Questions and Answers of Business Communication Essentials

During the next week, write one quick goodwill note—email, text, or handwritten—every day. At the beginning of each day, think about someone to recognize, congratulate, thank, or offer
On Glassdoor, search for a company for which you might like to work. How well is management responding to reviews? Discuss your analysis in small groups.
Imagine that the company you searched for in Exercise 15 hires you as a social media consultant. They want your recommendations for ways they can improve management responses on Glassdoor. Write a
To provide further guidance to the company you focused on in Exercises 15 and 16, write a sample management response. Choose a highly positive employee review on Glassdoor and follow Yelp’s advice:
Choose a company that interests you and visit at least three social networks where it has a presence. Screen-capture a few posts from each site to compare. Does the company convey a similar voice
You read about American Airlines’ principles for writing tweets. Read a few recent tweets at https://twitter.com/AmericanAir and compare them to another airline’s writing style. Which sounds more
Now choose one of the organizations from Exercise 20 and visit it on different social platforms. What does the company do to engage customers?Write a short report to the VP of marketing to identify
In small groups, have students describe their intranet experience, if any, from an employer or other organization. For the rest of the group, discuss how a company where you worked could have used an
Describe the value of positive messages in business.
Explain how to organize a neutral message.
Apply guidelines for writing a goodwill message in a business situation.
Apply guidelines for responding to online feedback in a business situation.
Explain ways to engage customers and employees on social media.
Have you ever persuaded someone to do something that was in your self-interest but not in their best interest? Most of us have at some point. Describe the situation. What was your motivation? What
Now reflect on a time when you were the victim of someone else’s persuasion. Apply the same questions above. Taking the two examples together, what do you learn about yourself, and what changes
Do you often find yourself duped? Do you tend to fall for marketing ploys and buy products you don’t need? Do you follow clickbait online and end up on irrelevant ads or websites? Which persuasive
How do you decide whether to complain about a company’s product or service? To another student, describe two situations: one in which you complained and one in which you didn’t. What were the
How comfortable are you in offering apologies? Do you tend to avoid them, or do you offer them easily when you are wrong or make a mistake? What prevents you from offering apologies more freely? Or,
Identify a company’s ad campaign—something you have seen in print or online—and analyze the ethics. Who is the audience? Does the product or service benefit them in some way? Could the purchase
Some companies hire college students to promote their products. What’s your view of this strategy? Consider how the company, the hired students, and the customers are affected. Who benefits most
Think about a team you know well, e.g., a volunteer organization, a school club, a small group at work, or a sports team. Now think about an idea you might introduce to the team— an idea that team
Think about something you want for which you need to persuade someone. Describe the person’s possible resistance. What makes the situation difficult? How can you, ethically, overcome each point of
Find an email you received from a nonprofit organization trying to persuade you. How well does it focus on you and convince you that you should care? How are issues framed? Explain other ways the
Rewrite the following excerpt to stress benefits instead of features. In addition, instead of the paragraph format, write a list of bullet points that focus on the reader. Consider starting each
In the movie Boiler Room, Giovanni Ribisi’s character (Seth) is a trainee working at a shady brokerage firm that sells stock in fake companies. During a sales call to a prospective customer
Find a speech online. You might watch a commencement speaker or a company executive. Identify examples of credibility (ethos), emotional appeals (pathos), and logical arguments (logos). Which of the
To discourage people from signing up at the Promise/Cash Center site shown in Figure 18, write an article for a blog that warns consumers about questionable business practices. Your objective is to
Similar to Grace Lee’s suggestion in Figure 8, write an email to a current or previous employer. Think of an idea that would improve the business: a new procedure, an upgraded system, an innovative
Using the bullets you created for Exercise 6 as a starting point, design a web page to sell the headphones. In addition to the bullets, what other text and graphics will you include?You can use web
a. Write a message for your school website. Imagine that you’re working for your college’s alumni office. You’re asked to write text for the website about donating to the school. What will you
Think about a negative customer service experience you had recently. Draft a message you can send to the business manager by email to explain what happened. Be sure to use a credible tone and
After you complete Exercise 13, switch emails with another student. Imagine that you’re the business manager receiving this complaint. Use the form in Figure 19 to give feedback to your partner.
Rewrite your customer complaint email from Exercise 13 for an online review. For your post to an online review site, you have a different reader: the public. Consider making changes for a broader
Find an example of a company that doesn’t respond well to online feedback. Look on Glassdoor, Yelp, TripAdvisor, or another review site. Rewrite the management response according to principles in
Imagine that you’re the customer service manager at a small company, and one of your employees has escalated a customer complaint to your attention. The customer reported that a custom luxury
Find an example in the news of a company that has made a mistake or suffered some backlash. Write a blog post that meets the criteria for effective apologies. As always, consider the context—the
Identify ways to tailor persuasive messages to different audiences.
Compare strategies to persuade an audience in a given situation.
Describe parts of an effective internal or external persuasive message.
Describe parts of an effective response to negative feedback.
Think about a time when you had to deliver bad news. What was the context, who was the audience, and how did you approach the situation? What were your main points, and what medium did you choose?
Now answer the questions from the first reflection question about bad news you received. If it’s not too painful, think about a time when you received news that was disappointing or upsetting.
Now think about a time when you either delivered bad news or received bad news via a text message. Why did you choose—or why do you think the sender chose—a text message instead of a richer, more
How do you typically prefer to receive bad news? Do you want news directly, with the main point up front, or do you prefer being eased into it? Do you prefer straightforward language, or do you
Review your responses to the reaction statements in Figure 16. Why do you think you react the way you do? Can you identify something in your history or personality that might drive your response?What
Watch Arne Sorenson’s video discussed in this chapter. (Go to https://youtu.be/SprFgoU6aO0, or search YouTube to find “COVID-19: A message to Marriott International associates from President and
When products are recalled for safety reasons, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration posts company messages on its website. In groups of three or four, discuss the Whole Foods announcement shown in
Imagine that you’re closing a restaurant that is part of a large chain. Use the communication plan template in Figure 2 as your guide for how to deliver the bad news to different audiences.
Discuss these situations in small groups and decide what medium—for example, email, text, video meeting, or in-person meeting—to use for each message. Try to come to consensus, although you may
In small groups, find as many bad-news messages as you can—rejections from colleges or jobs, emails you received, or public messages. In each message, how quickly does the writer get to the bad
Find a sample layoff email online. (You may use one posted by the Society for Human Resources. Search for “SHRM layoff letter.”) Revise the template, which sounds cold and stilted. Use your own,
Think about a public company that had a difficult year. Find the annual report and read the CEO’s letter, which is typically at the beginning of the report. Consider the context, audience, message,
Imagine that you built a successful company with 40 employees and decided to sell to a major corporation. You will leave, and the acquiring company has indicated that most employees will be laid off.
Imagine that you run a local used bookstore, where you receive the email shown in Figure 18 from a new employee.Figure 18Write an email response to this employee rejecting the suggestion. You can
Imagine that you own a website design firm, and an employee asks you for a favor: a onemonth salary advance. This is one of your best employees, someone who has worked with you for more than five
You’re the president of a campus business club that is offering students mock interviews with a school alumnus. An interested student emailed you to sign up after the deadline, asking to be added
Imagine that you work for a bank’s credit card division, and you’re trying to resolve a complaint from a customer. Through an online form on the website, you receive a customer’s message,
Write a statement that would appear on a website about an increase in the price of a service, product, or subscription. Choose the company and invent whatever details you would like.If the company
Based on the Whole Foods recall, shown in Figure 17, write an email to employees. This is a different audience, so consider how the tone and information provided might differ.Exchange drafts with
Prepare a statement for a company’s website about one of your favorite products. Sadly, the product will no longer be available. How will you explain the decision and still keep good customers like
Think about a time at a former job or internship when a coworker’s performance didn’t meet your expectations. Imagine that you are that person’s manager and plan to give feedback.Follow these
After your meeting with the employee, described in Exercise 19, write an email confirming what you talked about. Try to be supportive but avoid “sugar-coating” the feedback.Exercise 19Think about
As you did in Exercise 20, document your feedback to the employee. But this time, imagine that the employee was defensive and got angry during the conversation. If the employee had argued about the
Identify goals in communicating a bad-news message.
Describe factors to consider when writing a bad-news message.
Write a bad-news reply to a given business request.
Compare bad-news announcements about operations, the organization, and jobs.
Describe principles for giving and receiving constructive performance feedback.
When you want to find an answer to a question, how do you start? Do you use different sources for different types of information, or do you rely on Google or another web browser for your answers?Why
Think of a time when you struggled with too much information, not enough meaning, the need to act fast, or limited memory. What was the result? To which of the biases in Figure 3 are you most prone?
Where do you get your news? How might those sources—and your social media sites—give you biased information? What could you do to get additional points of view?
Think about a time when you liked, forwarded, or reposted something online that turned out to be untrue or misleading. Or have you told a friend or family member something you read that wasn’t
Have you participated in primary research, for example, by taking a survey online? What was the purpose, and who or what organization asked for your responses? What inspired you to participate? How
Choose a public company to research. If you’re not sure whether a U.S. company is public, search the Securities and Exchange Commission database at https://www.sec.gov/edgar/
Choose one of the following small business situations—or another situation that interests you:● You own a clothing store and want to know whether to offer hats.● You own a jewelry store and
Enter a few keywords into Google, Google Scholar, and a library database. You may use a scenario from Exercise 2 or choose a different situation. Try to get the most relevant, reliable results from
If you could start any business, what would it be? Maybe you have already been working on a business or have done so in the past. Write a list of questions you need answered before deciding whether
With a friend, compare social media feeds. What type of information do you see on each feed? Does the content reinforce what you think you already know? Now try to change what appears in your feed.
Find a media bias chart, which shows political leanings of news organizations. In small groups, discuss what might surprise you or confirm what you previously thought. Also consider the limitations
Imagine that you’re giving a presentation to middle school children to help them distinguish between credible and false information online. Using the steps in Figure 4 and your own thinking, make
Select two internet resources and evaluate them based on the criteria in Figure 4. You might search for news about a company that interests you. Submit a one-page summary of your analysis to your
Imagine that a person you admire is coming to speak on campus. You have been selected to introduce the speaker to your entire graduating class. Of course, you want to ensure you have accurate
Find an article about a study that was retracted from an academic journal. You might search for “retractions in academic journals” or something similar. Choose one that interests you. Read two or
Find a survey you were asked to complete recently. You might see one in your email, or you might see one appear when you’re on a web page. As you complete the survey, answer the following
Return to Exercise 4, which asked you to collect information on a new business idea. Now create a survey to collect primary data by following these steps:a. Identify your audience. Who is the ideal
Working in small groups, imagine that you’re planning a business targeted to students. First, decide on your business concept. This can be anything: a service (e.g., laundry or grocery shopping) or
For Exercise 14, you worked in a group to create a survey for other students in your class. Pair up with another group to evaluate each other’s survey. In class, meet with your partner group and
Find a messy chart online. Look for garish colors, too many lines or variables, shadows or shading, and other distractions from the main point. Create a new chart without these design features.
The text and chart in Figure 19 are from the U.S. Federal Reserve.36 In small groups, identify a list of questions you have about the data collection and presentation. In other words, what else do
Review the chart in Figure 19. How could the data be presented in a better way to improve comprehension? Also include a more descriptive title to summarize the main point. Redraw the chart and
For the following situations, select the most appropriate visual aid for presenting the data and explain why it is the best option. First, identify the primary purpose: comparison, parts of a whole,
Imagine that you’re the F&B director for a hotel group with four properties in the New York area. The owner has asked you for data about food quality at each location.You collected the guest
Imagine that you are the head of HR and received approval from the executive director and the board to offer a 401(k) retirement plan for employees.Prepare a chart to show employees how much their
Search for an infographic about a topic that interests you. Imagine that the author wants your feedback to improve future visual displays of information. Consider the source, audience, and
With two or three other students, choose one of these topics or find data about a subject that interests you:● Major banks: Which are the biggest banks according to market share, assets, employees,
Find three or four job postings for data analysts. Compare the descriptions, including required qualifications. With another student in class, discuss your interest in these positions. Would you like
Imagine that you are a team leader at Anders Consulting and manage a group of junior consultants. Your manager asks you to consider whether Kyle, one of your direct reports, is ready for promotion to
Revisit the survey you created for Exercise 14 and revised for Exercise 15. Distribute the survey to students and gather at least 50 responses.Next, interpretate your data in three steps: isolation,
Compare the number of people who are food insecure to something concrete. First, find raw data about people who are food insecure either within a country or worldwide—your choice. In addition to
Try to find three charts that illustrate each of the problems discussed in this chapter that mislead the audience: cherry-picking, apple-polishing, and comparing apples to oranges.Describe the issue

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