Writing In Business

Interview: Business Professor M -­‐ What do you look for when you evaluate these kinds of writing?

P -­‐Two major components. One component of course is the substance. So what do you say, does it make sense, what kind of research do you have to back up. So if you say Zimbabwe well that’s great but why. Why did you get your information, what kind of information that you have. So that people can say that yea that makes sense Zimbabwe is a risky country to enter. So I look at the substance, look at the arguments, look at the evidences that you provide in your paper to make your case. So that is one card. And then beyond that of course I look at the grammatical issues, the spelling, and organization in your paper to make your case. Sometimes you will be surprise the way some students write, one page report no paragraph. Just one page paragraph. So it is very difficult to read those because then you don’t know how is it going, where is starts, because it starts with an idea and by the time you get to the end of the page it is completely different. So I always tell the class make short paragraphs and each paragraph should have a central idea or theme and then connect it the next paragraph and the next paragraph. Use headings, subheadings so that it is for the reader to follow what you are trying to say.

M -­‐ Who should your students imagine as their audience when they write a paper for you class?

P -­‐Well it depends on the assignment like when they do this big marketing plan, the final report.

Usually the audience is the top management of a company, people who decide. The CEO of the pencil company, and I’m thinking about three different countries. I can go to China, I can go to India, I can go to Brazil. Which country should I pick? So that would be the audience, the people at the top, the C-­‐level people, who will make a decision about international expansion because this class is all about international expansion and international marketing.

M -­‐From these kinds of writing assignments what do you hope your students will take form the assignments?

P -­‐Well two things again. Substantially they should learn how to make a case, how to make your arguments. How to present a case to your boss and then not just say you want to go to China. Well that sounds great but why? Give me five reasons. So they should learn how to make a case, provide evidence, and justify a case that they’re making. And beyond that they should learn how to do research. These days with the amount of the information on the Internet and all they have to do is just start with Google and there’s so much information. Those days are gone when you have to go to the library, look at book and journals. People don’t do that they just look on the Internet. So people have to look through all the information, there’s so much information, and of course you cannot take everything so you have to pick which information is most relevant for you project, figure them through and present the most interesting facts and the most relevant facts in your paper.