Unit-2, Writing Skills.ppt bussiness communication

bussiness communication

1. UNIT-2 writing
skills

2. Purpose of Writing

3. •1. Future references: The limitation of human mind and poor
retention power cannot beoverlooked. Written messages can be
preserved as records and reference sources. Various media of
communication can be filed for future reference. Thus, keeping
records are essential for continuous operation of the business.
•2. Avoiding mistakes: In transmitting messages, earlier records help
in reducing mistakesand errors and also prevent the occurrence of
fraud.
•3. Legal requirements: Written communication is acceptable as a
legal document. That is why some executives think that even if some
messages have been transmitted orally, they should later be
confirmed in writing.

4. •4. Wide access: Communication media having become very fast,
written communication enjoy a wide access. If the communicator and
the receiver are far from each other, written communication sent
through post or e-mail is the cheapest and may be the only available
means of communication between them.
•5. Effective decision-making: Old documents help effective decision-
making in a great way.
•Decision-making process becomes easier if old records are available.
Because the messages provide the necessary information for
decision-making purpose.

5. Principles of effective writing
Effective written
communication is
achieved by following
the principles of
Unity Coherence Avoid Jargons
7C’s of
Communication

6. Unity
•Unitymeansthatthecomponentsdealwithonemainideaorthought.
•Theideascontainedwithinaparagraph‘hangtogether’inawaythatis
easyforthereadertounderstand.
•Aparagraphisalogicaldivisionofthecentralthemeofalongerpieceof
writing.
•Eachsentenceintheparagraphisdirectlyrelatedtothecentralideaor
themeandcontributestoitsdevelopment.
•Onlyonemainthoughtshouldbeexpressedinaparagraphtomaintain
unity.

7. NO Unity

8. Coherence
•Coherenceisconsistencyofspeech,thoughts,ideasandreasoningwhich
makestheexpressionclearandeasytounderstand.
•Itreferstoclearandlogicallinkingofideasinaparagraph.
•Incohesiveparagraphs,ideasarelinkedandoneidealogicallyleadsto
thenext.
•Coherenceiscloselyrelatedtounityaswhenmorethanoneideais
incorporatedinaparagraph,coherencegoesmissing.

9. Mechanical Devices for Coherence –4 Tools
Usesofpronouns–Pronounsconnectideasastheyreferthereaderto
somethingearlierinthetext.
Useoftransitionaltags/linkers–Theyhelpintransitionofideas.Transitional
tagscanvaryfromsimpleconjunctionslikebut,and,yet,etc.tocomplex
conjunctiveadverbslikehowever,moreover,etc.
Repetitionofkeywordsandphrases–Repetitionofcertainwordsalsogive
coherencetoaparagraph.Whileusingrepetitionthewritermustbevery
carefulbecausetoomuchrepetitionmayleadtomonotonyandredundancy.
Useofparallelgrammaticalstructure–Parallelismmeanssamegrammatical
form.Toattaincoherence,samegrammaticalformandstyleshouldbe
maintainedinallthesentencesaswellastheparagraph.

10. Examples
1) Use Pronouns to Link Sentences-
•Example: Mr. Thakur agreed to meet with members of the worker’s
union before hesigned the contract. Hewas interested in hearing
their concerns about the new insurance plan.
•2) Use Transitional Expressions to Link Ideas, Sentences, and
Paragraphs.
•Example: Many students believe they cannot write a good essay
becausethey are not writers. However, as they practice writing and
work on developing their writing skills, most students are able to gain
the needed confidence to start thinking of themselves writers.

11. •3) Use Repetition to Link Ideas, Sentences, and Paragraphs
•Example: Most students are intimidated by the works of William
Shakespeare. They believe Shakespeare’ssonnets and plays are far to
complicated to read and understand.
•4) Use Parallel Structures to Link Ideas, Sentences, and Paragraphs
•Example: Usually, the children spend the summer weekends playing
ball in park, swimming in the neighbor’s pool, eating ice cream under
the tree, or camping in the backyard.
•Example: At the museum, the class attended a lecture where the
speaker demonstrated how the Native Americans made bows and
arrows. They also attended a lecture where a sword smith
demonstrated how the Vikings crafted swords

12. Example of Coherence

13. Accuracy
To achieve accuracy, the writer should check
and double-check:
All facts and figures
The choice of words
The language and tone.
Some pitfalls can be avoided be being alert to
the following:
Follow the rules of grammar
Pay attention to punctuation marks.
Check words for spelling and usages.

14. Brevity
Brevity lies in saying
only what needs to be
said and leaving out
unnecessary words or
details.
To achieve brevity,
avoid wordiness. This
can be done in the
following ways:
1.Do not use four or six
words when one or two
will do.
2. Changing long
clauses into phrases.
3. Drop “which” and
“that” clauses when
possible.
4. Do not over use the
passive voice.

15. Clarity
To ensure that a piece of writing is understood by the target
audience, it is essential to use language that is commonly
understood.
Language , tone and level of formality.
Tone: According to Muriel Harris, “ the level of formality is
the tone in writing and reflects the attitude of the writer
toward the subject and audience. The tone can be:
1. Informal Tone: Colloquialisms-Casual words or phrases
used in informal writing.
Slang and regional words.
2. Semi-formal tone

16. Clarity
3. Strictly formal tone.
Positive language.
You-attitude
Natural language
Active voice
Sexist language

17. 3x3 Writing Process

18. Prewrite
•Prewriting includes three sub-tasks which are
•Analyze,
•Anticipate, and
•Adapt.

19. Analyze
•What is your big WHYor purpose for writing?
•It is an excellent way to gain perspective and direction for your writing.
•What do you want your receiver to do or believe?
•Anticipate
•Knowing whoyou’re writing to and for.
•The next step is to ANTICIPATE your audience and their specific profile.
•do a deep reader profile exercise with specific information like age,
occupation and gender.
•Consider your audience’s knowledge and experience level on the particular
subject.
•anticipate the type of emotional response that you want your reader to
have. Do you want them to be inspired, relieved, motivated or thankful

20. Adapt
•think about the language that you’ll use to elicit the emotional
response that you want.
•Prepare to ADAPT your language to accomplish this goal.
•You must decide on the writing style that you plan to employ at this
stage of the 3×3 writing process.
•Decide whether your writing will be professional, conversational,
whimsical, academic or some useful combination.

21. Writing

22. Writing includes three sub tasks which are
•Research,
•Organize and
•Compose.

23. •RESEARCH
•Gather data to provide facts.
•What do you need to know to write this message?
•How much the audience already know?
•ORGANIZE
•all of the major points and their sub points into headings and
subheadings.
•followed by an explanation and then action request in the closing.
•COMPOSE
•Prepare a first draft usually writing quickly.

24. Revising

25. Revising
•Revising includes three sub-tasks which are
•Revise,
•Proofread, and
•Evaluate.

26. •REVISE
•Edit your message to be sure that your message is clear,concise,
readable,conversational
The revision process should remedy the following issues :
•Superfluous modifiers.(e.gA wet rain followed the cold snow.)
•Long lead-ins for sentences (they usually end with “that” or “because”){ e.g
I am sending this announcement to let you all knowthatthe office will be
closed Monday.}
•Wordy phrases
•Paragraphs that are too long (longer than 6 or 7 sentences)
•Adverb overuse
•Redundancies
•Filler words

27. •Example of Adverb overuse
Harry Potter laughedhappilyas the majestic Hogwarts castle rose
from behind the clouds. He wasabsolutelydetermined to learn magic
as a wizard. His thoughts wererudelyinterrupted by Hermione, who
whisperedquietlyin his ears.
•Common redundancies to avoid in business writing:
•In my opinion, I… (Use: I…)
•Collaborated together (Use: collaborated)
•Past experience (Use: experience)
•The reason why (Use: reason)
•Plus in addition (Use: in addition)

29. Proofread
•Make a good impression on your readers with error-free copy.
•PROOFREAD your writing and clean up spelling and grammar issues at
this step.
•Correct errors in names, numbers, subject and verb agreement and
other grammatical issues.
•EXAMPLE: The boxes of cake mix are on the shelf.
•EXAMPLE: The dog drinks his water every day.
•EXAMPLE: Every man, woman, and child was/were given a book.
(“was”)
•EXAMPLE: Each student is/are required to pass the final exam. (“is”)

30. Evaluate
•Go back through the 3×3 writing process steps to see if you completed the
tasks at every step.
•Did you write with a clear purpose in mind?
•Did you write for the right audience and use the kind of language that will
connect with them?
•Did your research efforts produce the right information for your writing
and did you disclose the sources for any statistics that you provided?
•Will your writing inspire, motivate and/or educate the reader and drive
them to take action?
•Did you choose the best format for communicating the information?

31. Specific writing features

32. •1) Adaptation and Selection of Words
•• Use familiar words
•Unfortunately, many business writers do not use familiar language
enough instead, they tend to change character when they begin to
put their thoughts on paper.
•Endeavour –Try
•Ascertain –Find out
•Terminate –End
•Demonstrate –Show
•Utilise –Use

33. •Choose the short over the long word.
•Generally, short words communicate better as a heavy proportion of
long words confuse the reader.
• Use technical words with caution.
•All fields have technical words i.e., ‘jargon’, which becomes a part of
our everyday working vocabulary. In fact, so common will it appear in
your mind that you may assume that people outside the fields also
know it. And in writing to those who is outside from your field you
may use these words, which leads to miscommunication.

34. 2. Masculine Words
•Sometimes the use of particular words can support unfair or untrue attitudes
towards as particular sex, usually women. Many people while speaking or writing
English, prefer to avoid using language that is sexist. The modern non-sexist use
of language is sometimes called inclusive language.

37. 3. Choosing Words with Right Strength and Vigour
•Words have personalities, in same way words are like people. Some
words are strong and vigorous. Some are weak and dull and some fall
between these extremes.

38. 4. Thesaurus
•1. A thesaurus is the opposite of a dictionary.
•2. We turn to it when you have the meaning already but don’t yet have
the word. It may be on
•the tip of our tongue, but what it is we don’t yet know.
•3. It is like the missing piece of a puzzle.
•4. A thesaurus, says the dictionary, is ‘a treasury or storehouse, hence a
repository, especially for words, as a dictionary.’
"To protect from sunlight”
•Shield Defend

39. 5. Writing Effective Sentences
•Efficient authors manipulate and experiment with the combinations
and number of short and long sentences for various purpose in mind
as per the requirement of the text.
•Characteristics of Effective Sentences
•1. Unity
•2. Coherence
•3. Variety
•4. Economy
•5. Proper selection
•6. Simplicity

40. 6. Foreign Words & Phrases Sometimes Used in Correspondence
•Mostly words are originated from Latin/French language.
• ad hoc –for this special purpose
• de facto –actual, real
• bonafide –genuine, only bonafide members will be allowed to attend the
meeting.
• errata –list of errors
• in camera –in secret
• in toto –wholly/entirely
• laissez faire –free
• per capita –per head
• status quo –the existing condition
• sine die –indefinitely.

41. 7. Developing Logical Paragraph
•The paragraph is thus one’s thought process as it proceeds from one sentence to
another and develop step by step. Designed paragraph requires the ability to
organize and relate information. It involves the use of logic and imagination.
•Characteristics of a Good Paragraph:
•1. Unity
•2. Coherence
•3. Length
•4. The topic sentence
•5. Omitting unnecessary detail

42. 8. Overall Tone
•1. Conversational style-Write the words that have the effect of good
conversation. The words to be used should come from your speaking
vocabulary and the tone of writing should stimulate friendly
conversation.
•Rubber stamps are expressions used from habit every time a certain
situation occurs. You can avoid rubber stamps by writing in your
conversational vocabulary.

43. 2. The you-view point-You-view point writing emphasizes the reader’s
interests. It is an attitude that focuses on the reader’s point of view.

44. •3. Overall tone of courtesy-Avoid preaching (lecturing) and avoid
anger.
•4. Showing sincerity-Efforts to be courteous must be sincere
There are two major checkpoints for writing sincerely are:
•(i) Overdoing goodwill: One can overdo the goodwill effort. Too much you-view point sounds
insincere.
•(ii) Avoiding exaggeration: Exaggeration is overstatements of facts.
•Like extraordinary, delicious, sensational, revolutionary, perfection, etc. such words cause as to
question rarely do we really believe them.

45. Activity of Writing Skills
A customer ordered a product online, and they still haven’t received it after
the expected delivery date. The customer is irritated and demanding a
refund. Write a persuasive message to customer and resolve the issue.
A customer contacts your technical/support team with ideas on how you
can improve your product. Customers often provide invaluable insights that
can help your company thrive and grow. Whether or not you can fulfill the
request, it’s important to first thank the customer for the time they’ve taken
to share it with you, and explain how and when you plan to implement it, or
why you won’t be able to. Write message to customer regarding this issue.

46. Electronic Writing Process

47. Electronic communication (or e-communication)
•places new demands on language that leads to interesting variations
in written language use.
•powerful educational resource
•revolutionized the composing process
•encourage participation in writing activity.( provide a non-threatening
atmosphere to the writers, encouraging even timid students to participate in
online chats Also, Web provides an arena for writers to present their work to a
real and larger audience that extends beyond classroom and school boundaries)
•increase collaborative writing activities

48. 1
st
Step of E-writing process:Pre-writing
•Pre-writing activities include
•thinking of a topic and researching of the topic.
•Idea generation via group brainstorming, questioning via electronic
mail, participating to large groups,
•observing pictorial representation on the Internet, reading data
collected electronically,
•exploring CD ROMs and accessing electronic libraries are examples of
multimedia activities that may take place in this stage of the writing
process.

49. 2nd Step of E-writing process: Writing
•Writing activities include composing and inscribing.
•a multimedia environment can facilitate the process.
•Planning and outlining an essay with special software,
•making a rough draft with speech-recognition software, scanning text
and images, entering data directly on screen, as opposed to writing
longhand and then transcribing to the screen

50. 3
rd
Step of E-writing process: revising
•Rewriting: Rewriting activities involve and correcting.
•Multimedia can affect this stage of the process by allowing add, cut,
and paste sequences using voice recognition as opposed to
keyboarding activities,
•using a spell checker, using written language recognition software to
listen to an essay or an article, and correcting orthography, grammar
and syntax with interactive voice activated software

51. 4th Step of E-writing process: Post-writing
•Post-writing activities are consequent dimensions of the writing
process that multimedia has facilitated
•Editing and distributing with electronic facilities adds new meaning to
this portion of the writing process.
•Adding colour, animation, images, audio, and video to a text can
change the way information or investigation results are transmitted
and illustrated
•Distribution via the World Wide Web of student work will induce and
entice more than the written essay.

52. •Consequences for the writing process: This multimedia-based model
implies that writing is
•more than a sequence of events. Writing is the occasion for many
skills and attitudes to come together for a specific purpose.
Multimedia allows for loops and branching in any of the four stages
described here.
•We recommend that writing should be regarded as an interactive and
iterative series of processes that come together not just for the
production of written text, but also for real multimedia presentation
of intellectual excitement in an increasingly rich environment.

53. Netquitte
•Internet etiquette or netiquette is simply professional and social behaviors that
are deemed appropriate online. This involves being polite and courteous to
anyone you come across, the same way you should in the face to face
conversations.
•Your online activities would reflect on you and your company no matter how
much it deviates from how you present yourself in-person.
•Be responsible for the things you say or post online. Remember that there are
legal guidelines and cyber laws that you must adhere to.
•Practice control: Don’t let your emotions or the false security of anonymity
override your good thinking. Also, it helps to keep in mind that your posts will be
associated with you, so never post anything you wouldn’t want to represent you
as a person and professional.
•Presentation matters: Just like in presenting yourself in person, in the way you
dress or speak, it would be wise to present yourself in a positive light online. Keep
your posts clean, grammatically correct, and most importantly, relevant, and with
substance. Avoid posting content that’s inappropriate, very opinionated, or
political-related.

54. Some basic ‘Do Not’ guidelines are
•Do not be rude via the Internet nor email. There are a number of
communication avenues, i.e., posts, Facebook, Twitter, etc. No matter
which method is used, people should be cordial and respectful to whom
they are writing. Would you be happy if someone sent you a critical or
cutting remark? As the saying goes, ‘If you haven’t got anything nice to say,
don’t say anything’.
•Do not pass on other people’s information. No one is allowed to pass on a
person’s information without the approval of the individual. This is a crucial
rule to commit to memory especially if you are thinking of passing
someone’s personal information. This could lead to a serious offense, so do
not even consider it.
•Do not use all capitals when writing as its connotation implies yelling. Bear
in mind that the reader cannot see your face and can easily misinterpret its
meaning. Appending an emoticon to the capital letters to imply a tease
could even be misconstrued as a sarcastic remark. So pay attention to the
use of capital letters and only use them for, e.g., acronyms.
•Do not change someone else’s words. What a person writes belongs to
them. Do not change someone’s content to be spiteful, harmful, or hurtful.

55. •Do not send chain letters nor inappropriate links. Not everyone enjoys receiving chain
letters. This will just annoy the receiver. If you send someone a chain letter and they
respond to you with a ‘please do not send’, then respect their wishes and do not send
anymore.
•Do not send spam. Spam is any unwanted email. Set your email options to forward all
spam email to either a spam or trash folder where they can all be deleted without any
harmful effects.
•Do not spread private chats nor conversations. This is a malicious offense. The
conversation you have with someone is private and should remain as private unless they
say it is ok to pass the conversation to others. Not following this rule can be damaging
and libelous.
•Do not continuously send chat messages to someone who does not reply. Seeing
someone on chat doesn’t mean you have to speak with them. Be respectful-if someone
does not reply on chat, then they are probably busy.
•Do not send out an email to everyone (i.e., co-workers and managers ) and do not click
Reply to All if only one person needs to be the recipient. This is especially true if the
other people are not involved with the subject matter. This will only displease fellow
associates as they probably receive more emails than they want on a daily basis.

56. Writing to persuade
•Persuasive writing aims at convincing the reader about a matter that
is debatable
•It expresses opinions rather than facts. It should be convincing
•It is also called argumentative, as it supports and argues a viewpoint.
•The writer seeks to influence
•It focuses on the reader
•Found in opinion essays, editorials, business and research proposals,
reviews

57. Persuasive Message-Business
Context

58. Activity of Writing
Skills
•Write a short story about your life goals and
how you will achieve these goals?

59. Multiple
Choice
Questions
1. The handshake that conveys confidence is
a.Limp
b.Firm
c.Loose
d.Double
2. . ............... Involves how we arrange personal space and what we
arrange in it
a.Kinesics
b.Proxemics
c.Time language
d.Paralanguage

60. 3. It involves how we say something in different pitch, tone and voice modulation such as slow or fast.
Kinesics
Proxemics
Time language
Paralanguage
4. Chronemics is also known as-------language.
Space
Time
Body
Eye
5. Denotations and Connotations are ------------barriers in communication process.
a. Physical barriers
b. Semantic barriers
c. Encoding barriers
d. Technical barriers

61. 6. -----------is the wordless form of communication which takes the form of postures, body
language ,facial expressions, eye contacts, tension, breathing and tones etc.
a) Verbal communication
b) Garbage communication
c) Informal communication
d) Non-Verbal communication
7. According to Richard Fitch, in communication process 90% belongs to ----------
Formal communication
b. Non-verbal communication
c. Informal communication
d. Oral communication

62. 8. All of the following are examples of verbal communication EXCEPT:
Email
symbols
Telephone calls
Text messaging
9. . In empathetic communication, we can:
Probe
Respond to the feelings
Interpret
Advice.
10. Conciseness of message refers to:
Crispness
Comprehensiveness
Specificity
Brevity