To: Students, Written Communications
MEMO
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Date: August 10, 2023
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To: Students, Written Communications in Business
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From: Susan Basso McCauley, Instructor
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Subject: Instructions for Routine Message Assignment
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Here are the instructions for the Routine Message Assignment. Please review the material and post your questions to the Student Café or send a message to the instructor.
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The purposes of this assignment:
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• To identify purpose and audience and write the appropriate message
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• To use the direct order strategy
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• To practice writing a business letter with the correct business letter format and appropriate writing style
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• To develop peer review and editing skills
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ASSIGNMENT OVERVIEW
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Case Study:
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As a consumer, you’ve probably bought something that didn’t work right or paid for a service that did not turn out the way you expected. Maybe it was a pair of jeans with a rip in a seam that you didn’t find until you got home or a watch that broke a week after you bought it. Or maybe your family hired a lawn service to do some yardwork and no one from the company showed up on the day promised, and when the gardeners finally appeared, they did not do what they’d been hired for but instead did other things that wound up damaging valuable plants.
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Your Task:
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Choose an incident from your own experience and write a claim letter, asking for a refund, repair, replacement, or other adjustment. You’ll need to include all the details of the transaction, plus your contact address and phone number. If you can’t think of such an experience, make up details for an imaginary situation. If your experience is real and recent, you might want to mail the letter.
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Plan of Action
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After reading chapters 7 and 8, draft a one- to two- page letter (350-500 words) using the direct order strategy to compose your message.
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Purpose, Audience, and Strategy
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Review Analyzing Your Situation to plan your message. Anticipate your audience’s reaction and adapt your message and style accordingly. Because this is a routine message, you know that the direct strategy is appropriate.
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book The required textbook is Excellence in Business Communication, 9th edition or later, by John V. Thill and Courtland L. Bove?e. ISBN-13: 978-0133544176 ISBN- 10: 0133544176 (You may use the 9th edition of the text or later.
