How to untie your writing knots: They’re different from writer’s block, but their main cause—having too much to say—can similarly make your work grind to a halt. Writer (Kalmbach Publishing Co.), 124(4), 24-25.

Task to be completed – Use the information you learned to answer the following questions:

1. How do visual aids assist the individual who reads the report, and what are three examples of visual aids that you use or will use in the future?
2. What are the reasons an individual chooses to use email, memo, or letter formats for short, informal reports?
3. Explain how you would use each of the following in your work: informative formal reports, analytical formal reports, or recommendation formal reports.
4. What, if any, persuasion techniques are used in writing a report or using a visual aid?