COM 295 Week 1 Business Documents and Their Purposes Example

Memos, Emails, Reports and Proposals: How One HVAC Company's Documents Do Their Jobs

[Student Name]

University of Phoenix

COM/295: Business Communications

Week 1 Assignment

[Instructor Name]

[Date]

Gulf Breeze Air Services, its people, documents and figures are composites written for a model paper.

Gulf Breeze Air Services, a composite company, installs and repairs heating and air conditioning systems for homes and businesses in the Tampa Bay area. It employs about 180 people: 120 field technicians, 40 office and sales staff and 20 managers. Like most service businesses, it runs on documents. In a typical week, technicians file about 900 service reports, staff exchange hundreds of emails, managers send a few memos, the operations director writes a monthly report and the commercial sales team submits several proposals. When documents work, customers and staff know what to do. When they do not, phones ring. This paper examines the company's main document types and their purposes.

Purposes Shape Documents

Most business documents serve one of four main purposes: to inform, to request action, to persuade or to keep a record. Bovée and Thill (2021) advise writers to begin by defining their purpose and their audience, then to organize the message around what the reader needs to know or do first. A message that informs can lead with the main point; a message that persuades a skeptical reader may need to build a case first. Format follows purpose: a policy change belongs in a memo kept on file, a quick question in an email and a bid for new work in a proposal.

The Service Report

Technicians complete a service report on a tablet at each job. It records what was found, what was done, parts used and recommendations, and it goes to the office and to the customer. Its purposes are to keep a record and to inform the customer. Many reports serve the first purpose well and the second poorly. A typical recommendation reads: "Cap failing, TXV hunting, rec. replace cond. fan motor + cap, est 2 hrs." The office understands it. The homeowner does not, and calls to ask whether her system is safe.

Revised for the customer, the recommendation could read: "Your outdoor fan motor and its capacitor are wearing out. The system works today, but we recommend replacing both within the next month to avoid a breakdown in hot weather. The repair takes about two hours." The technical notes can stay in a separate section for the office.

The Policy Memo

Last month the operations director sent a memo changing how technicians record overtime. The memo opened with three paragraphs about the company's growth and the importance of accurate payroll. The actual change, that overtime must now be approved by a dispatcher before the technician stays late, appeared in the fourth paragraph. Technicians who read the first lines on their phones missed it, and dispatch received 40 questions in two days. A memo that informs should state the change and its effective date in the first sentence, explain why briefly and end with whom to contact.

The most important sentence in the overtime memo was the one fewest people read.

The Customer Email

Customer service sends follow-up emails after each visit. The current template is friendly but long, and the link to pay an invoice appears below a block of promotional text. Payment within seven days is 54 percent. A shorter email with the invoice amount, a payment button and one sentence of thanks near the top would serve the main purpose, prompting payment, better.

The Commercial Proposal

The commercial sales team's proposal to service rooftop units at a chain of eight medical offices is the company's best document. It opens with the client's problem, frequent breakdowns in summer and patient complaints, before describing Gulf Breeze's solution, schedule, costs and references. It ends with a clear next step: a site walk on a proposed date. The proposal won the contract. Its structure, problem first, solution second, proof third, action last, fits a persuasive purpose.

Monthly Reports

The operations director's monthly report to the owner runs 12 pages of tables. The owner says he reads only the first page. An executive summary listing three key numbers, one problem and one decision needed would serve its purpose of informing a busy reader.

Choosing the Right Channel

Purpose also shapes the channel. Daft and Lengel (1986) argued that richer channels, those that allow immediate feedback and multiple cues, suit messages that may be misunderstood, while lean written channels suit routine information. The overtime change affected pay and drew dozens of questions, which suggests it needed a short briefing at morning dispatch as well as a memo. Routine reminders, such as filing deadlines, can stay in email.

Writing for Phones

Most technicians and many customers read messages on phones. On a small screen, readers see only the first two or three lines before deciding whether to keep reading. This makes the purpose-first structure even more important: subject lines should state the action or change, and the first sentence should say what the reader must know or do. Long paragraphs and attachments are often skipped.

Internal Communication as a System

Kalla (2005) described integrated internal communication as including business, management, corporate and organizational communication, all of which shape how employees understand their work and the organization. At Gulf Breeze, documents are written by many people with no shared standards, so each department's habits shape what readers receive. A consistent approach across documents would help employees and customers know where to look for what matters.

Recommendations

Purpose-first templates for service reports, memos and customer emails, with the main point or action in the first lines.

A plain-language customer section in every service report, separate from technical notes.

An executive summary page for monthly reports.

A one-page writing guide based on the commercial proposal's structure for persuasive documents.

A short peer review for any document going to more than 50 customers or to a commercial client.

Conclusion

Gulf Breeze's documents show that type and purpose must match and that the reader determines what clear means. The commercial proposal succeeds because it is built for its reader and purpose; the overtime memo and service reports struggle because their structure hides what readers need. Purpose-first templates, plain language for customers and a little review would make the company's everyday writing work harder.

References

Bovée, C. L., & Thill, J. V. (2021). Business communication today (15th ed.). Pearson.

Daft, R. L., & Lengel, R. H. (1986). Organizational information requirements, media richness and structural design. Management Science, 32(5), 554-571. https://doi.org/10.1287/mnsc.32.5.554

Kalla, H. K. (2005). Integrated internal communications: A multidisciplinary perspective. Corporate Communications: An International Journal, 10(4), 302-314. https://doi.org/10.1108/13563280510630106