An electronic newsletter with communication tips and information
|
|
Agricultural Communications, Purdue University An electronic newsletter with communication tips and information |
 |
May 1999 |
When you start to create an educational product, you begin by identifying your goal and your audience. Then you think about possible approaches, try one of them, and, when you're done, evaluate it to see if the approach worked, allowing you to reach your audience and achieve your goal. If it did, great! If it didn't, you've identified a new issue to look at, and another branch of the process begins.
You and your colleagues, as creators of the product, should do a "postmortem" as part of your evaluation. By doing this type of evaluation, you will be able to change your approach to future products, in turn making them more effective educationally, stronger artistically, and more easily accomplished.
That's because a postmortem focuses as much on HOW you created the project--on the approach you and your colleagues took in creating it--as on the final product itself. This evaluation process involves a few simple questions. Remember, you and your colleagues are not only looking at the final product in the terms of how it appears visually and worked educationally, you--all of you--also need to question the process that you used in creating the product.
By asking these and similar questions, the product you created and the process that you used become a great teaching tool.
In other words, a postmortem lets you learn from a finished product and encourages you to use what you've learned to enliven future products.
Ahhh summer. Flowers, warm weather--and heated phone calls. That's right. Summertime can bring on a rash of heated phone calls to county offices on any topic from county fair issues to land use issues.
What to do? Take control of the anger. Don't let someone else make you angry. "You own your own anger," Richard Feinberg, professor of Consumer and Family Sciences and Retailing, says in the video "Anger Diffusion and Leadership," part of the Call Center Professional Videotape Library.
It's one thing to say it and another to do it. But Feinberg adds tips to help control the anger.
Of course it helps not to take someone else's ranting and raving personally. And don't take abuse. Either end the conversation immediately, or take rational steps to shift the situation to a more positive exchange.
Feinberg's video and others in the Call Center Professional Videotape Library can be useful for offices in reviewing and discussing their own policies on customer service. They are available from Purdue University Press (1-800-933-9637).
For more on heated conversations with customers, see "Dealing with Difficult People" in the June, 1998 "On Target." Find it through the URL provided at the top of this issue.
As Amy Gahran, Web designer and CEO of Content Exchange says, good writing is good writing no matter where you find it. However, she adds, each medium has unique considerations. One key point to consider for your Website is microcontent.
What's microcontent? It's all the short bits of text and design that give users a quick overview of the page. The basic categories of microcontent are:
According to Gahran, microcontent is especially important in Web writing for three reasons:
Therefore, every page in your site should provide near-instant orientation and context. Here are a few of Gahran's general principles for microcontent.
Gahran's comments are excerpted from an article in Web Site Journal ( Vol. 2, No. 15). You can subscribe to this useful on-line publication at "http://www.WebSiteJournal.com".
One difference between these two verbs is a relatively subtle, semantic one. Another has to do with style.
"Use" means to employ something for its intended or appropriate purpose.
Example: I often use suggestions from readers to determine "Grammar Trap" topics.
"Utilize" means to employ something for a new or unintended purpose, or to make do with an item meant for something else.
Examples: I often utilize the manuscripts I edit as sources of "Grammar Trap" topics. I didn't have a screw driver handy, so I utilized a knife.
So much for the semantic difference between the two words.
The style difference?
Many people seem to have gotten the idea that "utilize" is a classier, more formal version of "use." It isn't. It's just longer. And, because it's longer, it's to be avoided.
This is especially true when you're trying to reach a lay audience with material that's unfamiliar and perhaps already difficult for them to understand. Why make them work any harder than they have to? Why make your material seem more difficult than it is?
Tip: Don't write "utilize" when "use" will do. And it almost always will.
|
We want to hear from you. Do you have a communication question? Do you have a comment on this issue of "On Target"? If so, please e-mail any of our writers or On Target's managing editor, Kevin Smith. |
It is the policy of the Department of Agricultural Communication
Service of Purdue University
that all persons shall have equal opportunity and access to its programs and
facilities
without regard to race, color, sex, religion, national origin, age or disability.
Purdue University is an Affirmative Action employer.
These materials may be available in alternative formats.
Magazine Menu |
Resource Library Menu |