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Business Speech: Types with Examples, Informative, Special, Persuasive

Good presentation and speaking habits may be considered soft skills in the workplace or in any type of organization. Today in this article, we have shared what is business speech and how many types of business speeches are there.

Anybody can relate to all these types of business speech because these all are equally important in social life as well. So let’s start our topic with the basics of business speech.

► What is Business Speech?

Speech refers to that action when a person stands among a great number of people and starts delivering any kind of information or statement. It may be or may not be useful for the whole audience but most of the time it is valuable for them.

A speech that is delivered in the workplace or in any business organization for some specific purpose is known as Business Speech.

This is one of the forms of Business Communication and the audience has to sit quietly while the speech is being delivered. Most of the time audience knows very well that the speech must contain anything that will be beneficial for them.

► Types of Business Speech:

There are mainly three types of speech that are as follow;

• Informative Speech
• Persuasive Speech
• Special Occasion Speech

◉ Informative Speech

Informative business speech can be defined as speech that comprises the purpose to deliver useful information to the audience.

For Example  – In any organization, an Executive Coach or Trainer speaking about the new trends in the market to his trainees. It can be hard to understand for few trainees, but the fact is that he is delivering something informative that is beneficial for them.

Informative Speech is further divided into four types;

• Speeches about Objects
• Speeches about Events
• Speeches about Processes
• Speeches about Concepts

The following are known kinds of informative speech.

✔ Speeches about Objects :

It can be about any object related to that particular organization where the speech is being delivered.

For Example  – how various wildlife animals look, what is the smell of medicine, information about any product.

✔ Speeches about Events :

Those speeches that inform the audience about any events like historical incidents or about any situations are called speeches about the event.

For Example  – New President’s speech about future goals after the oath-taking ceremony.

✔ Speeches about Processes :

The main purpose of this type of informative speech is to inform the audience about anything which is currently happening or about how to do any particular task or work.

For Example  – a Yoga teacher explaining how to perform specific yoga poses.

✔ Speeches about Concepts :

Speeches about concepts are those speeches that inform the audience about any concept such as the peace of the world, freedom of rights, or love, fundamentals of any study topic.

For Example – a Science teacher explains Einstein’s theory of general relativity to his students in the class.

Must Read : Skills of HR Manager

◉ Persuasive Speech

Persuasive Speech refers to those speeches where the intention of the speech is to convince the audience to accept the particular opinion or fact and create influence on the audience to do anyhow.

In short, the speech which influences the listeners or audience to follow a certain idea is called a persuasive speech.

Persuasive speech is also an informative speech. because here speaker gives information in a lucrative manner to influence others.

For Example  –  in any debate, every person is try to persuade others to follow their given point of view. It is a form of persuasive speech.

In another example, During the advertising and promotional functions of any business, the sales manager or speaker uses his persuasion skills to influence the audience. Here the main purpose of speech is to change the thinking, beliefs, or behaviors of the audience towards his product.

Persuasive speech can be divided into three types that are as follows:

• Factual Persuasive Speech
• Value Persuasive Speech
• Policy Persuasive Speech

✔ Factual Persuasive Speech:

The Factual Persuasive Speech is such a speech that contains facts and it is based on a concrete proof about the certainty of anything that had happened.

The main purpose of this factual persuasive speech is to persuade the listeners whether the certain thing happened or not, exists or doesn’t exist.

For Example – If a student is giving a speech about the first man, who landed on the surface of the Moon. Nobody in the class knows whether it did happen or not, yet it possesses concrete proof.

✔ Value Persuasive Speech:

A Value Persuasive Speech is such a speech that tells the listeners about anything, whether it is wrong or right. The purpose of this speech is to challenge the ethical or moral aspects of a certain issue.

For Example –  If someone is giving a speech about capital punishment, whether it is moral or immoral, right or wrong, done or prevented. this type of speech is a value persuasive speech.

✔ Policy Persuasive Speech:

The policy persuasive speech refers to that speech where the speaker is trying to persuade the audience to either following a policy or rejecting it. It is not limited to just a policy, but it can be about accepting or rejecting a rule or a candidate is also a policy persuasive speech.

For Example – Suppose If the President of a country is not satisfied with the present foreign policy and wants to change it. The president gives a speech to higher authorities for convincing them to change the current foreign policy and support the new policy then it is known as policy persuasive speech.

Must Read : Types of Communication

◉ Special Occasion Speech:

Special Occasion speech refers to that speech which is given on the special occasion like;  A speech of farewell allows someone to say good-bye to one part of his or her life as he or she is moving on to the next part of life. Maybe you’ve accepted a new job and are leaving your current job.

Special occasion business speech is something which anyone can face at some point in their lives.

For example –  If your company won an award of the year for excellence. And you are receiving that award on the behalf of your company. The speech given by you after getting the award can be considered as a special occasion business speech.

In another example, If you are getting retirement from your job and want to thank your subordinates, superiors, and top management at the farewell party.

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12.3 Building a Sample Speech

Learning objectives.

• Demonstrate how to build a sample speech by expanding on the main points you wish to convey.
• Demonstrate how to use the five structural parts of any speech.

As you begin to investigate your topic, make sure you consider several sides of an issue. Let’s say you are going to do a speech to inform on the history of the First Transcontinental Railroad. At first you may have looked at just two sides, railroaders versus local merchants. Railroad tycoons wanted to bring the country together—moving people, goods, and services in a more efficient way—and to make money. Local merchants wanted to keep out competition and retain control of their individual markets.

Take another look at this issue and you see that several other perspectives have bearing on this issue. Shipping was done primarily by boat prior to the railroad, so shippers would not want the competition. Recent Chinese immigrants were in need of work. Native Americans did not want to lose their culture or way of life, and a railroad that crossed the country would cut right through the buffalo’s migration patterns. We now have five perspectives to the central issue, which makes the topic all the more interesting.

The general purpose is to inform the audience on the First Transcontinental Railroad and its impact on a young but developing United States. The thesis statement focuses on shipping, communication, and cultures across America.

• Topic . First Transcontinental Railroad
• General purpose statement . I want the audience to be more informed about the impact of the First Transcontinental Railroad.
• Thesis statement . The First Transcontinental Railroad changed shipping, communication, and cultures across America.

With the information we have so far, we can now list three main points:

Change in shipping

Change in communication

Change in cultures

Think of each one of these main points as a separate but shorter speech. The point is to develop each of these main points like you have developed your overall speech. What do you want to focus on? The major types of shipping at the time of the First Transcontinental Railroad? One aspect you may want consider is to what degree is your audience familiar with this time in history. If they are not very familiar, a little background and context can help make your speech more meaningful and enhance its relevance to your thesis statement. By taking time to consider what you want to accomplish with each point, you will help yourself begin to address how you need to approach each point. Once you have thought about what you want to focus on for each point, list each subheading next to the main points. For example,

• Navigating the waterways via barges and boats
• Overland stagecoaches
• Timetables for modes of travel
• Letters in the days of the Pony Express
• How the Morse Code telegraph system followed railroad lines
• Bringing people together across distances
• Prerailroad immigration
• Impact on Native Americans
• Territories become States

By now you’ve identified your key points and are ready to start planning your speech in more detail. While your organizational structure will vary from speech to speech, there are nonetheless five main parts of any speech: attention statement, introduction, body, conclusion, and residual message. These are basic to the rhetorical process and you will see time and time again, regardless of audience or culture, these same elements in some form utilized to communicate in public. They will serve to guide you, and possibly even save you should you get a last minute request to do a speech or presentation.

Place your hand on the table or desk and you’ll more likely see a thumb and four fingers. Associate your hand with these five elements. Each digit is independently quite weak, but together they make a powerful fist. Your thumb is quite versatile and your most important digit. It’s a lot like your attention statement. If you don’t gain the audience’s attention, the rest of the speech will be ineffective.

Each successive digit can represent the remaining four parts of any speech. One day you will be asked to speak with little or no time for preparation. By focusing on this organizational model, and looking down at your hand, you can quickly and accurately prepare your speech. With the luxury of time for preparation, each step can even be further developed. Remember the five-finger model of public speaking , as summarized in Table 12.3 “Five-Finger Model of Public Speaking” , and you will always stand out as a more effective speaker.

Table 12.3 Five-Finger Model of Public Speaking

Key Takeaway

Speeches are built by identifying the main points to be communicated and by following five structural elements (attention statement, introduction, body, conclusion, and residual message).

• By visiting the library or doing an Internet search, find a speech given by someone you admire. The speech may be published in a book or newspaper, recorded in an audio file, or recorded on video. It may be a political speech, a business speech, or even a commercial sales pitch. Read or listen to the speech and identify the five structural elements as this speaker has used them. Post your results, discuss with classmates, and if a link to the speech is available, please be sure to include it.
• By visiting the library or doing an Internet search, find a speech that would benefit from significant improvement. The speech may be published in a book or newspaper, recorded in an audio file, or recorded on video. It may be a political speech, a business speech, or even a commercial sales pitch. Read or listen to the speech and identify the five structural elements as this speaker has used them, noting specifically where they could improve their performance. Post your results, discuss with classmates, and if a link to the speech is available, please be sure to include it.
• What functions does organization serve in a speech? Can organization influence or sway the audience? Explain your response and position.

Business Communication for Success: GVSU Edition Copyright © 2015 by University of Minnesota is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License , except where otherwise noted.

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Learning Objective

• Describe the steps in the process of planning a speech.

As you begin to think about choosing your topic, there are a few key factors to consider. These include the purpose of the speech, its projected time length, the appropriateness of the topic for your audience, and your knowledge or the amount of information you can access on the topic. Let’s examine each of these factors.

Determine the General and Specific Purpose

It is important for you to have a clear understanding of your purpose, as all the other factors depend on it. Here’s a brief review of the five general purposes for speaking in public:

• Speech to inform . Increase the audience’s knowledge, teach about a topic or issue, and share your expertise.
• Speech to demonstrate . Show the audience how to use, operate, or do something.
• Speech to persuade . Influence the audience by presenting arguments intended to change attitudes, beliefs, or values.
• Speech to entertain . Amuse the audience by engaging them in a relatively light-hearted speech that may have a serious point or goal.
• Ceremonial speech . Perform a ritual function, such as give a toast at a wedding reception or a eulogy at a funeral.

You should be able to choose one of these options. If you find that your speech may fall into more than one category, you may need to get a better understanding of the assignment or goal. Starting out with a clear understanding of why you are doing what you are supposed do will go a long way in helping you organize, focus, prepare, and deliver your oral presentation.

Once you have determined your general purpose—or had it determined for you, if this is an assigned speech—you will still need to write your specific purpose. What specifically are you going to inform, persuade, demonstrate, or entertain your audience with? What type of ceremony is your speech intended for? A clear goal makes it much easier to develop an effective speech. Try to write in just one sentence exactly what you are going to do.

Notice that each example includes two pieces of information. The first is the general purpose (to inform or to persuade) and the second is the specific subject you intend to talk about.

Can I Cover the Topic in Time?

Your next key consideration is the amount of time in which you intend to accomplish your purpose. Consider the depth, scope, and amount of information available on the topic you have in mind. In business situations, speeches or presentations vary greatly in length, but most often the speaker needs to get the message across as quickly as possible—for example, in less than five minutes. If you are giving a speech in class, it will typically be five to seven minutes; at most it may be up to ten minutes. In those ten minutes, it would be impossible to tell your audience about the complete history of the Ford Mustang automobile. You could, however, tell them about four key body style changes since 1965. If your topic is still too broad, narrow it down into something you can reasonably cover in the time allotted. For example, focus on just the classic Mustangs, the individual differences by year, and how to tell them apart.

You may have been assigned a persuasive speech topic, linking global warming to business, but have you been given enough time to present a thorough speech on why human growth and consumption is clearly linked to global warming? Are you supposed to discuss “green” strategies of energy conservation in business, for example? The topic of global warming is quite complex, and by definition involves a great deal of information, debate over interpretations of data, and analysis on the diverse global impacts. Rather than try to explore the chemistry, the corporate debates, or the current government activities that may be involved, you can consider how visual aids may make the speech vivid for the audience. You might decide to focus on three clear examples of global warming to capture your audience’s attention and move them closer to your stated position: “green” and energy-saving strategies are good for business.

Figure 10.1

Visual aids may make this speech vivid for the audience.

Wikimedia Commons – CC BY-SA 3.0.

Perhaps you’ll start with a brownie on a plate with a big scoop of ice cream on top, asking your audience what will happen when the ice cream melts. They will probably predict that the melted ice cream will spread out over the plate in a puddle, becoming a deeper puddle as the ice cream continues to melt. Next, you might display a chart showing that globally, temperatures have risen, followed by a map of the islands that have lost beaches due to rising tides. To explain how this had happened, you may show two pictures of Antarctica—one taken in 1993 and the other in 2003, after it lost over 15 percent of its total mass as the Ross Ice Shelf melted, cracked, and broke off from the continent. You may then make a transition to what happens when water evaporates as it goes into the atmosphere. Show a picture of the hole in the ozone over Chile and much of South America, and hold up a bottle of sunscreen, saying that even SPF 45 isn’t strong enough to protect you. Finally, you may show a pie graph that illustrates that customers are aware of the environmental changes and the extent of their purchase decision is based on the perception of a product’s “green” features or support of related initiatives. In just a few minutes, you’ve given seven visual examples to support your central position and meet your stated purpose.

Will My Topic Be Interesting to My Audience?

Remember that communication is a two-way process; even if you are the only one speaking, the audience is an essential part of your speech. Put yourself in their place and imagine how to make your topic relevant for them. What information will they actually use once your speech is over?

For example, if you are speaking to a group of auto mechanics who specialize in repairing and maintaining classic cars, it might make sense to inform them about the body features of the Mustang, but they may already be quite knowledgeable about these features. If you represent a new rust treatment product used in the restoration process, they may be more interested in how it works than any specific model of car. However, if your audience belong to a general group of students or would-be car buyers, it would be more useful to inform them about how to buy a classic car and what to look for. General issues of rust may be more relevant, and can still be clearly linked to your new rust treatment product.

For a persuasive speech, in addition to considering the audience’s interests, you will also want to gauge their attitudes and beliefs. If you are speaking about global warming to a group of scientists, you can probably assume that they are familiar with the basic facts of melting glaciers, rising sea levels, and ozone depletion. In that case, you might want to focus on something more specific, such as strategies for reducing greenhouse gases that can be implemented by business and industry. Your goal might be to persuade this audience to advocate for such strategies, and support or even endorse the gradual implementation of the cost- and energy-saving methods that may not solve all the problems at once, but serve as an important first step.

In contrast, for a general audience, you may anticipate skepticism that global warming is even occurring, or that it poses any threat to the environment. Some audience members may question the cost savings, while others may assert that the steps are not nearly enough to make a difference. The clear, visual examples described above will help get your point across, but if you are also prepared to answer questions—for example, “If the earth is heating up, why has it been so cold here lately?” or “Isn’t this just part of a warming and cooling cycle that’s been happening for millions of years?”—you may make your speech ultimately more effective. By asking your listeners to consider what other signs they can observe that global warming is occurring, you might highlight a way for them to apply your speech beyond the classroom setting. By taking small steps as you introduce your assertions, rather than advocating a complete overhaul of the system or even revolution, you will more effectively engage a larger percentage of your audience.

How Much Information about My Topic Is Readily Available?

For a short speech, especially if it is a speech to entertain, you may be able to rely completely on your knowledge and ideas. But in most cases you will need to gather information so that you can make your speech interesting by telling the audience things they don’t already know. Try to choose a topic that can be researched in your college or university libraries. You may need to do some initial checking of sources to be sure the material is available.

Putting It All Together

When you have determined your general purpose, the amount of material appropriate to the time allowed for your speech, and the appropriateness for your audience, then you should be well on your way to identifying the topic for your speech. As a double-check, you should be able to state your specific purpose in one sentence. For example, the specific purpose of our “Classic Cars” speech could be stated as, “By the end of my speech, I want my audience to be more informed about the three ways in which they can determine whether a classic car is a rust bucket or diamond in the rough, and be aware of one product solution.”

Key Takeaway

Speech planning begins with knowing your general and specific purpose, your time allotment, your audience, and the amount of information available.

Complete the following sentence for your speech: By the end of my speech, I want the audience to be more informed (persuaded, have a better understanding of, entertained by) about ___________________.

If you can’t finish the sentence, you need to go back and review the steps in this section. Make sure you have given them sufficient time and attention. An effective speech requires planning and preparation, and that takes time. Know your general and specific purpose, and make sure you can write it in one sentence. If you don’t know your purpose, the audience won’t either.

• Make a list of topic that interest you and meet the objectives of the assignment. Trade the list with a classmate and encircle three topics that you would like to learn more about on their list. Repeat this exercise. What topic received the most interest and why? Discuss the results with your classmates.

Business Communication for Success: Public Speaking Edition Copyright © 2015 by University of Minnesota is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License , except where otherwise noted.

Chapter 11: Public Speaking

11.4 informative speech, learning objectives.

• Discuss and provide examples of ways to incorporate ethics in a speech.
• Construct an effective speech to inform.
• Discuss the parts of an informational presentation.
• Understand the five parts of any presentation.

Now that we’ve covered issues central to the success of your informative speech, there’s no doubt you want to get down to work. Here are five final suggestions to help you succeed.

Start with What You Know

Are you taking other classes right now that are fresh in your memory? Are you working on a challenging chemistry problem that might lend itself to your informative speech? Are you reading a novel by Gabriel García Márquez that might inspire you to present a biographical speech, informing your audience about the author? Perhaps you have a hobby or outside interest that you are excited about that would serve well. Regardless of where you draw the inspiration, it’s a good strategy to start with what you know and work from there. You’ll be more enthusiastic, helping your audience to listen intently, and you’ll save yourself time. Consider the audience’s needs, not just your need to cross a speech off your “to-do” list. This speech will be an opportunity for you to take prepared material and present it, gaining experience and important feedback. In the “real world,” you often lack time and the consequences of a less than effective speech can be serious. Look forward to the opportunity and use what you know to perform an effective, engaging speech.

Consider Your Audience’s Prior Knowledge

You don’t want to present a speech on the harmful effects of smoking when no one in the audience smokes. You may be more effective addressing the issue of secondhand smoke, underscoring the relationship to relevance and addressing the issue of importance with your audience. The audience will want to learn something from you, not hear everything they have heard before. It’s a challenge to assess what they’ve heard before, and often a class activity is conducted to allow audience members to come to know each other. You can also use their speeches and topic selection as points to consider. Think about age, gender, and socioeconomic status, as well as your listeners’ culture or language. Survey the audience if possible, or ask a couple of classmates what they think of the topics you are considering.

In the same way, when you prepare a speech in a business situation, do your homework. Access the company Web site, visit the location and get to know people, and even call members of the company to discuss your topic. The more information you can gather about your audience, the better you will be able to adapt and present an effective speech.

Adapting Jargon and Technical Terms

You may have a topic in mind from another class or an outside activity, but chances are that there are terms specific to the area or activity. From wakeboarding to rugby to a chemical process that contributes to global warming, there will be jargon and technical terms. Define and describe the key terms for your audience as part of your speech and substitute common terms where appropriate. Your audience will enjoy learning more about the topic and appreciate your consideration as you present your speech.

Using Outside Information

Even if you think you know everything there is to know about your topic, using outside sources will contribute depth to your speech, provide support for your main points, and even enhance your credibility as a speaker. “According to ____________” is a normal way of attributing information to a source, and you should give credit where credit is due. There is nothing wrong with using outside information as long as you clearly cite your sources and do not present someone else’s information as your own.

Presenting Information Ethically

A central but often unspoken expectation of the speaker is that we will be ethical. This means, fundamentally, that we perceive one another as human beings with common interests and needs, and that we attend to the needs of others as well as our own. An ethical informative speaker expresses respect for listeners by avoiding prejudiced comments against any group, and by being honest about the information presented, including information that may contradict the speaker’s personal biases. The ethical speaker also admits it when he or she does not know something. The best salespersons recognize that ethical communication is the key to success, as it builds a healthy relationship where the customer’s needs are met, thereby meeting the salesperson’s own needs.

Reciprocity

Tyler discusses ethical communication and specifically indicates reciprocity as a key principle.  Reciprocity , or a relationship of mutual exchange and interdependence, is an important characteristic of a relationship, particularly between a speaker and the audience. We’ve examined previously the transactional nature of communication, and it is important to reinforce this aspect here. We exchange meaning with one another in conversation, and much like a game, it takes more than one person to play. This leads to interdependence, or the dependence of the conversational partners on one another. Inequality in the levels of dependence can negatively impact the communication and, as a result, the relationship. You as the speaker will have certain expectations and roles, but dominating your audience will not encourage them to fulfill their roles in terms of participation and active listening. Communication involves give and take, and in a public speaking setting, where the communication may be perceived as “all to one,” don’t forget that the audience is also communicating in terms of feedback with you. You have a responsibility to attend to that feedback, and develop reciprocity with your audience. Without them, you don’t have a speech.

Mutuality  means that you search for common ground and understanding with the audience, establishing this space and building on it throughout the speech. This involves examining viewpoints other than your own, and taking steps to insure the speech integrates an inclusive, accessible format rather than an ethnocentric one.

Nonjudgmentalism

Nonjudgementalism  underlines the need to be open-minded, an expression of one’s willingness to examine diverse perspectives. Your audience expects you to state the truth as you perceive it, with supporting and clarifying information to support your position, and to speak honestly. They also expect you to be open to their point of view and be able to negotiate meaning and understanding in a constructive way. Nonjudgmentalism may include taking the perspective that being different is not inherently bad and that there is common ground to be found with each other.

While this characteristic should be understood, we can see evidence of breakdowns in communication when audiences perceive they are not being told the whole truth. This does not mean that the relationship with the audience requires honesty and excessive self-disclosure. The use of euphemisms and displays of sensitivity are key components of effective communication, and your emphasis on the content of your speech and not yourself will be appreciated. Nonjudgmentalism does underscore the importance of approaching communication from an honest perspective where you value and respect your audience.

Honesty , or truthfulness, directly relates to trust, a cornerstone in the foundation of a relationship with your audience. Without it, the building (the relationship) would fall down. Without trust, a relationship will not open and develop the possibility of mutual understanding. You want to share information and the audience hopefully wants to learn from you. If you “cherry-pick” your data, only choosing the best information to support only your point and ignore contrary or related issues, you may turn your informative speech into a persuasive one with bias as a central feature.

Look at the debate over the U.S. conflict with Iraq. There has been considerable discussion concerning the cherry-picking of issues and facts to create a case for armed intervention. To what degree the information at the time was accurate or inaccurate will continue to be a hotly debated issue, but the example holds in terms on an audience’s response to a perceived dishonestly. Partial truths are incomplete and often misleading, and you don’t want your audience to turn against you because they suspect you are being less than forthright and honest.

Respect should be present throughout a speech, demonstrating the speaker’s high esteem for the audience.  Respect  can be defined as an act of giving and displaying particular attention to the value you associate with someone or a group. This definition involves two key components. You need to give respect in order to earn from others, and you need to show it. Displays of respect include making time for conversation, not interrupting, and even giving appropriate eye contact during conversations.

Communication involves sharing and that requires trust.  Trust  means the ability to rely on the character or truth of someone, that what you say you mean and your audience knows it. Trust is a process, not a thing. It builds over time, through increased interaction and the reduction of uncertainty. It can be lost, but it can also be regained. It should be noted that it takes a long time to build trust in a relationship and can be lost in a much shorter amount of time. If your audience suspects you mislead them this time, how will they approach your next presentation? Acknowledging trust and its importance in your relationship with the audience is the first step in focusing on this key characteristic.

Avoid Exploitation

Finally, when we speak ethically, we do not intentionally exploit one another.  Exploitation  means taking advantage, using someone else for one’s own purposes. Perceiving a relationship with an audience as a means to an end and only focusing on what you get out of it, will lead you to treat people as objects. The temptation to exploit others can be great in business situations, where a promotion, a bonus, or even one’s livelihood are at stake.

Suppose you are a bank loan officer. Whenever a customer contacts the bank to inquire about applying for a loan, your job is to provide an informative presentation about the types of loans available, their rates and terms. If you are paid a commission based on the number of loans you make and their amounts and rates, wouldn’t you be tempted to encourage them to borrow the maximum amount they can qualify for? Or perhaps to take a loan with confusing terms that will end up costing much more in fees and interest than the customer realizes? After all, these practices are within the law; aren’t they just part of the way business is done? If you are an ethical loan officer, you realize you would be exploiting customers if you treated them this way. You know it is more valuable to uphold your long-term relationships with customers than to exploit them so that you can earn a bigger commission.

Consider these ethical principles when preparing and presenting your speech, and you will help address many of these natural expectations of others and develop healthier, more effective speeches.

Sample Informative Presentation

Here is a generic sample speech in outline form with notes and suggestions.

Attention Statement

Show a picture of a goldfish and a tomato and ask the audience, “What do these have in common?”

Introduction

• Briefly introduce genetically modified foods.
• State your topic and specific purpose: “My speech today will inform you on genetically modified foods that are increasingly part of our food supply.”
• Introduce your credibility and the topic: “My research on this topic has shown me that our food supply has changed but many people are unaware of the changes.”
• State your main points: “Today I will define genes, DNA, genome engineering and genetic manipulation, discuss how the technology applies to foods, and provide common examples.”
• Information . Provide a simple explanation of the genes, DNA and genetic modification in case there are people who do not know about it. Provide clear definitions of key terms.
• Genes and DNA . Provide arguments by generalization and authority.
• Genome engineering and genetic manipulation . Provide arguments by analogy, cause, and principle.
• Case study . In one early experiment, GM (genetically modified) tomatoes were developed with fish genes to make them resistant to cold weather, although this type of tomato was never marketed.
• Highlight other examples.

Reiterate your main points and provide synthesis, but do not introduce new content.

Residual Message

“Genetically modified foods are more common in our food supply than ever before.”

• Identify an event or issue in the news that interests you. On at least three different news networks or Web sites, find and watch video reports about this issue. Compare and contrast the coverage of the issue. Do the networks or Web sites differ in their assumptions about viewers’ prior knowledge? Do they give credit to any sources of information? To what extent do they each measure up to the ethical principles described in this section? Discuss your findings with your classmates.
• Find an example of reciprocity in a television program and write two to three paragraphs describing it. Share and compare with your classmates.
• Find an example of honesty in a television program and write two to three paragraphs describing it. Share and compare with your classmates.
• Find an example of exploitation depicted in the media. Describe how the exploitation is communicated with words and images and share with the class.
• Compose a general purpose statement and thesis statement for a speech to inform. Now create a sample outline. Share with a classmate and see if he or she offers additional points to consider.

Creating an Informative Presentation

An informational presentation is common request in business and industry. It’s the verbal and visual equivalent of a written report. Information sharing is part of any business or organization. Informative presentations serve to present specific information for specific audiences for specific goals or functions. The type of presentation is often identified by its primary purpose or function. Informative presentations are often analytical or involve the rational analysis of information. Sometimes they simply “report the facts” with no analysis at all, but still need to communicate the information in a clear and concise format. While a presentation may have conclusions, propositions, or even a call to action, the demonstration of the analysis is the primary function.

A sales report presentation, for example, is not designed to make a sale. It is, however, supposed to report sales to date and may forecast future sales based on previous trends.

An informative presentation does not have to be a formal event, though it can be. It can be generic and nonspecific to the audience or listener, but the more you know about your audience, the better. When you tailor your message to that audience, you zero in on your target and increase your effectiveness. The emphasis is on clear and concise communication, but it may address several key questions:

• Topic: Product or Service?
• Who are you?
• Who is the target market?
• What is the revenue model?
• What are the specifications?
• How was the information gathered?
• How does the unit work?
• How does current information compare to previous information?

Table 11.2 “Presentation Components and Their Functions”  lists the five main parts or components of any presentation (McLean, S., 2003).

Table 11.2  Presentation Components and Their Functions

You will need to address the questions to establish relevance and meet the audience’s needs. The five parts of any speech will serve to help you get organized.

Sample Speech Guidelines

Imagine that you have been assigned to give an informative presentation lasting five to seven minutes. Follow the guidelines in  Table 11.3  “Sample Speech Guidelines”  and apply them to your presentation.

Table 11.3  Sample Speech Guidelines

• Write a brief summary of a class or presentation you personally observed recently; include what you learned. Compare with classmates.
• Search online for an informative speech or presentation that applies to business or industry. Indicate one part or aspect of the presentation that you thought was effective and one you would improve. Provide the link to the presentation in your post or assignment.
• Pick a product or service and come up with a list of five points that you could address in a two-minute informative speech. Place them in rank order and indicate why.
• With the points discussed in this chapter in mind, observe someone presenting a speech. What elements of their speech could you use in your speech? What elements would you not want to use? Why? Compare with a classmate.

McLean, S. (2003).  The basics of speech communication . Boston: Allyn & Bacon.

Tyler, V. (1978). Report of the working groups of the second SCA summer conference on intercultural communication. In N. C. Asuncio-Lande (Ed.),  Ethical Perspectives and Critical Issues in Intercultural Communication  (pp. 170–177). Falls Church, VA: SCA.

To listen to speeches from great figures in history, visit the History Channel’s audio speech archive.  http://www.history.com/speeches

What were the greatest speeches of the twentieth century? Find out here.  http://gos.sbc.edu/top100.html

Visit this eHow link for a great video demonstrating how to remove ink stains from clothing.  http://www.ehow.com/video_2598_remove-ink-stains.html

To improve your enunciation, try these exercises from the Mount Holyoke College site.  http://www.mtholyoke.edu/acad/intrel/speech/enunciation.htm

The Merriam-Webster dictionary site provides a wealth of resources on words, their meanings, their origins, and audio files of how to pronounce them.  http://www.merriam-webster.com

For information on adapting your speech for an audience or audience members with special needs, explore this index of resources compiled by Ithaca College.  http://www.ithaca.edu/wise/disabilities/

Dr. Richard Felder of North Carolina State University presents this questionnaire to assess your learning styles.  http://www.engr.ncsu.edu/learningstyles/ilsweb.html

The American Speech-Language-Hearing Association offers an array of Web resources on ethics.  http://www.asha.org/practice/ethics

Visit this site for a list informative topics for a business speech.  http://smallbusiness.chron.com/ideas-informative-speech-topics-business-81465.html

Visit this eHow site to get ideas for an audience-oriented informative speech topic.  http://www.ehow.com/how_2239702_choose-topic-informative-speech.html

• Business Communication for Success. Provided by : University of Minnesota . Located at : https://open.lib.umn.edu/businesscommunication/chapter/13-5-preparing-your-speech-to-inform/ . License : CC BY-NC-SA: Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike

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The Science of Strong Business Writing

• Bill Birchard

Lessons from neurobiology

Brain scans are showing us in new detail exactly what entices readers. Scientists can see a group of midbrain neurons—the “reward circuit”—light up as people respond to everything from a simple metaphor to an unexpected story twist. The big takeaway? Whether you’re crafting an email to a colleague or an important report for the board, you can write in a way that delights readers on a primal level, releasing pleasure chemicals in their brains.

Bill Birchard is an author and writing coach who’s worked with many successful businesspeople. He’s drawn on that experience and his review of the scientific literature to identify eight features of satisfying writing: simplicity, specificity, surprise, stirring language, seductiveness, smart ideas, social content, and storytelling. In this article, he shares tips for using those eight S’s to captivate readers and help your message stick.

Strong writing skills are essential for anyone in business. You need them to effectively communicate with colleagues, employees, and bosses and to sell any ideas, products, or services you’re offering.

• Bill Birchard is a business author and book-writing coach. His Writing for Impact: 8 Secrets from Science That Will Fire Up Your Reader’s Brain will be published by HarperCollins Leadership in April 2023. His previous books include Merchants of Virtue, Stairway to Earth, Nature’s Keepers, Counting What Counts, and others. For more writing tactics, see his website .  

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Chapter 1: Effective Business Communication

Venecia Williams

Learning Objectives

• Examine the importance of being a good communicator
• Define the communication process
• Explain 8 essential components of communication
• Discuss the role of ethics in communication

Communication is an activity, skill, and art that incorporates lessons learned across a wide spectrum of human knowledge. Perhaps the most time-honoured form of communication is storytelling. We’ve told each other stories for ages to help make sense of our world, anticipate the future, and certainly to entertain ourselves. The art of storytelling draws on your understanding of yourself, your message, and how you communicate it to an audience that is simultaneously communicating back to you. Your anticipation, reaction, and adaptation to the process will determine how successfully you are able to communicate. You were not born knowing how to write or even how to talk—but in the process of growing up, you have undoubtedly learned how to tell, and how not tell, a story out loud and in writing.

Effective communication takes preparation, practice, and persistence. There are many ways to learn communication skills; the school of experience, or “hard knocks,” is one of them. But in the business environment, a “knock” (or lesson learned) may come at the expense of your credibility through a blown presentation to a client. The classroom environment, with a compilation of information and resources such as a text, can offer you a trial run where you get to try out new ideas and skills before you have to use them to communicate effectively to make a sale or form a new partnership. Listening to yourself, or perhaps the comments of others may help you reflect on new ways to present or perceive, thoughts, ideas and concepts. The net result is your growth; ultimately your ability to communicate in business will improve, opening more doors than you might anticipate.

Importance of Good Communication Skills

Communication is key to your success—in relationships, in the workplace, as a citizen of your country, and across your lifetime. Your ability to communicate comes from experience, and experience can be an effective teacher, but this text and the related business communication course will offer you a wealth of experiences gathered from professional speakers across their lifetimes. You can learn from the lessons they’ve learned and be a more effective communicator right out of the gate.

Business communication can be thought of as a problem-solving activity in which individuals may address the following questions:

• What is the situation?
• What are some possible communication strategies?
• What is the best course of action?
• What is the best way to design the chosen message?
• What is the best way to deliver the message?

In this book, we will examine this problem-solving process and help you learn to apply it in the kinds of situations you are likely to encounter over the course of your career.

Communication Influences Your Thinking about Yourself and Others

We all share a fundamental drive to communicate. Communication can be defined as the process of understanding and sharing meaning (Pearson & Nelson, 2000). You share meaning in what you say and how you say it, both in oral and written forms. If you could not communicate, what would life be like? A series of never-ending frustrations? Not being able to ask for what you need or even to understand the needs of others?

Being unable to communicate might even mean losing a part of yourself, for you communicate your  self-concept —your sense of self and awareness of who you are—in many ways. Do you like to write? Do you find it easy to make a phone call to a stranger or to speak to a room full of people? Perhaps someone told you that you don’t speak clearly or your grammar needs improvement. Does that make you more or less likely to want to communicate? For some, it may be a positive challenge, while for others it may be discouraging. But in all cases, your ability to communicate is central to your self-concept.

Take a look at your clothes. What are the brands you are wearing? What do you think they say about you? Do you feel that certain styles of shoes, jewelry, tattoos, music, or even automobiles express who you are? Part of your self-concept may be that you express yourself through texting, or through writing longer documents like essays and research papers, or through the way you speak.

On the other side of the coin, your communications skills help you to understand others—not just their words, but also their tone of voice, their nonverbal gestures, or the format of their written documents provide you with clues about who they are and what their values and priorities may be. Active listening and reading are also part of being a successful communicator.

Communication Influences How You Learn

When you were an infant, you learned to talk over a period of many months. When you got older, you didn’t learn to ride a bike, drive a car, or even text a message on your cell phone in one brief moment. You need to begin the process of improving your speaking and writing with the frame of mind that it will require effort, persistence, and self-correction.

You learn to speak in public by first having conversations, then by answering questions and expressing your opinions in class, and finally by preparing and delivering a “stand-up” speech. Similarly, you learn to write by first learning to read, then by writing and learning to think critically. Your speaking and writing are reflections of your thoughts, experience, and education. Part of that combination is your level of experience listening to other speakers, reading documents and styles of writing, and studying formats similar to what you aim to produce.

As you study business communication, you may receive suggestions for improvement and clarification from speakers and writers more experienced than yourself. Take their suggestions as challenges to improve; don’t give up when your first speech or first draft does not communicate the message you intend. Stick with it until you get it right. Your success in communicating is a skill that applies to almost every field of work, and it makes a difference in your relationships with others.

Remember, luck is simply a combination of preparation and timing. You want to be prepared to communicate well when given the opportunity. Each time you do a good job, your success will bring more success.

Communication Represents You and Your Employer

You want to make a good first impression on your friends and family, instructors, and employer. They all want you to convey a positive image, as it reflects on them. In your career, you will represent your business or company in spoken and written form. Your professionalism and attention to detail will reflect positively on you and set you up for success.

In both oral and written situations, you will benefit from having the ability to communicate clearly. These are skills you will use for the rest of your life. Positive improvements in these skills will have a positive impact on your relationships, your prospects for employment, and your ability to make a difference in the world.

Communication Skills Are Desired by Business and Industry

Oral and written communication proficiencies are consistently ranked in the top ten desirable skills by employer surveys year after year. In fact, high-powered business executives sometimes hire consultants to coach them in sharpening their communication skills. According to the National Association of Colleges and Employers (2018), the following are the top five personal qualities or skills potential employers seek:

• Communication skills (verbal and written)
• Strong work ethic
• Teamwork skills (works well with others, group communication)
• Analytical skills

Knowing this, you can see that one way for you to be successful and increase your promotion potential is to increase your abilities to speak and write effectively. An individual with excellent communication skills is an asset to every organization. No matter what career you plan to pursue, learning to express yourself professionally in speech and in writing will help you get there.

What is Communication?

Many theories have been proposed to describe, predict, and understand the behaviours and phenomena of which communication consists. When it comes to communicating in business, we are often less interested in theory than in making sure our communications generate the desired results. But in order to achieve results, it can be valuable to understand what communication is and how it works. All communication is composed of three parts that make a whole: sharing, understanding, and meaning.

Sharing  means doing something together with one or more person(s). In communication, sharing occurs when you convey thoughts, feelings, ideas, or insights to others. You also share with yourself (a process called intrapersonal communication) when you bring ideas to consciousness, ponder how you feel about something, figure out the solution to a problem, or have a classic “Aha!” moment when something becomes clear.

The second keyword is understanding . “To understand is to perceive, to interpret, and to relate our perception and interpretation to what we already know.” (McLean, 2003) Understanding the words and the concepts or objects they refer to is an important part of the communication process.

Finally,  meaning  is what you share through communication. For example, by looking at the context of a word, and by asking questions, you can discover the shared meaning of the word and better understand the message.

Watch the following video reviewing Types of Communication

• Interpersonal communication is any message exchanged between two or more people.
• Written communication is any message using the written word.
• Verbal, or oral, communication is any message conveyed through speech.
• Nonverbal communication is any message inferred through observation of another person.

Communications Process: Encoding and Decoding

In basic terms, humans communicate through a process of  encoding  and  decoding . The encoder is the person who develops and sends the message. As represented in Figure 1.1 below, the encoder must determine how the message will be received by the audience, and make adjustments so the message is received the way they want it to be received.

Encoding is the process of turning thoughts into communication. The encoder uses a ‘medium’ to send the message — a phone call, email, text message, face-to-face meeting, or other communication tools. The level of conscious thought that goes into encoding messages may vary. The encoder should also take into account any ‘noise’ that might interfere with their message, such as other messages, distractions, or influences.

The audience then ‘decodes’, or interprets, the message for themselves.  Decoding  is the process of turning communication into thoughts. For example, you may realize you’re hungry and encode the following message to send to your roommate: “I’m hungry. Do you want to get pizza tonight?” As your roommate receives the message, they decode your communication and turn it back into thoughts to make meaning.

Of course, you don’t just communicate verbally—you have various options, or channels, for communication. Encoded messages are sent through a channel, or a sensory route, on which a message travels to the receiver for decoding. While communication can be sent and received using any sensory route (sight, smell, touch, taste, or sound), most communication occurs through visual (sight) and/or auditory (sound) channels. If your roommate has headphones on and is engrossed in a video game, you may need to get their attention by waving your hands before you can ask them about dinner.

The  transmission model of communication describes communication as a linear, one-way process in which a sender intentionally transmits a message to a receiver (Ellis & McClintock, 1990). This model focuses on the sender and message within a communication encounter. Although the receiver is included in the model, this role is viewed as more of a target or endpoint rather than part of an ongoing process. You are left to presume that the receiver either successfully receives and understands the message or does not. Think of how a radio message is sent from a person in the radio studio to you listening in your car. The sender is the radio announcer who encodes a verbal message that is transmitted by a radio tower through electromagnetic waves (the channel) and eventually reaches your (the receiver’s) ears via an antenna and speakers in order to be decoded. The radio announcer doesn’t really know if you receive their message or not, but if the equipment is working and the channel is free of static, then there is a good chance that the message was successfully received.

The  interaction model  of communication describes communication as a process in which participants alternate positions as sender and receiver and generate meaning by sending messages and receiving feedback within physical and psychological contexts (Schramm, 1997). Rather than illustrating communication as a linear, one-way process, the interaction model incorporates feedback, which makes communication a more interactive, two-way process. Feedback includes messages sent in response to other messages. For example, your instructor may respond to a point you raise during class discussion or you may point to the sofa when your roommate asks you where the remote control is. The inclusion of a feedback loop also leads to a more complex understanding of the roles of participants in a communication encounter. Rather than having one sender, one message, and one receiver, this model has two sender-receivers who exchange messages. Each participant alternates roles as sender and receiver in order to keep a communication encounter going. Although this seems like a perceptible and deliberate process, you alternate between the roles of sender and receiver very quickly and often without conscious thought.

The  transaction model  of communication describes communication as a process in which communicators generate social realities within social, relational, and cultural contexts. In this model, you don’t just communicate to exchange messages; you communicate to create relationships, form intercultural alliances, shape your self-concepts, and engage with others in dialogue to create communities. In short, you don’t communicate about your realities; communication helps to construct your realities (and the realities of others).

The roles of sender and receiver in the transaction model of communication differ significantly from the other models. Instead of labelling participants as senders and receivers, the people in a communication encounter are referred to as communicators. Unlike the interaction model, which suggests that participants alternate positions as sender and receiver, the transaction model suggests that you are simultaneously a sender and a receiver. For example, when meeting a new friend, you send verbal messages about your interests and background, your companion reacts nonverbally. You don’t wait until you are done sending your verbal message to start receiving and decoding the nonverbal messages of your new friend. Instead, you are simultaneously sending your verbal message and receiving your friend’s nonverbal messages. This is an important addition to the model because it allows you to understand how you are able to adapt your communication—for example, adapting a verbal message—in the middle of sending it based on the communication you are simultaneously receiving from your communication partner.

Eight Essential Components of Communication

The communication process can be broken down into a series of eight essential components, each of which serves an integral function in the overall process:

Environment

Interference.

The source imagines, creates, and sends the message. The source encodes the message by choosing just the right order or the best words to convey the intended meaning and presents or sends the information to the audience (receiver). By watching for the audience’s reaction, the source perceives how well they received the message and responds with clarification or supporting information.

“The message is the stimulus or meaning produced by the source for the receiver or audience” (McLean, 2005). The message brings together words to convey meaning but is also about how it’s conveyed — through nonverbal cues, organization, grammar, style, and other elements.

“The channel is the way in which a message or messages travel between source and receiver.” (McLean, 2005). Spoken channels include face-to-face conversations, speeches, phone conversations and voicemail messages, radio, public address systems, and Skype. Written channels include letters, memorandums, purchase orders, invoices, newspaper and magazine articles, blogs, email, text messages, tweets, and so forth.

“The receiver receives the message from the source, analyzing and interpreting the message in ways both intended and unintended by the source” (McLean, 2005).

When you respond to the source, intentionally or unintentionally, you are giving feedback. Feedback is composed of messages the receiver sends back to the source. Verbal or nonverbal, all these feedback signals allow the source to see how well, how accurately (or how poorly and inaccurately) the message was received (Leavitt & Mueller, 1951).

“The environment is the atmosphere, physical and psychological, where you send and receive messages” (McLean, 2005). Surroundings, people, animals, technology, can all influence your communication.

“The context of the communication interaction involves the setting, scene, and expectations of the individuals involved” (McLean, 2005). A professional communication context may involve business suits (environmental cues) that directly or indirectly influence expectations of language and behaviour among the participants.

Interference, also called noise, can come from any source. “Interference is anything that blocks or changes the source’s intended meaning of the message” (McLean, 2005). This can be external or internal/psychological. Noise interferes with normal encoding and decoding of the message carried by the channel between source and receiver.

Your Responsibilities as a Communicator – 4 tips

Whenever you speak or write in a business environment, you have certain responsibilities to your audience, your employer, and your profession. Your audience comes to you with an inherent set of expectations that is your responsibility to fulfill. The specific expectations may change given the context or environment, but two central ideas will remain: be prepared, and be ethical.

Preparation

Being prepared means that you have selected a topic appropriate to your audience, gathered enough information to cover the topic well, put your information into a logical sequence, and considered how best to present it.

Organization

Being organized involves the steps or points that lead your communication to a conclusion. Once you’ve invested time in researching your topic, you will want to narrow your focus to a few key points and consider how you’ll present them. You also need to consider how to link your main points together for your audience so they can follow your message from point to point.

You need to have a clear idea in your mind of what you want to say before you can say it clearly to someone else. It involves considering your audience, as you will want to choose words and phrases they understand and avoid jargon or slang that may be unfamiliar to them. Clarity also involves presentation and appropriate use of technology.

Conciseness

Concise means to be brief and to the point. In most business communications you are expected to ‘get down to business’ right away. Being prepared includes being able to state your points clearly and support them with trustworthy evidence in a relatively straightforward, linear way. Be concise in your choice of words, organization, and even visual aids. Being concise also involves being sensitive to time constraints. Be prepared to be punctual and adhere to deadlines or time limits. Some cultures also have a less strict interpretation of time schedules and punctuality. While it is important to recognize that different cultures have different expectations, the general rule holds true that good business communication does not waste words or time.

Ethics in Communication

Communicating ethically involves being egalitarian, respectful, and trustworthy—overall, practising the “golden rule” of treating your audience the way you would want to be treated. Communication can move communities, influence cultures, and change history. It can motivate people to take a stand, consider an argument, or purchase a product. The degree to which you consider both the common good and fundamental principles you hold to be true when crafting your message directly relates to how your message will affect others.

The Ethical Communicator Is Egalitarian

The word “egalitarian” comes from the root “equal.” To be egalitarian is to believe in basic equality: that all people should share equally in the benefits and burdens of a society. It means that everyone is entitled to the same respect, expectations, access to information, and rewards of participation in a group. To communicate in an egalitarian manner, speak and write in a way that is comprehensible and relevant to all your listeners or readers, not just those who are ‘like you’ in terms of age, gender, race or ethnicity, or other characteristics. In business, an effective communicator seeks to unify the audience by using ideas and language that are appropriate for all the message’s readers or listeners.

The Ethical Communicator Is Respectful

People are influenced by emotions as well as logic. The ethical communicator will be passionate and enthusiastic without being disrespectful. Losing one’s temper and being abusive are generally regarded as showing a lack of professionalism (and could even involve legal consequences for you or your employer). When you disagree strongly with a coworker, feel deeply annoyed with a difficult customer, or find serious fault with a competitor’s product, it is important to express such sentiments respectfully.

The Ethical Communicator Is Trustworthy

Trust is a key component in communication, and this is especially true in business. Your goal as a communicator is to build a healthy relationship with your audience and to do that you must show them how they can trust you and why the information you are about to share with them is believable. Your audience will expect that what you say is the truth as you understand it. This means that you have not intentionally omitted, deleted, or taken information out of context simply to prove your points. They will listen to what you say and how you say it, but also to what you don’t say or do. Being worthy of trust is something you earn with an audience. Many wise people have observed that trust is hard to build but easy to lose.

The “Golden Rule”

When in doubt, remember the “golden rule,” which is to treat others the way you would like to be treated. In all its many forms, the golden rule incorporates human kindness, cooperation, and reciprocity across cultures, languages, backgrounds, ad interests. Regardless of where you travel, with whom you communicate or what your audience is like, remember how you would feel if you were on the receiving end of your communication and act accordingly.

Being a good communicator is essential to becoming a successful business person. Therefore, it is important to learn how to communicate well. The first step in that process is understanding what effective communication means. This will help you to evaluate and improve your communication skills.

End of Chapter Activities

1a. thinking about the content.

What are your key takeaways from this chapter? What is something you have learned or something you would like to add from your experience?

1b. Review Questions

Discussion Questions

• Recall one time you felt offended or insulted in a conversation. What contributed to your perception?
• When someone lost your trust, were they able to earn it back?
• Does the communicator have a responsibility to the audience? Does the audience have a responsibility to the speaker? Why or why not?

1c. Applying chapter concepts to a situation

Communicating with a supervisor

Mako is an international student enrolled in a post-degree program in Vancouver. She has been working at a grocery store for the past three months on Tuesdays, Thursdays and Fridays when she doesn’t have class. Mako enjoys working at the grocery store and gets along well with her colleagues and supervisor. Customers often comment on her professionalism and friendliness and she has noticed that her communication skills have improved.

When she applied for the job and filled out her available hours, she made sure to state that she could only work a maximum of 20 hours per week as an international student. She mentioned it once more during the interview and was told it would not be a problem.

Since then her supervisor has asked her to work overtime in a few instances to accommodate a colleague who was running late. That was not a problem. However, recently her supervisor asked if she could pick up an extra shift for two weeks because one colleague was out sick. Mako is not comfortable working so many hours over her maximum, but she is worried her supervisor might be upset and think she is not a team player.

What should Mako do? How should she communicate her decision to her supervisor?

1d. Summary Writing

Read this article from Salesforce.com on the 10 Must-Have Communication Skills for Business Success . Summarize the article and identify which of these skills you would like to improve.

Content Attribution

This chapter contains content from Communication for Business Professionals – Canadian Edition which was adapted from Business Communication for Success in 2013 by  University of Minnesota Libraries Publishing  through the  eLearning Support Initiative . The 2018 revision continues to be licensed with a Creative Commons license (CC BY-NC-SA) following the precedent of a publisher who has requested that they and the original author not receive attribution.

Ellis, R. and Ann McClintock,  You Take My Meaning: Theory into Practice in Human Communication  (London: Edward Arnold, 1990), 71.

Leavitt, H., & Mueller, R. (1951). Some effects of feedback on communication.  Human Relations, 4 , 401–410.

McLean, S. (2003).  The basics of speech communication . Boston, MA: Allyn & Bacon.

McLean, S. (2005).  The basics of interpersonal communication  (p. 10). Boston, MA: Allyn & Bacon.

NACE. (2018). Employers Want to See These Attributes on Students’ Resumes. Retrieved August 26, 2020, from https://www.naceweb.org/talent-acquisition/candidate-selection/employers-want-to-see-these-attributes-on-students-resumes/

Pearson, J. C., & Nelson, P. E. (2000).  An introduction to human communication: understanding and sharing . Boston: McGraw Hill.

Schramm, W.,  The Beginnings of Communication Study in America  (Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage, 1997).

Video Attribution

This chapter contains the video Types of Communication Interpersonal, Non Verbal, Written Oral Video Lesson Transcript Stud by Zaharul Hafiq from YouTube.com.

Chapter 1: Effective Business Communication Copyright © 2020 by Venecia Williams is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License , except where otherwise noted.

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Business Writing for Beginners (the Essentials), with Examples

February 2, 2022 - Sophie Thompson

Business writing is a professional piece of writing used to pass a message in a comprehensible and effective way. This could be a report, email, proposal, notice, speech, memo, PowerPoint presentation, and brochure, among others.

Business writing can be informational, instructional, transactional, or persuasive. As part of effective communication in a workplace, it must be proficient and concise. That means the grammar, sentence structure, and use of language must be on point.

The ability to convey information succinctly and accurately in a business setting is vital, especially in this era, whereby audiences are busy. Careless mistakes can make customers question the products or services on offer.

Or it can leave employees and associates wondering what else the organisation has been negligent in.

To inspire clients, invite partners, or encourage workers, there are various ways to make a message stand out in business writing.

1. Understanding the audience

The reader takes centre stage in business writing. So, when advertising a business, the focus should be on what the customer needs rather than what the seller knows.

Often, a message intended for everyone appeals to no one. That is why it is crucial to know the readers, whether young, highly educated, urban, or fashionable. That way, it is easier to address their most pressing matters.

Example : ABC company is advertising services targeted at  Gen Z (zoomers) , the hyper-connected generation. First, ABC should keep in mind that this is a tech-centred audience that is very active on social media. They jump from one thing to the next in no time or multitask. Captivating the zoomers may take twice as much effort as it would for the millennials. There’s no need for long-form advertisements as Gen Z easily loses focus. Yet, they can quickly absorb simple, captivating content on Instagram stories, TikTok, and Snapchat. If ABC wants to use video, then it should showcase the service in the first few seconds; otherwise, the brand will lose social interactions.

Another key aspect of the audience is the demographic traits. These are the common attributes of a particular audience. Men may see things differently from women, for instance.

If a business is doing a PowerPoint presentation on iron deficiency, the slides would include more data on the best sources of iron during a menstrual cycle and pregnancy. This information would not be needed if the audience were men.

The age, employment status, and education level of the target audience matter a lot. A highly educated audience can grasp scholarly language, but first-year college students might need simplified terminologies.

Recognising that individuals and cultural norms are dynamic enhances intercultural communication. It is imperative to be aware of the perceptions of the target audience and to practice fairness.

This requires non-judgmental business communication that is open-minded, bearing in mind that some ideas can be strongly opposed because of differences in values and beliefs.

2. Correct format

Documents come in different formats. Some useful formatting elements include:

• Titles and subtitles to separate categories
• Brief paragraphs
• Plenty of white space with bulleted and numbered lists
• Indented text as a sub-element of the previous message

When it comes to emails and other forms of online communications, paragraphs should not exceed seven lines. Lengthy sentences  reduce readability  and most people are likely to jump an enormous block of text.

Headings and sub-headings help to scan the information more efficiently. On the other hand, indented paragraphs help to emphasize the hierarchy of information.

While dangling expressions may add an element of fun, it is best to avoid them altogether in business writing. Many times, they creep in when copy-pasting documents in bullets.

Example : Ximena took plenty of photos before flying back to Spain using her GoPro camera.

The reader might wonder how a GoPro camera can serve as a mode of transport in the example provided above.

3. Honing clarity

One mistake that communications managers make is creating bloated documents. The fewer the words, the better. Bloat happens when sloppy verbs are used. The first step to evade this blunder is cutting unnecessary words.

Focusing on action verbs is the best approach to enhancing clarity. Readers get bored when a piece of writing contains little action or unclear verbs.

A verb must play its role well without overwhelming the audience with add-ons. Similarly, good business writing doesn’t always need adverbs. It is better off to incorporate powerful verbs that do not require modifiers.

Example : Alexander passionately loves the urban lifestyle.

A more powerful form of this sentence would be: Alexander treasures the urban lifestyle.

Decades ago, business writers thought big words showcased intelligence. But the truth is short, simple words have more impact. Unless employed wisely,  ten-dollar words  may sound redundant and exaggerated. They are awkward to read and hard to understand.

Here are examples of ten-dollar words and their synonyms.

• Magnanimous- kind
• Predilection- fondness
• Feckless- incompetent
• Chimera- monster
• Facetious- amusing
• Incongruous- twisted
• Indiscriminately- needlessly

4. Structure

Business writing must achieve its original purpose. It is okay to write down thoughts as they occur, but it is more important to bring order to the succession of ideas. The concept must be clear.

“If you cannot explain it to a six-year-old, then you don’t understand it yourself.” – Albert Einstein.

A complex idea with multiple angles, requests, and questions must be outlined before composing the message. An outline or draft saves time in clarifying points later. That said, a good business writer must think from the reader’s perspective.

This helps to anticipate questions from the audience. The context should be good enough to explain what is in the text. If not, all the blanks must be filled in.

However, there’s no need to go overboard explaining concepts. The goal is to provide enough information without overwhelming readers with trivial details.

5. Confident tone

A confident tone is calm and assuring. It doesn’t use too many conjunctions, leaving the reader out of breath. On the other hand, a tone that is trying hard to impress may sound desperate and turn off the reader.

Here are two examples: a desperate tone vs. a confident tone.

Travelling with us is the best decision you can make today, and you can rest assured of safety. If you book with us, you don’t need to worry about anything, and you can continue with your day-to-day activity knowing that we are in charge of your holiday plans.

Travel with us today easily and safely. Book with us and let us do the rest for you. Relax knowing that your vacation plan is in able hands.

Many business people are tempted to write the way they talk. This could be a positive thing, as it maintains a conversational tone. However, rambling in several sentences without getting to the point can make a document sound unconvincing.

Prepositional phrases often render business correspondence unnecessarily wordy. Prepositions should be used prudently to give the writing much-needed clarity. Using active voice eliminates dispensable prepositional phrases, e.g.

“The house was built by a famous Swedish architect” could be rephrased to “A famous Swedish architect built the house.”

Another tip to avoid unnecessary prepositions is the use of adverbs, e.g.,

“The tool operates with vigour,” could be shortened to “The tool operates vigorously.”

6. No fluff

Fluff content adds no value to a sentence. While  filler words  seem to add colour, they are the enemy of compelling emails or product descriptions. It is possible to get to the point by implementing these tips:

• Tightening up the introduction
• Limiting adjectives and adverbs
• Avoiding jargon
• Not stating the obvious
• Staying on topic
• Editing and proofreading

Some words and phrases are worthless in business writing: actually, absolutely, completely, kind of, sort of, really, just, and literally.

It is hard to grab the readers’ attention with jargon. The content should sound like a human. Jargon speeches are the easiest way to bore and confuse the reader. Information targeted at the average person flows naturally.

Adjectives are great, but too many of them become filler words. A lot of people tend to misuse the words ‘incredible’ and ‘amazing.’ Descriptive words can make an article exciting, but readers might question the credibility of the business. Similarly, adverbs should be used in moderation.

Lastly, business writing should not state the obvious or include clichés. For instance, a restaurant manager is drafting a grand opening press release. The document can include the exact time and date of opening, the location, web address, and the type of food to be served. But there’s no need to write a section on the topic ‘how to make burgers.’

If statements cause readers to roll their eyes, then there’s a problem in writing. Even though most prospects are seeking knowledge, they don’t need repetitive explanations. The most effective message is hyper-targeted to the topic.

Any piece of business writing must keep the reader’s interest at the forefront. Most people don’t have the time to recap lengthy messages, so a formal document must be captivating in the first few sentences. The greatest challenge is to maintain clarity.

While trying to make a statement as brief as possible, it is easier to lose the original meaning.

Ultimately, good business writing gives a company the credibility it deserves. Poor writing skills present a brand as less qualified than the competition. Very few customers will be willing to pay for services if the ads contain obvious mistakes.

In the words of Mark Twain, “To get the right word in the right place is a rare achievement,” but good writing can be achieved as long as it relays what a brand represents.

Business Speech

Business speech generator.

In relation to the upcoming 90th Academy Awards this March 2018, you may have known of Leonardo DiCaprio. It took him at least 22 years and 5 attempts before finally winning an Oscar in 2016 with as he starred in the movie The Revenant . Among all his other nominated movies for best actor, there was one particular motion picture that brought out the best of him as a ruthless and determined salesman. And that was The Wolf of Wall Street  which was released in 2013. You may also see motivational speech .

• Inspirational Speech Examples
• Speech Outline Examples

To give you an idea on what the movie is about, DiCaprio stars as real life Wall Street stockbroker Jordan Belfort. Under the employment of a certain Mark Hanna (played by Matthew McConaughey), he begins to learn that a stockbroker’s only job is to make money for himself. He runs out of a job after Black Monday and finds himself under the new employment at a boiler room brokerage firm specializing in penny stocks. Little by little, he starts to make a small fortune thanks to his aggressive pitching style and the high commissions. You may also see introduction speech

Fast forward, he and his neighbor Danny Porush founded Stratton Oakmont, an “over-the-counter” brokerage house that practices the pump and dump scam in Long Island, New York making money illegally faster than they anticipate. Thanks to the valiant efforts of the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), his company was closed and under his reduced prison sentence started hosting seminars on sales technique. You may also see thank-you speech

Despite its dishonesty, it is a proven fact that he was one heck of a sales personnel. Even before Stratton Oakmont, he sounded convincing enough to let a client purchase penny stocks from him because of his persistence. Just like any other speech, business speeches have to be thought out and must inspire the people those working for you. You may also see informative speech

Examples of Writing an Inspirational Business Speech

Here are three examples of writing an inspirational business speech which will aid you in delivering one for your company or for a client.

Know Your Audience

It is critical to have a good understanding to know who you’re going to be speaking to. If not, there will be no common ground that you and the audience to stand on and vice versa causing misunderstanding. Try to conduct a bit of research about them so that both the audience and you have something that you share with each other. You may also see special occasion speech .

Most likely, your audience will come from the business or general public sector likely your audience depending on the type of clients your business caters to. Here are some questions that the speaker should try to research on:

• What’s the job function of the  aud ience members that represent the businesses sector?
• What’s would be the s ize and i ndustry of those companies if your listeners represent different companies?
• Do they have pressing concerns?
• What is the age range of the audience?
• Are your audience members present clients, prospective clients, or a mix of both?

If it so happens that you will be delivering the speech in a conference room, chances are that you can ask the event organizer on the demographic of your attendees. From there, you will be able to get an idea on how to adjust your content according to their preference to allow the audience to comprehend better. Just as there are countless of types of audiences, be sure to adapt and adjust to their cultural differences. You may also see presentation speech

Know Your Subject

Just because you are the speaker, it does not mean that you can just rely on what you prepared for your speech and deliver it as it is. It does not hurt to do a little more research on your topic. The more knowledgeable you are about something, the better. Do not feel threatened or intimidated when the audience will raise a question. Find the time to entertain the question. Your audience may know something that you do not. It is serves as an opportunity to gain insight from them as well.You may also see welcome speech

Have a Vision

Purpose. The heart and soul of the business speech. Not just the content alone, but the direction you would want your audience to follow after listening to you. Do not be a “garbage-in-garbage-out” kind of speaker wherein at the end of the day, your audience does not do or has not learned anything from that speech. But be that kind of speaker to leave a lasting impression to your audience to make them follow in your footsteps to allow them to become just like you may also see self-introduction speech

We hope we aided you in creating an outline for your own future business speech. Convince that client and close that sale with our examples on how to write a business speech.

Text prompt

• Instructive
• Professional

Create a Business Speech outlining your company's vision for the future.

Write a Business Speech for a product innovation conference.

How to Write Work Emails in German

Vanessa Richie

As you learn the German language, you’ve probably put a lot of focus on conversation and passive learning . Another aspect that you are almost certainly going to need to know is email etiquette. It’s not an area that most people consider, but it is just as important to communicate through email in German as it is in English . Since you are going to write emails in German, you should know what to do - and what to avoid.

Most people don’t have traditional pen pals anymore – they communicate through something like email for similar kinds of connections.

Whether you write to someone for fun, for work, or for something else, knowing proper email etiquette gives you another way to practice the language.

Here are some tips and tricks to help you write emails in German – after all, it’s a great way to get your thoughts written down and feel confident in your writing abilities.

6 Common Ways of Beginning Emails in German

A lot of schools teach how to start a letter correctly, and emails tend to have the same type of rules. It’s not quite like texting where you usually know the person you are texting. It’s a way of talking quickly, so addressing someone isn’t really relevant.

For an email, the address is a way of verifying that the email is going to the right person. If someone sees that the name at the top is not their’s, they will probably stop reading because they can immediately see it isn’t for them. Of course, some people may keep reading, but at least they know it isn’t for them.

In English, you are taught to start your letters with phrases like Dear or To Whom It May Concern. German also has a few options of how to start an email.

However, they are more aware of being formal when they are not related to or close to the person they are addressing. They have an entirely different way of addressing people who are just acquaintances, even in conversation. You will need to be more formal in composing an email, as well.

The following are the common ways of beginning your email.

When you finish with the salutation, take a moment to go back and make sure you’ve got the right adjective ending. You don’t want to say Sehr geehrte Herr Schmidt or Sehr geehrter Frau Herrman because that sets the wrong tone for the rest of the email.

Setting the Tone - Formal vs Informal Emails in German

You’ll want to set a tone using the right form of German. If you are writing a work email , make sure to keep all of the conjugations in formal German and use proper addresses for people. It’s a great chance to practice being polite since you probably won’t use formal German as often in conversation – unless you are actually in a German speaking country.

If it is a formal email, such as a work email, remember to refrain from using slang as well. This should be fairly easy as you will want to keep the email concise. The closest you will come to small talk is in the salutation.

Formal German is actually a bit more challenging because you have to be more mindful of conjugations and adjective endings over the entire body of the email. When you are writing an informal email you can ramble and chat as much as you like since that is pretty much what you do when you catch up with someone.

Writing friends and family is a great way to really practice your German. You don’t want to treat your email partner as a teacher, but as a friend for most of your emails. This means you can not only use slang, you can add things like emojis and other images to be more playful and engaging.

Something to keep in mind when you email in German, you don’t use a capital letter for the first sentence of the email. That’s because the sentence actually starts with the greeting. The comma that you add after the introduction indicates that it is a break in the first sentence, and not a new sentence.

This may look a little odd, especially if you start off with “ich habe…” since German speakers don’t capitalize “ich” like English speakers capitalize “I.” The only time you would capitalize “I” is at the beginning of a sentence, and in this case, the “I” isn’t at the beginning.

8 ways of Closing Out Work Emails in German

After spending a good bit of time making sure that you get the ending right, especially if you are writing a formal email . Just like with the salutation, you have a number of choices for the way you want to close your email.

Here are the most common ways of wrapping up a formal letter:

Obviously, you will want to choose the response that meets your situation. If you expect a response, you will want to choose an ending phrase that reflects that. If not, you can use one of the more typical endings.

If you are closing out an informal email, you have a few choices:

Notice that you don’t add a comma at this point in German, but you do in English. It’s actually the thing that you will probably take the longest to get right because people tend to be tired after writing a full email. It’s easy to feel over confident or mentally drained, so you are more likely to make this easy mistake at the end – if nothing else, you may add a comma out of habit.

Don’t forget to add your name after your email closer.

Getting the Other Components Right

Since you’ve probably sent a lot of emails, you know that there are a few other considerations to sending one than just the email body. Here are a few additional tips to help you to master those other email parts.

Staying Current with Email Etiquette in German

Like traditional letter writing, email etiquette doesn’t tend to change much over time. To make sure you stay current, make emailing someone a regular part of your schedule. This can be daily or weekly – and that’s what makes having an email pen pal ideal for making sure you don’t lose your German skills. A lot of German speakers will be happy to help point out where you make mistakes or to offer advice.

Once you get used to writing emails, it’s pretty easy to keep this skill current. All you have to do is make sure that you have someone to email in German to keep your skills from getting rusty.

Speechling is a nonprofit app and website that combines human coaching with technology to improve your foreign language speaking.

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Writing effective IEP goals for AAC

• 6 minute read
• September 2, 2024

Writing individual learning goals for students learning to use AAC can be challenging. However, ensuring quality goals in their individual education plans (IEPs) is crucial to supporting AAC use.

Educational goals in IEPs

The most common place to find goals for school-aged learners is in their Individualized Education Plan (IEP). An IEP is a legal document that outlines the additional support and accommodations a student receives in school in the United States. The IEP also captures each student’s current skills in a section titled “Present Level of Academic Achievement and Functional Performance (PLAAFP).” This portion of the IEP serves as a baseline to guide the rest of the IEP planning, including what goal areas will be addressed for the next 12-month period. These may include academic goals, communication goals, safety, and self-care. The common thread is that each IEP goal must support that student’s specific needs, be linked to learning the curriculum, and relate to their role as a learner in the school setting.

Writing better goals for AAC learning

The communication goals for students using AAC may directly target AAC skills (such as operating their device) or target specific language areas. Sometimes, communication goals are not structured in a way that leads to expanding communication but to a specific task. Here are four things to keep in mind when writing IEP goals for someone learning to use AAC.

1. Measure observable communication rather than mastery

It is common for speech and language goals to target 80% accuracy on a specific task or skill. But consider that when working on early communication skills, it’s often inappropriate to write goals requiring a student to perform a skill on 8 out of 10 opportunities.

For example, an accuracy-based goal might say:

“Student will use the phrase, “I want __(food or drink)_” when they are hungry or thirsty on 8/10 opportunities.”

But let’s think about this.

While we can create opportunities by making food or drink available, we don’t know whether a child is really hungry or thirsty. If they do not request an item, how do we know if it was an “error” or if they just weren’t thirsty? They may understand the skill but not demonstrate it when an adult expects them to.

Goals have to be measurable, but the measure of success does not need to be “accuracy.” Consider other observable signs that are meaningful to that individual. Some examples of observable communication behaviors that you can measure include:

• The amount of time a student remains within the proximity of AAC modeling & instruction
• The amount of time a student stays engaged as an adult or peer uses AAC
• The number of times they seek out an adult with AAC
• The number of times they look at, reach, or tap the screen of an AAC system.

Think about what type of engagement is observable, skills that can be supported through targeted practice, and opportunities that can be measured over time.

2. Measure progress over time

Goals are typically designed to cover a year of learning and progress, with incremental progress reported at marking periods. It is common for IEP teams to gather updated data on goals when progress reports are due. To do this, school teams often test students to see if they’ve achieved that goal. Remember that testing a targeted skill at a specific time, using a manufactured opportunity, may not reflect the actual understanding and growth of the student. It may be hard to see incremental gains when measuring a student’s ability in a single moment.

Instead, IEP goals can capture growth through an observational period. When creating goals, the IEP team gets to decide the time frame attached to the metrics. For example, the conditions for mastery could be:

“ Student will initiate a greeting with a peer three times over two weeks of documented observations ,” or

“ Student will explore their AAC vocabulary as evidenced by activation of at least 40 unique words over the course of four weeks. ”

The duration of a reporting period varies based on the student, the environment, and the specific skill that’s being measured. Remember that various members of the IEP can support data collection on goal progress. Perhaps there’s a monthly tally sheet in the classroom, and staff jot down a note when they see that skill throughout the day. Spreading out the measurement period encourages broader carryover and implementation.

3. Address patterns that we’d like to see rather than one specific skill

Sometimes, we write ourselves into a corner by creating highly specific IEP goals.

Consider goals that build on a broad set of skills, such as a communication function. For example:

Narrow goal: “Student will use the word, “like” to indicate preference or enjoyment.”

Broad goal: “Student will express opinions in response to people, activities, or objects throughout their school day.”

This broader goal allows for more opportunities to practice the skill of “expressing opinions.” It also recognizes that a student may comment on more than positive opinions, such as “like.” They might want to say something is “gross,” “bad,” or “stinky.” These are also valid opinions and provide motivating opportunities to many students.

4. Embed the conditions that a student needs to be successful

To give students the best chance of success, we need to ensure they’ve had ample time to learn about AAC and targeted language skills. This means giving the student time to observe a new skill and participate in explicit language instruction. Over time and exposure, students build their language skills and learn when and how symbols are used.

IEP goals need to be written to ensure the student is provided with sufficient learning opportunities. One way to do this is to add the conditions required for a goal to be mastered. What does the student need in order to have ample opportunities to practice this skill? These conditions for learning or ‘condition statements’ often fit at the beginning of a goal. For example:

“Given daily core vocabulary instruction during literacy centers, student will independently use at least four core words throughout the school day.”

Other possible condition statements include:

• Given unrestricted access to AAC systems…
• Following staff modeling by attributing meaning…
• Provided with daily demonstration of novel AAC use…
• After providing peer-led opportunities to engage with AAC…

When goals are nested within the conditions they need to thrive, the IEP team has extra assurance that those supports are clearly listed for any team member who targets these goals.

Share with your IEP Team

If there are additional considerations you’d like to embed into your students’ IEPs, talk to the IEP team about it. It’s not uncommon for schools to have preferred ways they like to see goals written. But remember, IEP goals are designed to be relevant and individualized to each student. As you think about new ways to target AAC goals, talk to your IEP team about what this goal will look like in action.

While the IEP process may be unique to some parts of the world, the need for establishing goals is universal. Whether in the schools or a clinical setting, these ideas are designed to support meaningful AAC learning all year.

Speech-Language Pathologist

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6.2 Writing Style

Learning objective.

• Demonstrate your ability to prepare and present information using a writing style that will increase understanding, retention, and motivation to act.

You are invited to a business dinner at an expensive restaurant that has been the top-rated dining establishment in your town for decades. You are aware of the restaurant’s dress code, which forbids casual attire such as jeans, T-shirts, and sneakers. What will you wear? If you want to fit in with the other guests and make a favorable impression on your hosts, you will choose a good quality suit or dress (and appropriately dressy shoes and accessories). You will avoid calling undue attention to yourself with clothing that is overly formal—an evening gown or a tuxedo, for example—or that would distract from the business purpose of the occasion by being overly revealing or provocative. You may feel that your freedom to express yourself by dressing as you please is being restricted, or you may appreciate the opportunity to look your best. Either way, adhering to these style conventions will serve you well in a business context.

Your writing style reflects on you when you are not there to represent yourself. Make sure your style is professional.

Pixabay – CC0 Public Domain.

The same is true in business writing. Unlike some other kinds of writing such as poetry or fiction, business writing is not an opportunity for self-expression. Instead it calls for a fairly conservative and unadorned style. Writing style , also known as voice or tone, is the manner in which a writer addresses the reader. It involves qualities of writing such as vocabulary and figures of speech, phrasing, rhythm, sentence structure, and paragraph length. Developing an appropriate business writing style will reflect well on you and increase your success in any career.

Formal versus Informal

There was a time when many business documents were written in third person to give them the impression of objectivity. This formal style was often passive and wordy. Today it has given way to active, clear, concise writing, sometimes known as “Plain English” (Bailey, 2008). As business and industry increasingly trade across borders and languages, writing techniques that obscure meaning or impede understanding can cause serious problems. Efficient writing styles have become the norm. Still, you will experience in your own writing efforts this “old school versus new school” writing debate over abbreviations, contractions, and the use of informal language in what was once considered a formal business context. Consider the following comparison of informal versus formal and bureaucratic styles.

Bureaucratic: Attached is the latest delivery data represented in topographical forms pursuant to the directive ABC123 of the air transportation guide supplied by the Federal Aviation Administration in September of 2008.

• Formal – Please note the attached delivery data for July 2009.
• Informal – Here’s the delivery data for last month.

While it is generally agreed that bureaucratic forms can obscure meaning, there is a debate on the use of formal versus informal styles in business communication. Formal styles often require more detail, adhere to rules of etiquette, and avoid shortcuts like contractions and folksy expressions. Informal styles reflect everyday speech patterns and may include contractions and colloquial expressions. Many managers prefer not to see contractions in a formal business context. Others will point out that a comma preceding the last item in a series (known as the “serial comma”) is the standard, not the exception. Some will make a general recommendation that you should always “keep it professional.” Here lies the heart of the debate: what is professional writing in a business context? If you answered “it depends,” you are correct.

Keep in mind that audiences have expectations and your job is to meet them. Some business audiences prefer a fairly formal tone. If you include contractions or use a style that is too casual, you may lose their interest and attention; you may also give them a negative impression of your level of expertise. If, however, you are writing for an audience that expects informal language, you may lose their interest and attention by writing too formally; your writing may also come across as arrogant or pompous. It is not that one style is better than the other, but simply that styles of writing vary across a range of options. Business writing may need to meet legal standards and include references, as we see in the bureaucratic example above, but that is generally not the norm for communications within an organization. The skilled business writer will know his or her audience and will adapt the message to best facilitate communication. Choosing the right style can make a significant impact on how your writing is received.

You may hear reference to a conversational tone in writing as one option in business communication. A conversational tone , as the name implies, resembles oral communication in style, tone, and word choice. It can be appropriate for some audiences, and may serve you well in specific contexts, but it can easily come across as less than professional.

If you use expressions that imply a relationship or a special awareness of information such as “you know,” or “as we discussed,” without explaining the necessary background, your writing may be seen as overly familiar, intimate, or even secretive. Trust is the foundation for all communication interactions and a careless word or phrase can impair trust.

If you want to use humor, think carefully about how your audience will interpret it. Humor is a fragile form of communication that requires an awareness of irony, of juxtaposition, or a shared sense of attitudes, beliefs, and values. Different people find humor in different situations, and what is funny to one person may be dull, or even hurtful, to someone else.

Although there are business situations such as an interview or a performance self-evaluation where you need to state your accomplishments, in general business writing it is best to avoid self-referential comments that allude to your previous successes. These can come across as selfish or arrogant. Instead, be generous in giving credit where credit is due. Take every opportunity to thank your colleagues for their efforts and to acknowledge those who contributed good ideas.

Jargon is a vocabulary that has been developed by people in a particular group, discipline, or industry, and it can be a useful shorthand as long as the audience knows its meaning. For example, when writing for bank customers, you could refer to “ATM transactions” and feel confident that your readers would know what you meant. It would be unnecessary and inappropriate to write “Automated Teller Machine transactions.” Similarly, if you were working in a hospital, you would probably use many medical terms in your interactions with other medical professionals. However, if you were a hospital employee writing to a patient, using medical jargon would be inappropriate, as it would not contribute to the patient’s understanding.

Sewing, like many other fields of expertise, has its own jargon.

plaisanter~ – Sewing – CC BY-SA 2.0.

Finally, in a business context, remember that conversational style is not an excuse to use poor grammar, disrespectful or offensive slang, or profanity. Communication serves as the bridge between minds and your written words will represent you in your absence. One strategy when trying to use a conversation tone is to ask yourself, “Would I say it in this way to their face?” A follow-up question to consider is, “Would I say it in this way in front of everyone?” Your professional use of language is one the hallmark skills in business, and the degree to which you master its use will reflect itself in your success. Take care, take time, and make sure what you write communicates a professional tone that positively represents you and your organization.

Introductions: Direct and Indirect

Sometimes the first sentence is the hardest to write. When you know the two main opening strategies it may not make it any easier, but it will give a plan and form a framework. Business documents often incorporate one of two opening strategies regardless of their organizational pattern. The direct pattern states the main purpose directly, at the beginning, and leaves little room for misinterpretation. The indirect pattern, where you introduce your main idea after the opening paragraph, can be useful if you need a strong opening to get the attention of what you perceive may be an uninterested audience. Normally, if you expect a positive response from the reader you will choose a direct opening, being clear from the first sentence about your purpose and goal. If you do not expect a positive reception, or have to deliver bad news, you may want to be less direct. Each style has its purpose and use; the skilled business writer will learn to be direct and be able to present bad news with a positive opening paragraph.

Adding Emphasis

There are times when you will want to add emphasis to a word, phrase, or statistic so that it stands out from the surrounding text. The use of visual aids in your writing can be an excellent option, and can reinforce the written discussion. For example, if you write that sales are up 4 percent over this time last year, the number alone may not get the attention it deserves. If, however, near the text section you feature a bar graph demonstrating the sales growth figures, the representation of the information in textual and graphical way may reinforce its importance.

As you look across the top of your word processing program you may notice bold , italics , underline, highlights, your choice of colors, and a host of interesting fonts. Although it can be entertaining to experiment with these visual effects, do not use them just for the sake of decoration. Consistency and branding are important features of your firm’s public image, so you will want the visual aspects of your writing to support that image. Still, when you need to highlight an important fact or emphasize a key question in a report, your readers will appreciate your use of visual effects to draw their attention. Consider the following examples:

• Bullets can be effective when used with discretion.

Take care when using the following:

• With subheadings
• In serial lists
• As they can get
• A bit overwhelming to the point where
• The reader loses his or her interest

Emphasis can be influenced by your choice of font. Serif fonts, such as Times New Roman and Garamond, have decorative ends that make the font easy to read. Sans serif fonts, like Arial, lack these visual cues and often serve better as headers.

You can also vary the emphasis according to where you place information within a sentence:

• Maximum emphasis . Sales have increased across the United States because of our latest promotion efforts in our largest and most successful market.
• Medium emphasis . Because of our latest promotion efforts in our largest and most successful market, sales have increased across the United States.
• Minimum emphasis . The United States, which has experienced a sales increase, is our largest and most successful market.

The information at end of the sentence is what people often recall, and is therefore normally considered the location of maximum emphasis. The second best position for recall is the beginning of the sentence, while the middle of the sentence is the area with the least recall. If you want to highlight a point, place it at the beginning or end of the sentence, and if you want to deemphasize a point, the middle is your best option (McLean, 2003).

Active versus Passive Voice

You want your writing to be engaging. Which sentence would you rather read?

• A – All sales orders are processed daily by Mackenzie.
• B – Mackenzie processes all sales orders daily.

Most readers prefer sentence B, but why? You’ll recall that all sentences have a subject and a verb, but you may not have paid much attention to their functions. Let’s look at how the subject and verb function in these two sentences. In sentence A, the subject is “Mackenzie,” and the subject is the doer of the action expressed by the verb (processes). In sentence A, the subject is “sales orders,” and the subject is the receiver of the action expressed by the verb (are processed). Sentence A is written in active voice —a sentence structure in which the subject carries out the action. Sentence B is written in passive voice —a sentence structure in which the subject receives the action.

Active sentences tend to be shorter, more precise, and easier to understand. This is especially true because passive sentences can be written in ways that do not tell the reader who the doer of the action is. For example, “All sales orders are processed daily” is a complete and correct sentence in passive voice.

Active voice is the clear choice for a variety of contexts, but not all. When you want to deemphasize the doer of the action, you may write, “Ten late arrivals were recorded this month” and not even mention who was late. The passive form doesn’t place blame or credit, so it can be more diplomatic in some contexts. Passive voice allows the writer to avoid personal references or personal pronouns (he, she, they) to create a more objective tone. There are also situations where the doer of the action is unknown, as in “graffiti was painted on the side of our building last night.”

Overall, business communication resources tend to recommend active voice as the preferred style. Still, the styles themselves are not the problem or challenge, but it is how we use them that matters. A skilled business writer will see both styles as options within a range of choices and learn to distinguish when each style is most appropriate to facilitate communication.

Commonly Confused Words

The sentences in Table 6.6 “Common Errors in English” focus on some of the most common errors in English. You may recall this exercise from the introduction of this chapter. How did you do? Visit the “Additional Resources” section at the end of the chapter for some resources on English grammar and usage.

Table 6.6 Common Errors in English

Making Errors at the Speed of Light

In business and industry there is increasing pressure to produce under deadlines that in some respects have been artificially accelerated by the immediacy inherent in technological communication devices. If you receive an e-mail or text message while you are in the middle of studying a complex problem, you may be tempted to “get it out of the way” by typing out a quick reply, but in your haste you may fail to qualify, include important information, or even check to make sure you have hit “Reply” and not “Reply to All” or even “Delete.” Take care to pause and review your text message, e-mail, or document before you consider it complete. Here is a quick electronic communication do/don’t list to keep in mind before you click “send.”

Do remember the following:

• Everything you access via an employer’s system is subject to inspection.
• Everything you write or record reflects you and your business or organization, even if it is stored in a Google or Yahoo! account.
• Respect personal space by not forwarding every e-mail you think is funny.
• Use a concise but relevant and informative phrase for the subject line.
• E-mail the receiver before sending large attachments, as they may exceed the limit of the receiver’s in-box.
• Attach your intended attachments.

Key Takeaway

An appropriate business writing style can be formal or informal, depending on the context, but it should always reflect favorably on the writer and the organization.

• Select at least three examples of writing from different kinds of sources, such as a government Web site, a textbook, a popular magazine, and a novel. According to the style characteristics discussed in this section, how would you characterize the style of each? Select a paragraph to rewrite in a different style—for example, if the style is formal, make it informal; if the selection is written in active voice, make it passive. Discuss your results with your classmates.
• What are some qualities of a good business writing style? What makes certain styles more appropriate for business than others? Discuss your thoughts with a classmate.
• Find an example of formal writing and write an informal version. Please share with your classmates.
• Find an example of informal writing and write a formal version. Please share with your classmates
• You are assigned to a work team that has to come up with a formal declaration and an informal explanation for the declaration. The declaration could be a memo indicating that your business will be observing a holiday (each team should have a different holiday).
• How would you characterize your writing style? Do you need to make modifications to make your style suitable for business writing? Write a one- to two-page essay on this subject.

Bailey, E. P. (2008). Plain English at work: A guide to business writing and speaking . New York, NY: McGraw-Hill.

McLean, S. (2003). The basics of speech communication . Boston, MA: Allyn & Bacon.

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