Week 10 – Professional Memo Assignment
Professional Memo Assignment
Your mission for this week, should you choose to accept it, is to write a professional memo. The memo should be of moderate length (somewhere between 350-600 words), and the topic should reflect the material covered in the previous chapters of the text. Don’t panic if you can’t think of a decent topic, as I’ve included some topic ideas for everyone at the end of this assignment description.
Requirements for this assignment.
Length should be 350-600 words, give or take.
Follow the structural recommendations I set forth in the lecture series. Your memo should have four sections: Heading, Purpose, Discussion and Action. Do not deviate from this requirement. Each of these sections should meet the objectives which were set forth in the lectures.
Be sure the memo carries the proper sense of tone.
Keep the jargon to a minimum. You don’t have to completely ‘dumb down’ your memo so that every employee in the firm could understand it, but it should be a document that someone with only a basic understanding of the subject could understand.
In keeping with the material covered in the course, you’ll want to make sure that the memo offers a suggestion of some kind for improving workforce, customer service, technology management, or other area previously covered in class. While not required, it helps if you base this on something from your own work experience. Here are some possible subject ideas:
A memo that increases workforce engagement and motivation within a specific department.
A memo that argues for a restructuring of either job or work design for a specific department.
A memo that offers some metrics for assessing technology, effectiveness and satisfaction (again, within a specific department).
As with the white paper, these are just some ideas. Feel free to center your memo around a different initiative if you think it would be appropriate.
Grading Rubric
Possible Points
20
15-19
9-14
0-8
Criteria
Memo follows the structural guidelines set forth in the lecture series (Heading, Purpose, etc.). Topic is relevant to the course readings. Text is clearly written, and the content of each section is appropriate. No grammatical, spelling and syntactical errors.
Memo follows the structural guidelines set forth in the lecture series (Heading, Purpose, etc.). Topic is relevant, but either the purpose, discussion or action section of the memo is incomplete. Two to sixteen grammatical, spelling or syntactical errors.
Memo is not properly structured. Topic is not relevant, and two or more sections of the memo are poorly constructed. Twenty to forty-four grammatical, spelling and syntactical errors.
Sections of the memo are missing, length requirement is not satisfied. Over forty-four grammatical, spelling or syntactical errors.
