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Scenarios adapted from Ramsey, Business Writing Scenarios .

WRD 202

Assignment 2 Internal Correspondence Packet

PART 1 : Delivering Bad News about Employee Benefits

The background. You are the CEO of a medium-sized company of 300 employees. For 20 years, your company paid all the costs of medical insurance, which covered each employee as well as his/her spouse and children. However, the average cost of this plan has grown from $8,500 per employee to $12,500 per employee—an increase of 47%, for a total of $1.2 million—and this was just in the past three years. The company cannot absorb this cost, and you must now require employees to share these expenses.

You need to write a memo informing all employees that they must start, as of September 1, 2019, to pay part of the costs for the medical insurance offered through the company. Here are the details of the new insurance plan:

  • Individual employees will pay, on average, $2000 per year.

Employees with a spouse OR child (family of two) will pay, on average, $3000 per year.

Employees with a spouse and child OR two or more children (family of three or more) will pay, on average, $4000 per year.

The company will also scale annual costs to the different salary levels of employees (that is, it will charge more to the employees with larger salaries).

For all employees, the co-pay for most medical service will increase from $10 per service to $15. (A co-pay is a fee that a patient pays for each doctor’s visit and is not covered by insurance.)

Grading Criteria: A successful memo will:

  • Clearly explain the change in policy and the reasons for it. You should do this without hedging—the decision has already been made, it is not going to change, and your job is to inform your employees.
  • Consider the audience’s reactions—they will likely be upset and some may worry that this is a sign that the company is failing.
  • Be formatted like a memo, with a header containing the recipient(s), sender, date, and subject line;
  • Demonstrate thoughtful organization and formatting to make the information easily accessible.
  • Demonstrate careful editing for tone, style, concision, and formal grammar and punctuation.

PART 2 : Responding to a Discourteous Email

The background. You are the purchasing assistant for a supplier of computer software and hardware. You’ve worked with several staff members for an entire month researching the least costly means of obtaining a large number of circuit boards for resale to a big distributor. You receive the following email from the CEO of your company:

Kimball—I can’t figure out how you got these weird figures for our big purchase of circuit boards from J-Peg Enterprises. Have some new numbers on my desk tomorrow morning. We just can’t afford such a big outlay at this time, and I trust you and the purchasing group will be able to find a less costly means of getting the items we need for resale.

Adam Bekwik

CEO

The assignment. Mr. Bekwik’s demand for new numbers by tomorrow morning is absolutely impossible—your team has been working on this for a month! Also, he hasn’t given you much information: What exactly is wrong with those numbers? We don’t know.

You need to write a response to Mr. Bekwik requesting more information about why he’s dissatisfied and gaining more time for your task.

Grading Criteria: A successful email will:

  • Contain content that will likely gain you more time and more information;

Consider the audience (What does Adam Bekwik seem to value? What does he want?);

  • Have a respectful, tactful and reassuring tone that will earn respect from your boss;
  • Be formatted like an email, with a header containing a subject line, a greeting, and a signature;
  • Demonstrate thoughtful organization and formatting to make the information easily accessible;
  • Demonstrate careful editing for tone, style, concision, and formal grammar and punctuation.

    • Part 3: Request an Extension

    The background. Due to a technical problem, you are running behind on a big project—one that’s taken you multiple months to complete—and need to request a deadline extension from your boss.

    I’ll let you determine the exact details for this scenario, for example:

    • Maybe it’s the Annual Financial Report or Annual Budget for your company and the software systems you use are no longer compatible, so all the data has to be entered manually, causing a delay;

    Maybe it’s a major print marketing campaign, and the company’s printers are broken, so you’ll have to send the files containing the mockups to an outside company to be printed—or wait for the repairs to be finished.

  • Maybe it’s a major construction project that you are managing and work is being delayed because an important piece of equipment has broken down.

    • Or maybe it’s something else. Whatever the case, something has occurred that it outside of your control and you need to request more time.

    The assignment. Write an email to your boss (or in some cases, you “boss” might actually be a client) asking for an extension.

    Grading Criteria: A successful email will:

    • Contain content that will likely be successful in gaining you more time on the project with a minimum loss to your reputation;

    Consider the audience’s needs—your boss will want to know the reason for delay and how longer you anticipate the project taking;

    Have a respectful, tactful and reassuring tone that will earn respect from your boss;

    Be formatted like an email, with a header containing a subject line, a greeting, and a signature;

    Demonstrate thoughtful organization and formatting to make the information easily accessible;

    • Demonstrate careful editing for tone, style, concision, and formal grammar and punctuation.