Communication

Reading and Lecture Guide for Tests 1 and 2 BCOM 1300/3300

These questions are meant to help guide your notetaking for readings and in-class lectures as you prepare for the exam.

Test 2

Lecture 12-13 Effective Business Writing – Chapter 4

1. How are oral and written communication similar and different from each other?

2. What is the difference between verbal and nonverbal communication?

3. What are internal communication and external communication?

4. What are the three styles of writing? How do you figure out which style to use?

5. How cannot sweating the small stuff (e.g., grammar and spelling) impact people’s perception of you?

6. What is bypassing? When can it occur?

7. What are the 6 basic qualities of good business writing?

Lecture 12-13 Writing Preparation – Chapter 5

1. How can confirmation bias, egocentrism, and sociocentrism impact writing and critical thinking? How do these concepts interact with each other?

2. Who determines if a source/message sender is credible?

3. What are strengths, weaknesses, and expectations of communication channels? When and for which audiences should you use each channel? Check out Table 5.1.

4. Why do you need to give credit to your sources in written communication? What’s plagiarism?

5. Why is it important to evaluate your sources? How do you do that?

6. What’s the difference between analyzing and reading a document?

7. How does document design and organization impact understanding?

8. What are general purposes in writing? Be able to identify them in examples.

9. What are guidelines for adding emphasis in documents?

Lecture 14: Writing and Document Format – Chapter 6

1. How do ethos, pathos, and logos work in business writing?

2. What do effective sentences look like? Focus on p. 169-171 (don’t need to know the 4 types of sentences on p. 168)

3. How do you determine when to use informal v. formal/bureaucratic style?

4. What is conversational tone? What’s jargon?

5. What are active and passive voice? Be able to identify them and use them in writing.

6. Understand the common errors in English (table 6.6).

7. What is Toulmin’s 3-part rhetorical strategy? What does that look like in an example?

8. What are fallacies in writing?

9. What are the steps to paraphrasing?

Lecture 15: Revising and Presenting Your Writing – Chapter 7

1. What are four categories that require revision in a document? Be able to identify them in examples.

2. How are commas and semicolons used?

3. What are common errors associated with apostrophes?

4. Be able to identify errors with subject-verb agreement, verb tenses, split infinitives, double negatives, faulty comparisons, and misplaced modifiers.

5. Be able to identify different style revisions needed in a business document.

6. What are strategies on how to communicate when evaluating someone’s work? “You” v. “I” language, phrasing disagreement, focusing on the document as a product.

7. What are five critical elements of critical analysis to use in evaluating a person’s writing?

Lecture 17: Direct and Indirect Strategies Chapter 17.1 (Delivering a negative news message)

1. What are direct v. indirect strategies? What type of messages/audiences do you use each strategy for?

2. How would you organize an indirect message? How would you organize a direct message?

3. What are the advantages/disadvantages of presenting negative news in writing? 

4. What is the SPIKES method? Be able to apply it. 

5. What are four basic parts of negative message?

6. What are internal/external communications?

Lecture 16: Email and texting (9.1)

1. What makes a good subject line?

2. Why and when do you use direct opening? What does a direct opening look like?

3. How do you craft the main purpose? How do you craft message appearance? How do you craft tone?

4. How do you open and close an email professionally?

5. What are texting best practices at work and with recruiters?