What Should We Be Teaching Students in Business Writing?

Abstract

Learning six key processes will enable students to adapt their writing to any on-the-job challenge they meet. These processes include: invention, adaptation for audience, clarification of purpose, organization, control of voice or persona, and polishing. This list is based on an informal survey of 125 writers in business, industry, and government. Methods for teaching the processes are derived from texts and articles in rhetoric, composition, technical writing, and business writing. Although the classroom application of these processes is illustrated in an analysis of one writing assignment, the memo, the processes can be taught in assignments ranging from job application materials to negative letters to proposals to formal reports. They can serve as the foundation of any course in business writing.

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References

In six writing workshops I conducted at Bell Telephone, General Motors, IBM, and the United States Great Lakes Basin Commission, 1978-1980, I distributed questionnaires to all workshop participants. The answers to question 4 are categorized at the beginning of this article.

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10.

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