ENG 333 Communication for Science and Research

The Communication Situation: This formal proposal option requires you to think creatively and calls for some entrepreneurship because you will be taking the role of a professional business consultant. In this role, you are not expected to be an expert in any one organization or its procedures. You are much like a newcomer who has to enter and assess the problems within an organization, department, or social group. Consultants are common in business today, and the good ones know how to read a situation to move beyond the routine and ordinary. When you start a new job, your task is much the same - people expect you to walk into a new situation, size it up, chart a course, and act.

The Assignment: Identify a need or problem in your school, community, or workplace. This problem should be one that you can research. Also, a recommendation or solution should be developed. Past semester projects have included a scaled down design of Aspen, a Chemical Engineering simulation program, for high school students, and the feasibility of using cotton stalk for making paper.

The report should the following:

• Cover page
• Title page
• An abstract, or executive summary
• A table of contents
• A list of tables and figures
• The report content
• A bibliography
• An attachment

Format and Background Details: You should provide information about any research you have done. Your report should contain sufficient detail for a thorough evaluation of its feasibility. Be sure to consider the following information as you persuade your audience that your solution to whatever problem you identify is feasible, and doable:

Proposed Project with an outline of the final report

Plan of Action - General steps for required research

Schedule - Time line for completing the final report (Optional: A general estimate of potential profit based on an hourly consulting fee.)

Qualifications & Resources

Use the following 5 steps for analyzing a problem situation:

1. Define a conflict or key issue

2. Look at the problem from different perspectives

3. Make your problem definition more operational

4. Explore the parts of the problem

5. Come to an open-minded conclusion

The typical consulting cycle parallels the thinking process for finding and defining problems. The following steps are useful for landing a consulting contract and delivering a final product and may help you as you think about identifying a problem to solve:

THE CONSULTING CYCLE

Step 1. Define the Problem you Propose to Solve

Before a client is committed you must submit a proposal that is a definition of the problem you see and think you can solve. An effective problem definition rearranges the facts in a way that teaches the client something new. For example, a company may know it is losing market shares, but you separate the cause from the result by showing them a problem rooted in internal inefficiency. To do this, you will have to dig beneath the surface to see such problems, since the information you get in an initial investigation is usually a distillation of the facts, not the facts themselves.

Your problem definition most propose a preliminary solution; the recommendation about what to do will come later if you land the contract. It should include the steps you will take to analyze the problem and a timetable.

Step 2. Analyze the Problem

If your initial problem analysis was successful and you sign a consulting contract with your client, you begin your research, looking for more information about the problem - and about the context behind the "facts" given to you.

Step 3. Develop a Recommendation or Solution

Your success at analyzing and redefining the problems will be measured by two things: Does it lead to a solution or recommendation? And will your client then choose to act upon your recommendations? You must turn your analysis into an action your client could take, making sure your actions directly address the problems you defined.

Step 4. Implement Your Recommendation in a Written Report

Your success as a consultant is not based solely on "good recommendations" - everybody has good ideas. Your recommendation must convince your client to carry them out. The text you write is your product. Your proposal and report must function rhetorically, to persuade the client by offering a convincing picture and reasons to accept your recommendations. (Clients who pay for clever but useless recommendations rarely come back.) The recommendations you make are typically addressed to a primary audience - the decision maker(s) who will accept or reject your analysis.

To help implement your recommendations, you must also write in clear operational terms to show how others will carry out your recommendation: what to do, how to make it work, how to evaluate whether it is working. These procedures often go to a secondary audience - the staff who carry out the plans and who rely on the quality of your instructions.