A Rhetorical Approach
To Workplace Writing
5th Edition. Prepared by the Professional &
Technical Communication Program in the Department of
English at the University of South Florida.
Edited by Tanya P. Zarlengo
Copyright © 2018 by University of South Florida. All rights reserved
Printed in the United States of America
ISBN:
No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, stored in
a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, except as
may be expressly permitted by the applicable copyright statutes or in
writing by the Publisher.
University of South Florida
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Contents
Chapter 1: Rhetoric in the Workplace..................................4
Chapter 2: Purpose............................................................15
Chapter 3: Audience..........................................................19
Chapter 4: Design..............................................................38
Chapter 5: What Is PTC.....................................................75
Chapter 6: Ethics...............................................................81
Chapter 7: Usability...........................................................85
Chapter 8: Accessibility.....................................................92
Chapter 9: Writing Process................................................95
Chapter 10: Organizing Information ...............................102
Chapter 11: Writing Style................................................107
Chapter 12: Email............................................................118
Chapter 13: Letters..........................................................129
Chapter 14: Memos.........................................................135
Chapter 15: Resumes.......................................................144
Chapter 16: Presentations................................................164
Chapter 17: Instructions..................................................177
Chapter 18: Proposals......................................................189
Chapter 19: Reports........................................................199
Chapter 1: Rhetoric in the Workplace
Chapter 1
Rhetoric in the Workplace: What Is
Rhetoric and Why Should You Care?
Before diving into a discussion of professional and technical
communication (PTC), you’ll need grounding in rhetoric—specifically, classical rhetoric. What do a bunch of dead dudes from the 4th
century B.C.E. have to do with professional and technical writing in
the age of the internet, 3D printers, and electric cars? It’s a reasonable question.
Way back in 1979, Carolyn Miller observed a commonly held
position among scholars that PTC courses should be “‘skills’ courses” focused on “subduing language so that it most accurately and
directly transmits reality” (610). Miller invoked the “‘windowpane
theory of language’” (611) to characterize the attitude that effective
professional and technical communication should transmit facts and
information transparently—as through a windowpane. The windowpane theory held that any effort to tailor a message to achieve of
its purpose with the target audience obscured objective reality and
rendered the message inaccurate.
The idea of “tailoring” a message introduces a core concept of
rhetoric: to communicate effectively, a message should be shaped to
suit the needs of an audience in the interest of achieving a specific
purpose. Perhaps you already can see that tailoring communication
to a purpose and audience is important in all communication, including professional and technical communication. In fact, you probably
already approach professional writing rhetorically:
• When you write an email, do you consider who you’re writing to and the relationship you have with that person as you
decide how to say what you need to say?
• If you’re going to ask for time off from work on short notice,
do you consider whether to make the request via email or
in person, and what words you will use to communicate the
request?
These decisions that consider the purpose, audience, and design of
communication are rhetorical choices, and you make them all the
time, including in work-related contexts.
If it’s not yet clear to you how PTC is rhetorical, don’t worry.
This textbook is designed to develop the rhetorical understanding of
professional and technical communication that will help you create
effective documents in the workplace.
To that end, then, let’s go back to the fourth century B.C.E. for
some olde tyme classical rhetoric.
Classical Rhetoric
Rhetoric, the art of effective communication, dates back to ancient
Greece. Rhetoric grew out of the need
for people to represent themselves in
a court of law. The narrative handed down is that Corax of Syracuse
started the first schools to teach the
principles of rhetoric to help people
“argue” over land. What Corax started has made a very broad impact on
Western thought and the basic premises of writing and communication
still in use today. Although much has
changed in the subsequent centuries,
one thing has not—the need to be able to communicate effectively.
Unfortunately, today “rhetoric” is a term often used in the pejorative sense for persuasive or manipulative political commentary. But
if you go back to the original meanings and definitions of rhetoric,
A Rhetorical Approach to Workplace Writing 5
applying rhetorical principles in communication can increase understanding between people and foster development of knowledge and
reason. In this way, rhetoric becomes a useful concept for learning
how to construct and deliver effective communication.
The fundamental tenets of rhetoric were codified by Aristotle,
and contemporary Western educational models are still based, in
large part, on his work. Over the years, two closely related definitions of rhetoric have emerged. The first definition holds as follows:
• Rhetoric refers to the specific features of texts, written or
spoken, that cause them to be meaningful, purposeful, and
effective for readers or listeners.
This definition emphasizes the text as an object of analysis. It dictates that the rhetoric of a text consists of its diction (word choice),
types of sentence, and use of figurative language like metaphors. The
idea is that paying close to attention to words and sentences is helpful and important in crafting a text that becomes effective. Inherent
in this definition are two problems, both of which constrain rhetoric’s usefulness.
The first problem with defining rhetoric solely in terms of textual features is that it often leads to the mistaken interpretation that
rhetoric is only about style (the words on the page and the way they
are put together). If rhetoric is merely a style of communicating,
then it can be turned on and off—that is, a writer can use rhetoric or
not use rhetoric, as they prefer. Perhaps you can see how this definition could lead to a theory such as the “windowpane” model noted
above: if you ascribe to the windowpane theory of PTC, then good
professional and technical writing should not be rhetorical. As noted
in the examples above, professional communication requires rhetorical choices.
A second problem is that this definition eliminates any ethical
or philosophical dimension from rhetorical activity. As you know,
words can be used to damage or hurt a person or group of people.
Discussing when and where communication works to marginalize,
discredit, or vilify a person or group is vital to any discussion of
communication, including PTC. This ethical dimension of communication is encompassed by another, complementary definition of
rhetoric.
Chapter 1: Rhetoric in the Workplace 6
In a more complete definition of rhetoric:
• Rhetoric refers to the work of finding and analyzing all the
choices that a writer, speaker, reader, or listener might make
in a situation so that the text becomes meaningful, purposeful,
and effective for readers or listeners.
Or, if you are the writer:
• Rhetoric is the ability to discover and analyze all the possible
options for communicating, and choose from those options the
most effective means of creating communication that is meaningful, purposeful, and effective for readers or listeners in a
given situation at a given time.
This definition is a paraphrase of one offered by Aristotle in the first
systematic textbook on the subject, The Art of Rhetoric, written in
the fourth century B.C.E. It incorporates not just the textual features
of communication (as in the first definition), but also the work of
analyzing the reasons why you’re writing (purpose) and who you’re
writing to (audience).
The Rhetorical Situation
Aristotle not only codified this more complete definition of rhetoric, he created the basic structure of a rhetorical educational system.
One of the basic tenets of his system is the rhetorical situation.
The Rhetorical Appeals
In Rhetoric, Book 1, Aristotle defines rhetoric as “the faculty of
observing in any given case the available means of persuasion.” Because Aristotle’s Greece was a predominantly oral culture, Aristotle
taught that a speaker’s ability to persuade is based on how well the
speaker appeals to his or her audience in three different areas (see
Figure 1):
• Ethos: appeal of one’s character. How you present yourself
to your audience as trustworthy or credible when speaking on
a subject
• Pathos: appeal to emotion. How you invoke feelings in your
audience
A Rhetorical Approach to Workplace Writing 7
• Logos: appeal to reason. How you communicate the logic of
your argument, to include evidence (e.g., facts and statistics),
but also the logical and reasonable presentation of your argument (e.g., organization and structure)
These areas form what later rhetoricians have called the Rhetorical
Triangle.
Figure 1: The Rhetorical Triangle
The appeals are “proofs” the rhetor/speaker uses in delivery
of his speech, because effective use of the appeals “proves” that a
speaker’s argument is effective.
As you might imagine not every rhetorical situation calls for
the use of all three appeals in equal measure. It’s easy to see that,
in professional and technical writing, credibility (ethos) and logic
(logos) would be very important, but appealing to emotion might not
be effective—in fact, use of pathos could harm the credibility of the
document if the appeal to emotion is included inappropriately. However, as will be discussed in the visual communication chapter, even
color choice can evoke emotion. When thinking rhetorically, your
situation will guide your use of the appeals, and all appeals should
be considered when making decisions.
Chapter 1: Rhetoric in the Workplace 8
Recursive Participants
Aristotle’s culture was orally focused, but as Western culture
became more text based, these same appeals were adapted to the development of a written text. The appeals also are readily applicable
to the visual and multimedia arguments.
The rhetorical triangle can be used to represent the participants
in a speech act, or any other act of communication. Because so many
media are available to a communicator today, the label rhetor can be
used to mean anyone communicating in any medium. See Figure 2.
Figure 2: Rhetorical Triangle: Recursive Participants
Note that this triangle is essentially equilateral. Why? The equal
sides and angles illustrate the concept that each aspect of the triangle
is as important as the others. It also suggests that a balance of the
three is important. Too much of one is likely to produce an argument that will not be effective—for example, readers may find the
argument unconvincing or difficult to understand, or they may stop
reading.
Professional and technical communication takes the theory of
rhetoric and practically applies it. We can even take the rhetorical
triangle and “convert” to be used in PTC. See Figure 3.
A Rhetorical Approach to Workplace Writing 9
Figure 3: Rhetorical Triangle: For Professional and Technical Communication
For professional and technical communicators, the rhetorical
triangle gives you a starting point for the creation of any document.
The triangle sits in a specific context or organizational setting. See
Figure 4.
Figure 4: Technical Communication in Context
Chapter 1: Rhetoric in the Workplace 10
Organizational cultures encompass values, beliefs, standards,
past and current practices, expectations, industry standards, economics, and politics. Organizational settings and cultures are patterns of
basic assumptions that develop within a distinct social group and/
or parent organization. These assumptions guide the type of professional or technical writing that you will do. For example, progress
reports for a software development cycle will be different from progress reports for monthly evaluations of air quality, and both those
reports could differ among organizations.
Decorum and Kairos
To help guide your entry into the writing situation, there are two
terms you need to know: decorum and kairos.
Decorum
Decorum is the easier term to understand and on the surface
looks rather simple, but it is often overlooked or misinterpreted,
which can lead to a failure of communication. Decorum is a code
that governs the expectations of behavior. Or, said another way,
decorum is a conventional norm. For example, just as it would
be a violation of expected behaviors for you to sleep in a business
meeting, it would be a violation of conventional norms to use curse
words in an email. The tricky aspect of decorum is that expectations
for behavior and conventional norms often are unwritten within
organizations. The two examples above are obvious observations of
general appropriateness. However, organizational cultures have their
own unwritten rules of decorum that you need to learn, especially
when it comes to writing tasks.
For example, some organizations will welcome and encourage
you to use previous technical documents as models for the writing
you do. Other organizations will frown upon this practice. When
you are assigned a job writing for an organization, or when you join
an organization, it is vital that you read the organizational culture,
so you can begin to understand these unwritten expectations. Sometimes you will be given documents to help you—for example, style
manuals or documents from Human Resources regarding approA Rhetorical Approach to Workplace Writing 11
priate behavior-—but, often, you will have to research and closely
observe organizational culture to learn the conventional norms that
are unwritten.
Kairos
The second term is kairos. Kairos
has no direct translation into English,
but it is directly tied to time—specifically, an opportune, critical, or exact
time or moment. In rhetorical practice, kairos refers to the right response
to a specific time, opportunity, or occasion. It is sometimes characterized
as doing “the right thing at the right
time,” or, if you think back to the second definition of rhetoric above, it’s
the part of the definition that defines
effective communication for “a given situation at a given time.” Kairos
helps to focus the rhetorical situation
as a function of time. As a professional and technical communicator, kairos positions your rhetorical situation
(purpose, audience, and design) in a
specific moment—a specific time—
so that you can craft your message
based on the needs of the moment or
situation.
For example, you’ve been tasked
Figure 5: Time as Occasion (Kaiwith writing the technical description ros) by Francesco Salviati, Palazzo
of a proposed new water treatment Vechio Museum, Italy
plant. The final report (design) will
be delivered at a city council (audience) budget meeting. Your description should focus on the technical
aspects of the plant and the long term cost savings of updating the
plant (purpose). These directives were dictated when the report was
assigned. However, you also know that currently the city council is
working toward “greening” city operations, so you might increase the
Chapter 1: Rhetoric in the Workplace 12
report’s effectiveness with the target audience if you highlighted sustainable practices in planned plant updates. This analysis of the rhetorical situation includes the kairotic factor of your audience’s current
interest in sustainability.
When you engage in rhetoric, you move toward asking specific
questions about your writing situation and making strategic decisions
about your products. Professional and technical writers who actively
engage in rhetorical decision making understand that:
• Writers always write in response to a rhetorical situation: a
convergence of time, place, and circumstances that leads them
to make decisions about what purpose their text might accomplish, who their audience is, what type of document/design
would be most effective
• Writers also make thoughtful decisions about how and when
to appeal to the audience’s need for a credible and trustworthy
rhetor (ethos), a logical and rational argument (logos), and an
emotionally engaging experience (pathos). When the rhetor
puts their decisions into practice, they create meaningful, purposeful, and effective documents.
To help you begin to put rhetoric into practice, consider Figure 6.
It illustrates the basic concepts of rhetoric, and gives you questions
to prompt your analysis of the rhetorical situation of a given PTC
project.
Figure 6. PAD: How to Analyze a Rhetorical Situation
Changing contexts demand changing strategies. In other words,
communicating well means understanding your topic, of course, but
also knowing your audience(s) and purpose(s). To that end, you
can use the PAD —purpose, audience, and design—as a mnemonic
device that will help you analyze a rhetorical situation and make
rhetorical decisions to produce effective professional and technical
A Rhetorical Approach to Workplace Writing 13
writing projects.
Work Cited
Miller, C. R. (1979). A Humanistic Rationale for Technical Writing.
College English, 40(6), 610–617. https://doi.org/10.2307/375964
Exercise
You are faced with professional communication tasks all the
time in your everyday life, whether as a student, an employee, or a
member of a club, group, or team. Pick a communication task that
you recently faced—something you’ve already completed. This task
could be anything in any medium (e.g., writing, speaking, making a
poster): a course assignment, a group project, a work project or task,
or a project for an extracurricular club or group. If you have been
asked to communicate, then you can think rhetorically about that
communication project. Once you have picked a task, use PAD to
analyze the rhetorical situation for this task. Address the following:
• Purpose: Why am I communicating?
• Audience(s): Who am I communicating to/for?
• Design: What should it look like?
Based on your analysis, how and what would you craft to ensure that your message is most effectively communicated to your
audience.
Compare your decisions described above to what you actually
did when you created and delivered your message (the physical product or speech act).
• Do you see yourself making rhetorical decisions even before
you knew what rhetoric was? Where and how?
• Do you think your analysis based on PAD would have produced more effective communication? Why/why not and how?
A Rhetorical Approach to Workplace Writing 14
Chapter 2: Purpose
Chapter 2
Purpose: Why am I Writing?
Before starting any writing project, you need to know the answers to the PAD questions that will guide your work:
If you consider these questions independently, you quickly will
realize that they are inextricably connected as part of the rhetorical
situation. As such, a complete understanding of a project’s rhetorical
situation requires that purpose, audience, and design should always
be considered collectively when making decisions about a project.
However, to help you explore each question thoroughly, let’s consider them separately, beginning with purpose.
Answering the Purpose Question
Purpose is defined by what the audience should
• Know
• Think
• Decide
• Do
• Be able to do
after they read your document. Purpose helps you begin the writing
process by narrowing the scope of your project based on the project’s goal or desired outcome. Your documents can
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
Explain
Evaluate
Inform
Entertain
Persuade
Describe
Express
Narrate
Argue
Etc.
Documents can do almost anything, and, as the rhetor, it’s your
job to make sure you
• Know what the document should do
• Communicate to the audience what your document is doing.
An understanding of the document’s purpose is necessary to accomplish this work. To answer the Purpose Question, your strategy
requires that you consider the end result of your project, and then
make the purpose of your project clear throughout the document,
while avoiding mistakes that obscure the document’s intent.
You’ll notice that, in order to make decisions about the purpose
of a document, you must have an understanding of the audience for
whom you’re writing, and, in order to make decisions about how
you will achieve the document’s purpose, you have to consider the
document design that will facilitate accomplishment of the purpose.
As you can see, all the elements of PAD relate when assessing a rhetorical situation: assessing purpose requires assessment of audience
A Rhetorical Approach to Workplace Writing 16
and design.
Consider the End Result
An easy way to consider the end result of a document is to ask a
series of questions that may include the following:
• Why does the audience want the document?
• How will they use it?
• What do I want my document to achieve?
• What action(s) do you want your reader/user to do?
• Will they respond immediately, or file it, publish it, distribute
it electronically?
Make Sure Your Purpose is Clear
In working to a project’s purpose, your primary job is to make
sure that your readers/users know what the purpose is. You should
state your purpose clearly in the document, and, in most cases, you
should state your purpose as early in the document as possible. You
also need to make sure the document stays focused on the purpose
throughout the text. Straying from that purpose compromises the
capacity of the document to achieve the purpose.
For example:
• In an email: Be specific in your subject and stay focused on
that subject in your message.
• In a report: State the problem in the introduction and make
sure all subsequent information relates clearly to the stated
problem.
• In a description: Immediately identify the “thing” you’re
describing and describe only that “thing” throughout the
document.
Chapter 2: Purpose 17
Avoid Common Mistakes
Below are some common purpose-related errors to avoid:
• Burying your purpose: Don’t make it difficult for your audience to figure out what a document is trying to do.
• Confusing your end result: You will not achieve your purpose
if you set out to do one thing and end up doing another.
• Failing to consider the end result: If you set out unclear on
what you are doing, then you will not have a clear end result
for your audience.
• Overlooking the idea of multiple purposes: Projects may be
used any number of ways by your audience(s). Make sure that
you have considered the multiple purposes your document may
serve.
• Confusing use of language: Your language should be clear,
effective, and appropriate, as determined by purpose and
audience.
• Neglecting to convey vital information: Always include all
information necessary for your audience to understand and/or
act on the problem or issue you address.
• Underestimating, overestimating, or obscuring vital information: You must give vital information the appropriate meaning
and weight. Your purpose will not be achieved if you fail to
make clear the relative value and/or import of information.
• Conveying the wrong information: If you introduce errors,
you guarantee your document will not achieve its purpose.
A Rhetorical Approach to Workplace Writing 18
Chapter 3: Audience
Chapter 3
Audience: Who am I writing to/for?
Before starting any writing project, you need to know the answers to the PAD questions that will guide your work:
If you consider these questions independently, you quickly will
realize that they are inextricably connected as part of the rhetorical
situation. As such, an complete understanding of a project’s rhetorical situation requires that purpose, audience, and design should
always be considered collectively when making decisions about a
project. However, to help you explore each question thoroughly, this
chapter considers audience.
Your audience is/are the person or people reading or using what
you write. Throughout this book, audience, reader, recipient, and
user are used interchangeably to designate your audience. Understanding audience and all that term encompasses is one of the most
important and challenging tasks you will face on the job. Once you
begin the work of understanding and addressing the concept of
audience, you are on your way to being a successful professional and
technical writer.
Answering the Audience Question
To answer the audience question, you need to perform an audience analysis. Here are some broad questions to get you started:
• What type of person/people will be reading the document?
For example: Are you writing for executives, engineers, the
general public, etc.? Is your audience knowledgeable about or
experienced with your topic/issue/problem? Are they favorably,
unfavorably, etc., inclined toward your topic/issue/problem?
• Why is your audience reading the document (notice the
relationship to purpose)? For example: What does the audience
want from the document? What is your audience expecting: to
be asked to act, to be given information, to receive a recommendation, etc.?
• How will your audience use your document (notice the
relationship to design)? For example: Will they simply read
the document, or will they responsively interact with it (e.g.,
modify, edit/revise, or develop it)? Where and how will they
engage with the document? Will they be reading your document
online, using it in hard copy in a lab environment, viewing it in
a meeting, etc.?
Audience analysis means you need to consider the type, knowledge, physical location, disposition, experience, interest and expectations of your potential audience(s). You’ll want to pay close attention to cultural factors, as well. Differences in culture significantly
inform whether your document will be effective in communicating to
your audience and achieving its goal.
Audience Types
Audience is a dynamic construct. That means your audience is a
moving target. Audiences are living things composed of people, and,
as you know, people transform, adapt and evolve all the time. While
we use the term “audience” like it’s a singular, static entity, “audience” is a dynamic, changing group of people.
In analyzing audience, then, your job is to come up with an “informed guess” about the character and qualities of your reader(s). In
A Rhetorical Approach to Workplace Writing 20
many cases, you will have multiple audiences (and multiple purposes) for a single document, and you need to think through and explicitly identify all possible audiences and their relationships to your
document as you make decisions about how to write your work.
You also may need to do research to make sure you understand the
following as well as possible:
• Who will see your document?
• Where it will be circulated?
• What strategies and language are required to effectively communicate with your audience?
Primary Audience
To do an audience analysis, your first job is to identify the primary audience—that is, the person or group most directly interested
in or connected to your document. You will write principally to this
person/group, as your primary audience represents the person/group
for whom your document must be most useful and effective. You
may be acquainted with this group and have the luxury of bringing
your personal experiences with your primary audience to the table
when you sit down to write, but your primary audience often will
be unknown or little known to you. In this case, you will have to
research their needs, expectations, and communication norms and
standards. Some approaches to audience research are discussed at
the end of this chapter.
Secondary Audience
Once you have determined your primary audience, you also
need to consider your secondary audience(s). These groups will have
different reasons for reading your document and different expectations about what they will get out of it, but, because they too will
be looking for information in your document, they are readers who
need to be considered.
For example (See Figure 1), you are a junior engineer tasked
Chapter 3: Audience 21
with writing the preliminary technical specifications for a pedestrian
bridge improvement in a greenway project. Your primary audience
are engineers and the project manager who will be responsible for
overseeing the bridge project. However, you also are keenly aware of
your secondary audiences: the unit supervisor who will be promoting
a junior engineer in the coming months, and the finance people who
have to make sure the project can be completed within the specified
budget. A further complication is that the draft of your document
must first get past the initial audience, who will review the document prior to distribution to the primary and secondary audiences.
The initial audience here is the senior engineer on the project, who
doesn’t like you very much.
Ultimately, your technical specifications will be included in a
larger recommendation report for the bridge project. This full report
will be read by the vice-president of sales, who will either approve it
or request changes (initial and secondary audience), before she sends
it to another key audience: the potential client who sent out the Call
for Proposals (CFP) for the bridge. The client represents another primary audience as it is this reader who will decide, from all proposals
received, which engineering firm should get the contract.
Figure 1. Example Audience Analysis
A Rhetorical Approach to Workplace Writing 22
Communication is not an isolated one-way event, but instead, a
circuit involving many people, many audiences. A combined audience will read most of the documents you write on the job, especially
longer documents (e.g., reports). While Figure 1 does not show that
your audiences might be talking to each other about your document,
they may and often do. You need to approach audience analysis as a
multi-layered event that takes into consideration the social process of
communication. Considering all of the potential audiences is a vital
aspect of professional and technical communication.
Audience Expertise Categories
Although audiences are varied and diverse, they can be broken
down into four general knowledge categories that describe each
reader’s expertise in your field or subject. These general categories
can serve as a guide to help you develop an understanding your
audience.
Lay Audience (Knowledge Level: Uninformed)
The lay or uninformed audience is not expert in the technical
field, discipline or subject matter about which you are writing. The
lay audience has a practical interest in your focus, rather than an
interest in the technical details, specifications, or operations of your
subject. Most likely, the lay audience has a personal stake in the
topic with an emphasis on how the subject matter affects them, their
priorities, their lives and/or work. To write for this audience, consider the following:
• Focus on the big picture—the results, not the methods
• Explain facts and figures in the simplest terms
• Define all terms
• Use illustrations and/or graphics to visualize information and
highlight what’s important
• Employ comparisons and anecdotes that are familiar to the
lay audience to relate your subject matter to experiences that
are part of their everyday lives
Chapter 3: Audience 23
• Provide enough background information to put data and conclusions in context
• Draw conclusions for the audience and explain them fully,
rather than leaving it to the audience to derive conclusions or
implications
Executive Audience (Knowledge Level: Acquainted or Informed)
The executive audience may have some technical knowledge, but
is definitely not an expert. They are interested in the big picture, and
generally will be use your document to act or make decisions, often
involving money. Therefore, they are concerned practical matters
such as: How does this matter affect the company, the business as
a whole, and/or the industry? To write for an executive audience,
consider the following:
• Provide some background information. The executive audience will need less background than a lay audience because
executives are familiar with the business of the organization
and most likely will have been exposed to the topic of your
document.
• Explain facts and figures
• Discuss the implications of data and/or specifications rather
than the details of data or specifications
• Supply opinions, interpretations, and recommendations
that would be helpful when making decisions, in addition to
conclusions
Note that executive audiences working in your organization will
be more informed about your subject and be better acquainted with
the organization’s communication norms and conventions than executive audiences with the same level of knowledge who work outside
your organization.
Audience of Technical Experts Outside of Your Field (Knowledge
Level: Acquainted or Informed)
A Rhetorical Approach to Workplace Writing 24
An audience of technical experts who work outside of your field
are expert in some field, but not in the field in which your document
is situated. Because they are experts, this audience will have a high
level of knowledge and skills, but they aren’t expert in the technical
knowledge/skills of the field on which your document focuses. To
write for an audience of technical experts outside your field, consider
the following:
• Focus on technical description of how things work (rather
than implications or interpretations)
• Supply technical data, details, and methods, but
• Define terms and concepts specific to your field
• Do not explain basic terms or concepts, or general/obvious
technical/scientific principles
• Discuss how the information provided relates to the entire
project (i.e., all fields involved)
Audience of Technical Experts in Your Field (Knowledge Level:
Expert)
The audience of technical experts in your field are field specialists
who have the knowledge and skills necessary to fully understand and
contextualize the information your document provides. This audience will not need background information that explains technical
terms, concepts or scientific principles that underpin the field, and
they will be able to understand and interpret technical shorthand,
such as equations, formulas, or abbreviations and acronyms. When
you supply data, you may wish to include all details and observation,
even when they appear inconsequential. Your audience of technical
experts might want to examine seemingly trivial information because
it could lead to useful insights. To write for an audience of technical
experts in your field, consider the following:
• Focus on technical descriptions of how things work (rather
than implications or interpretations)
• Include context or background only if it relates to specific
situations or methods new or previously unknown within the
Chapter 3: Audience 25
field or concerning your subject
• Supply all technical data, observations, and methods in detail
• Draw any conclusions clearly and explicitly from data
These four categories are neat containers that help get your
audience analysis started, but, in practice, the categories above exist
more accurately on a continuum, as seen in Figure 2.
Figure 2. Audience Analysis: The Expertise Continuum
In the example at the beginning of the chapter, in which you
were writing a specification for a pedestrian bridge, here’s how we
can classify the expertise levels and types of different audiences:
Primary Audience Analysis
Primary Audience
• Other engineers: Technical experts in your field
• Project manager: Executive in your organization with some
technical knowledge
Secondary Audience
• Unit Supervisor: Executive in your organization with some
technical knowledge
• Finance People: Executives in your organization with some
technical knowledge
Initial Audience
A Rhetorical Approach to Workplace Writing 26
• Senior engineer: Technical expert in your field (review/recommend revision of specification drafts)
Secondary Audience Analysis
Initial and Secondary Audience
• Vice-president of sales: Executive in your organization with
some technical knowledge (review/recommend revision of
report drafts)
Primary Audience
• Client (end user): Executive outside your organization with
some technical knowledge who also will have
• Technical experts in and outside of your field who read the
specification and report back to him
Figure 3 is another way to visualize the knowledge levels of
your audiences, and another way to classify the general expertise
categories.
Figure 3. Amount of Information to Include as a Function of Audience Knowledge
Chapter 3: Audience 27
As Figure 3 shows, you can gradually increase the amount of
technical information you include in a document based on the expertise level of your audience. For the lay or uninformed audience,
always keep things simple. For informed audiences, like technical
experts, you can increase the amount of complexity.
Beyond Expertise
An audience’s expertise in the subject matter about which you
write is a fundamental and defining component of a useful audience
analysis for a professional or technical writing project. However, expertise most definitely is not all there is when considering how your
document will be read and interpreted by an audience. While professional concerns like expertise are a fundamental focus of professional and technical writing projects, considerations beyond professional
factors always play a role in an accurate assessment of audience.
Audience and Organizational Hierarchy
The organizational infrastructure in the place where you write
can influence communication decisions, as it informs and defines
relational power dynamics in the workplace. A power-related facet
of audience analysis situates reader(s) within an organizational tree.
An organizational tree or chart (see this sample organizational chart
or Google one for yourself) describes the organization’s hierarchy of
roles and responsibilities. This visual representation of an organization’s structure describes how the organization’s personnel relate to
each other, who has oversight of which departments and/or personnel, and who is responsible for making which decisions. Considering
these hierarchies informs how you should address your audience and
fulfill their expectations.
As you analyze your audience, consider your reader’s position
(i.e., job or role in the organization) in relation to your position
within the organizational hierarchy. Think about how your various
audiences relate to or view your role in the organization. This understanding may guide your choices of language and tone, and also help
A Rhetorical Approach to Workplace Writing 28
you incorporate your organization’s political and cultural conventions. Think about the differences between a document you create
for a supervisor or a board of directors vs. a group of your peers or
subordinates. You’ll see that this comparison correlates to not only
knowledge level, but also to power dynamics within the organizational hierarchy.
Another factor related to organizational hierarchy is a reader’s
decision-making role (which is often, but not always, tied to position
or job). Audiences with decision-making responsibilities are important to consider in your audience analysis because the decisions these
readers make can have significant, far-reaching, and/or long term
impacts on the people inside and, potentially, outside your organization. It is vital that your document communicate effectively to
audiences with such consequential authority.
Audience Personality
Audiences are made up of people, of course, and all people have
their own unique personalities and quirks. Groups, too, have standards, norms of conduct, and, yes, quirks that define the group’s
culture. Further, people and groups interact in the circuit of audiences discussed earlier in the chapter, and these interactions color and
shape how the audience as a whole will behave. Perhaps now it’s
clear how audiences are dynamic living things.
As previously discussed, you cannot be expected to fully capture all the individual and collective quirks of your audience in your
audience analysis, but you can learn or become aware of elements of
an audience’s personality that will help you create a document that
more effectively communicates to your audience.
Think back to the pedestrian bridge example. As you recall, the
senior engineer who is your initial audience in charge of draft revisions is not into you. With this information in mind, you would
want to make each draft you submit as thorough and polished as
possible. Also, the unit supervisor who is part of your secondary audience is in charge of hiring for a promotion you totally want. This
knowledge motivates you to produce the highest quality product
possible.
As another example, if you know the project manager, who is
part of your primary audience, rarely reads anything all the way
Chapter 3: Audience 29
through, you definitely should thoroughly develop the executive
summary, concluding recommendation paragraph, and any other
sections the project manager likely would jump to in the interest of
finding key information quickly.
Audience Interest
The interest your audience will take in your document is important factor in audience analysis that needs to be considered from two
perspectives:
• What is the audience’s attitude toward the subject?
• What are the audience’s reading preferences?
All audiences, and all individuals within audiences, have inherent biases. It is your job to try to understand the audience’s bias and
adapt accordingly. Readers may or may not have a friendly, hostile,
indifferent, or interested view of the information you are communicating. Be as aware as possible of the attitudes readers bring with
them. While this is much easier said than done, as you gain experience in reading your organization’s culture and work more with
people from outside your organization, you’ll become more adept
at reading biases and attitudes. For example, your audience may
not find a robust discussion of fasteners as interesting as you do, so,
while information about fasteners should be included in your technical specification, maybe don’t spend four pages discussing the fascinating world of flange bolts.
The other important factor in audience interest is reading preferences or how audiences read.
Today’s business person is probably suffering from information overload. Because of all of the information, varying people
have developed various reading strategies to deal with incoming
information.
At any given time, your audience may use one or more of the
following reading strategies.
• Skimming: Looking for general or main ideas, or to see if
everything that should be there is there. These readers aren’t
really trying to get any deep understanding or detailed informa-
A Rhetorical Approach to Workplace Writing 30
tion from the document.
• Scanning: Looking for keywords. These readers will stop
when they see a keyword, read the a sentence or two around
the keyword, and then move on if it’s not what they need.
• Search Reading: It’s what you do every time you do a Google
search. You read just enough get what you’re looking for, and
then you stop. This approach is similar to scanning, but often
times readers may not know the exact keyword they are looking for until they find it.
• Receptive Reading: These readers are actually reading what
you write to get a complete understanding of your work. And
they are probably reading most every word.
• Critical Reading: This is the type of reading audiences do
when they are approaching something new. Critical readers
usually read every word as they work to develop as thorough
an understanding of the subject as you document allows.
Taken together, your reader’s disposition toward your subject
and reading habits directly correspond to how the reader consumes
your work and what they are looking for within it.
Cultural Factors
Remember that the business and technical world is increasingly
increasingly global. Keep in mind that the audience for your document may be multicultural. In that case, you need to take the time
to research and understand the business practices of audiences from
other countries, and be very thorough in ensuring that your text will
not be misunderstood by or offensive to readers from countries and
cultures other than your own.
Biased Language
Technology has made our lives easier and brought our world
closer together, making it accessible to conduct business on global
level. When adapting a message to your audience, be sure to use
language that is sensitive to implied biases. Avoid expressions that
refer to gender, race, ethnicity, age, and disability unless they are
necessary for understanding the context of the situation. Avoid use
Chapter 3: Audience 31
of idioms and phrases, as they are can be confusing or offensive in
other cultures.
Being audience-aware is a very big, very important job. Consider this: No matter how accurate, technically sophisticated, or
life-changing the information in your document is, if your audience
doesn’t understand it, can’t access it, or is offended by it, the information won’t go anywhere and the message doesn’t matter. The
response of the audience ultimately determines how successful the
document is, and knowing how to identify and analyze your audience is a crucial skill for all writers.
Avoid Common Assumptions About Audience
When conducting audience analysis, it’s easy to fall into a trap
of faulty assumptions. This is a list of the easiest and most common
errors of assumption, but you must be mindful throughout your
work to avoid generalizing your audience. Be careful of the following assumptions:
• The person you are addressing (primary audience) is always
the only audience
• The audience is like you in expertise, character, or
expectations
• The report has a finite time period of use
• The writer (you) and/or the audience always will be available
for reference or to answer question about the work
• The audience is familiar with the reasons why the document
was produced
• The audience has been involved in daily discussions of the
material
• The audience has time to read the document
Making any of these assumptions can decrease the effectiveness of
your document.
Researching Your Audience
If you are an expert in your field and you are asked to write your
fellow field experts, you will have a pretty solid idea what your auA Rhetorical Approach to Workplace Writing 32
dience expects from the document and how they expect to be given
the information. However, odds are that you will need to write for
primary audiences outside your field and with differing knowledge
levels at some point, if not often. And you most definitely will be
tasked with writing for secondary audiences from wide-ranging fields
and levels of expertise. When you are tasked with writing for diverse
groups with whom you are to varying degrees familiar, you will need
to research your audience. There are any number of ways to conduct
this research. The ones mentioned below are only some common
methods.
Internet
A good place to start is the Internet. Consider the type of audience you are researching, and identify some defining characteristics—for example, field or discipline, location, age, interest, role in
the organization, or any other aspect of their character that could
inform their engagement with your work. Once you have considered who the audience might be, search for artifacts from that group
or similar groups. The information you find might include studies
conducted by other researchers in the field, census reports and other
public records, scholarly or trade journals, or professional or public
articles written by or for the group, as well as official websites for
professional organizations and government departments or unofficial
blogs. In addition to government, professional, and scholarly conversations about your audience, you can read what members of an audience think about their community and themselves, and maybe even
the topic or issue your technical communication actually addresses.
You are looking for are looking for documents or artifacts in any
other media that might give you insight into the following questions:
• How does the audience talk between and among fellow
members?
• How does the audience talk to people outside the group?
• How do people outside the group communicate with your
audience?
• Is the audience thinking or talking about the topic or issue
that’s the subject of your document? If so,
Chapter 3: Audience 33
• What does the audience think about your topic or issue and
how do they talk about it?
When you read/view these sources, try to listen for the values and
the language that communicates these individuals’ needs, in addition
to the communication conventions they employ. This information
defines what counts as effective communication for the audience.
Structured Research
Depending on the assignment you’ve been given and the expectations of the document, you may be afforded the opportunity to engage in more formal or structured research into your audience. These
circumstances are rare and precious, as they give you the chance to
gather empirical evidence about the people for whom your writing,
rather than relying exclusively on informal inference and subjective
interpretation.
Observation
If you can talk to or observe your target audience(s), you can
learn how they speak to and interact with each other and with the
objects and materials they use to do their jobs. If you are permitted
this type of direct interaction, it will give you invaluable insight into
the the daily standards, practices and norms of the field in which
your target audience operates, not only from a professional perspective, but on an interpersonal level, as well.
Surveys
Surveys are particularly useful for providing statistics about
demographics and answering specific questions directed toward your
audience. You can ask straightforward questions about race, gender,
beliefs, attitudes, but carefully consider the response options and
what is implied in the language you use. You don’t want to bias your
participants’ responses by giving them a poorly worded question, or
offend them with objectionable or culturally insensitive language.
Interviews
Unlike surveys, answers in interviews are more personal and
A Rhetorical Approach to Workplace Writing 34
open-ended. When deciding whether and whom to interview, consider that interviews take more time than surveys. You can get more
in-depth with interviews, but you’ll be talking to fewer people,
which means you’re not necessarily getting the broadest perspective.
Prepare your questions ahead of time and avoid “yes/no” questions
that discourage dialogue and are better suited to survey methods.
Focus Groups
Focus groups are like interviews, but, rather than being conducted one-on-one, they are conducted with an assembled small group of
people. You would want to create a comfortable setting that encourages participants to interact not only with you, but with each other.
Participants should be free to discuss their opinions. Using a moderator can keep participants on task, mitigate any hostility between
personalities, and conclude the session on time while you interact
with the group. As with observations, you would want to conduct a
few focus groups to ensure that you’re drawing reliable conclusions
from the sessions.
Each of these methods has its merits and challenges, and the
method you choose should depend on the context and scope of your
project. Often, a combination of methods is most beneficial. However, none of these structured methods may be an option for you.
If not, you will have to go back to the good ol’ Internets, and just
talk to as many people as you can who might offer credible insight.
As stated earlier in the chapter, audiences are dynamic, and, for all
your best efforts, your analysis of audience will yield an “informed
guess.” But that “informed guess” and the effort you put into making it are absolutely vital to the success of your document. Remember, no matter how thorough, informative, insightful, or generally
amazing your work is, that work is meaningless if your target audience doesn’t understand, stops reading, or is excluded from the
document. It is your job to ensure the work you create can be understood and used the way it needs to be.
Chapter 3: Audience 35
Exercises
1. Pick a subject and find two works on that subject—e.g., a professional presentation, speech, document, video, etc. Your works
can focus on a product (e.g., electric car), or a service (ride sharing
services), or anything else about which you can find professional and
popular (i.e., general public) works.
a. Do an audience analysis for each of the two works.
• Identify primary/secondary audiences, as appropriate
• Identify all relevant audience characteristics and categories
for each audience (i.e., knowledge level, personality, biases,
etc.)
• Explain your reasons for characterizing the audience the way
you do (i.e., What’s your evidence for your conclusions?).
b. Compare the two analyses
• Are the audiences the same for each work? Different? How
do you know?
2. Choose the best audience research method (this may be one or a
combination) for each scenario and explain your decision:
Health Sciences
1. You are creating a pamphlet describing the benefits and side
effects of a pill that helps lower cholesterol. Your employer is the
pharmaceutical company that produces the pill. They have supplied
the data, but you need to present it clearly to users and potential
users of the medication.
2.You are designing a computer patient information system for a
hospital and want to know how to make it most efficient for doctors,
nurses, and staff.
3. You want to research the demographics of an area surrounding a
A Rhetorical Approach to Workplace Writing 36
new medical center to determine what services would be most useful.
Engineering
1. You have developed a new user manual for a printer, and you
want to find out if it is helpful to users of the product.
2. You need to research a city’s traffic patterns to decide exactly
where to install signs and directions towards a newly constructed
bridge.
3. You have developed a tutorial for a new computer software program, and want to determine its usefulness to users.
Business Writing
1. You are creating a handout for a meeting that you will run with
a colleague, and you want to make sure you list all major talking
points for the both of you.
2. You are producing a report on your company’s financial standing
for potential investors.
3. You are giving a presentation on your company’s latest product
to an audience of potential buyers. You want to research their needs
in addition to providing proof of the product’s success with other
groups.
Chapter 3: Audience 37
Chapter 4: Design
Chapter 4
Design: What should my document
look like?
Before starting any writing project, you need to know the answers to the PAD questions that will guide your work:
If you consider these questions independently, you quickly will
realize that they are inextricably connected as part of the rhetorical
situation. As such, an complete understanding of a project’s rhetorical situation requires that purpose, audience, and design should
always be considered collectively when making decisions about a
project. However, to help you explore each question thoroughly,
let’s look at design.
When you are tasked with a writing assignment, the genre or
form of the final product often is specified (e.g., write a report, a
memo, etc.). Knowing the genre conventions gives you a basic set of
ideas for what the document should look like, but many decisions
remain as you work to design a document that is visually appealing and easy to read. A document’s overall appearance affects the
reader’s attitude toward the document, and determines whether the
reader can find and engage with information simply and efficiently.
Answering the Design Question
Design incorporates two major concerns:
• Format of the page
• Incorporation of graphics or visuals
This first part of this chapter addresses the design of the page
and the arrangement of words on the page. The second part of the
chapter discusses graphics and other visuals, their use and type.
Business and technical documents need to be designed well
because documents must compete for your reader’s attention in the
workplace. Some, perhaps all, of your readers are only looking at
your document because they are required to do so as part of their
jobs. These readers will scan your document or only read sections
relevant to their purposes. Good design ensures that the document is
easy to read, and a document that is easy to read contributes to the
document’s overall effectiveness.
The design of your document will be based on your audience and
your purpose. Once you’ve determined these two factors, use can
use the following general guidelines to design your document. You
should make decisions about document design in the planning stages,
before you actually begin to write, because what you write will be
informed by the format used to presenting your words to your audience. With this in mind, you will need to make choices regarding the
following design elements:
• Shaping the appearance of the page
• Styling words through typographic elements
• Crafting access to information
• Adding other design features
Chapter 4: Design 39
Figure 1 illustrates a document design flowchart. Once you have
made these choices, you must stick to them and use them consistently throughout the document.
Figure 1: Document Design Flowchart.
A Rhetorical Approach to Workplace Writing 40
Shaping the Page
Shaping the page includes three primary factors: margins, white
space, and grids.
Margins
Most desktop publishing software, as well as Microsoft Word
and other word processing programs, automatically set default margins. It is important to consider whether the default margins are the
best design choice for your documents. You need to be sure you have
left ample room around your page to accommodate format issues
like binding and display conditions.
You will select your margin space based on your audience, purpose, and final delivery. For instance, if your document will be printed and bound on the left side, you should leave a margin of at least 1
½ inches on the left side to allow room for binding. You will need to
ask for guidelines if you don’t know for certain how much space to
leave or how the document will be used or circulated.
Margin decisions also include the use of justified or unjustified
text. Justification refers to the alignment of type along the left and
right sides of the margin. The previous two paragraphs are left
justified: the type aligns on the left, and type edge is ragged on the
right. This paragraph formatted using full justification: the type
aligns on both the left and right sides of the page. You probably are
most familiar with left justification in your writing projects, but full
justification is commonly used in books and other formal documents
and materials. Like margins, ask for company guidelines about justification. Default left justification (also called “ragged right” justification) won’t always be appropriate.
White Space
White space remains one of the most important features of document design. White space is all the empty “white” space not filled
by words, images, or other visual elements. It provides a way to
separate sections of the document, and this separation is invaluable
for the reader—both visually and mentally. White space can do three
very important things in a document:
Chapter 4: Design 41
Provide a break for the reader’s eye (see Figure 2)
Figure 2: Page with little white space (left) compared to one with white space
(right).
Keep elements together (see Figure 3)
Figure 3: White space showing like elements together.
A Rhetorical Approach to Workplace Writing 42
Isolate or emphasize important elements (see Figure 4)
Figure 4: White space emphasizing information.
To understand the significance of white space, imagine text on
a page as noise—voices reading the words on the page. White space
provides your reader a quiet space—literally—to take a break from
the visual noise of the text and the mental noise of information.
These spaces, these brief rests, allow the reader to pause for a moment to process what you’ve told them and to get ready to move
forward before re-entering your text. As with any rest—however
slight—the reader returns to your work just a little more focused and
receptive to the document. If you’ve ever experienced mental fatigue
looking at a page of solid text with no breaks, then you can imagine
how white space helps the reader.
Grids
Chapter 4: Design 43
Grids allow you to design a page with the “big picture” in mind.
Grids give you a consistent page layout that readers will use to access the information. Grids are like page maps that you make during
the planning process. These page maps standardize placement of
text and graphics throughout the document. Grids vary in type and
design, but Figure 5 below shows three standard examples of grids.
Figure 5: Page Grid Examples.
The first sample (far left) in Figure 5 is a two-column grid or
vertical grid. The far right is a horizontal grid with noticeable
“chunks” of information. The one in the middle is a combination of
them both. These are simply three standards of grid examples. You
can and will design your own grids when you sit down to create a
document. When you do, remember that using grids gives you a page
template that helps with effective and consistent page design.
Styling Words
You need to consider typographic choices to make your documents easier to read. Typographic choices also help guide the reader
through the document. There are four considerations for typographic
choices:
•
•
•
•
Typefaces
Sizes
Emphasis
Capitalization
A Rhetorical Approach to Workplace Writing 44
Typefaces
All typefaces are divided into two major types: Serif or Sans Ser-
if. See Figure 6.
Figure 6: San Serif (top) and Serif Fonts (bottom)
Serif fonts have “little tails” on the letters while sans (meaning “without” in French) serif fonts are “clean” since they have no
“tails.” Sample typefaces follow:
12 point Times New Roman
12 point Arial
12 point Courier New
12 point Garamond
12 point Comic Sans
In most conventional print documents, headings are formatted
in a sans serif font and body text are formatted in a serif font. For
online documentation, both headings and body tend to be sans serif.
But you can experiment with different typefaces. Readers become
used to conventional fonts that they have seen over and over again.
This habituation to certain fonts can be good if you do not want
to call your readers attention to your design choices. Using conChapter 4: Design 45
ventional fonts tells your reader that you are doing things “by the
book”—like turning in a paper for a class using Times New Roman.
In that case, you want your instructor to be focused on content and
not forming opinions about your unconventional design choices.
Conversely, a change in typeface will be noticed by the reader, even
if only slightly, and that extra attention could make it easier for the
reader to notice typographic elements like headings when scanning,
or, if submitting a proposal, to distinguish your organization’s offer
from other firms.
However, a word of caution about font selection. Fonts are
designed to convey mood and tone. They work on the human mind
like different voices. The mood and tone of a font conveys emotion
(remember pathos?), no matter how subtly. As you pick through
fonts, make sure that the voice you choose to speak your words is
appropriate for your rhetorical situation. Like many bungled design
choices, choosing the wrong font for the job will hamstring the effectiveness of your document before your audience has read a word.
For example—Pro Tip: Do not ever write a technical document using
Comic Sans. You can call it the Comic Sans Rule: No PTC documents in Comic Sans. Just. Seriously. Don’t do it. Unless you’re
writing a memo to clowns. And even then, no.
Sizes
This text is written in 11 point font. Body text is usually between
12 or 10 point. Headings size will vary, but consider that you will
have multiple heading levels (e.g., Heading level 1, 2, 3, etc.), and no
heading level should be smaller than your body text. Also, headings
need to be readily spotted by your audience. As you think about size,
then, consider that your headings should be neither obnoxiously
large nor insignificantly small. Each heading should be easily seen,
but not disruptive to the reader. The table below provides some examples of font sizes and uses.
A Rhetorical Approach to Workplace Writing 46
12 pt
Body Text
20 pt
Heading 2 or 3
36 pt Big Heading 1
42 pt Title
Emphasis
Typographic highlights for emphasis that you can use are Bold,
Italics, Color, or Underline. Some conventional uses of emphasis
include bold for important phrases (i.e., key concepts), or italics for
special terms (especially on first use). However, use special typefaces and highlighting options sparingly. Overuse of emphasis results
in loss of effectiveness when the reader sees the emphasis so often
that it doesn’t seem emphatic any more. Overused emphasis also is
visually distractly, causing the reader to focus more on the type itself
then the information. Both of these conditions decrease the overall
effectiveness of the document
If you do decide to use typographic emphasis, remember that,
like your other design decisions, you need to be consistent with the
use of emphasis throughout your document. If you bold an important keyword in one section, make sure you bold important keywords
throughout the document. Like headings, emphasis is a visual cue.
You can also use creative typefaces for emphasis, but the above
rule applies. If you use creative typefaces, use them thoughtfully and
do not overdo it. Following are several creative typefaces that you
could possibly use when making design decisions. Or you could add
some emojis. Okay, really, to complement the Comic Sans Rule, NO
emojis in PTC documents.
Capitalization
Capitalization is another way to add emphasis, BUT YOU NEED
TO BE CAREFUL. Sentences or long passages in full capitals letters
are difficult to read, and also give your readers the impression that
Chapter 4: Design 47
you are yelling at them. You can use all capital letters for emphasis
to highlight a word or short phrase (as in the Emoji Rule above). For
single word headings capitals may also be considered for a design
choice. As with other emphasis typography, use all capital letters
very carefully—unless you WANT to yell at your audience.
Accessing Information
Readers need to be able to simply and efficiently access the information you’ve compiled in your document. Two of the most effective
ways for readers to access information is by incorporating headings
and lists into your documents. Headings and lists function as both a
way to organize information and as a design feature. Headings and
lists are textual elements that communicate information, but they
also are visual elements that draw the eye and break up the page into
readable portions, or chunks, of information. Headings and lists also
serve as visual cues that tell the audience what type of information
is coming up—i.e., a new topic (headings) or several items that all
relate to a current topic (lists). Headings and lists organize both the
page and the information on the page.
Headings
Headings serve as a roadmap of your document—often literally,
as they form the basis of the table of contents. Following the map
laid out by headers should provide readers reliable access to different
types of information. Headings are one of the most important design elements in professional and technical writing. To illustrate this
claim, consider the following:
Imagine a 50-page report. Hold it in your hands. Open it up
and flip through it. It has no headings. Not one. Just 50 solid pages
of text, tables, and graphs. Close that right up. Now open it again,
and see the headings that navigate you through the content. Which
document are you going to read? Thanks, headings. Headings are the
best.
Keep in mind the chaos of the headingless document as you
design your own projects. If you’re using headings, you are on your
way to success as a professional and technical writer.
A Rhetorical Approach to Workplace Writing 48
Decide on Levels of Headings
Since headings function as a roadmap to your document, you
should have a system based on the level of headings. You should
match size of the heading to its importance. For example
Heading 1: Sections
Heading 2: Major Topics
Heading 3: Minor Topics
In general, you shouldn’t use more than four levels of headings.
Although headings are important, excessive use of headings make
the document seem fragmented or cluttered. If you use too many
headings, they no longer provide structure, they just add distraction.
Below are some guidelines to creating effective headings.
Write Concrete and Specific Headings
You should always write descriptive headings that include concrete language. Generic headings like “Section 1” or “Part II” are
not useful for the reader because they provide no information regarding content.
Write Parallel Headings
Parallel headings are easier for the reader to access and remember. Parallelism means that the heading is written in an identical
grammatical form. The headings in this document are an example
of parallel construction. The following table shows an example of
parallelism.
Chapter 4: Design 49
Table 1: Non-Parallel and Parallel Headings (Source: Lannon, John. Technical
Communication. 9th edition. New York, Longman: 359.)
In Table 1 above, the non-parallel headings used a mixture of
phrases and sentences in varying grammatical forms. Look at the
first words of the non-parallel list items: clean, writing, it is, disks,
keep. This is a random-seeming mix of nouns, verbs, and verb tenses. It reads as careless and disorganized. Look at the first words in
the parallel list: clean, write, keep, keep, and keep. All these words
are active verbs in the imperative mood. These headings are orderly,
symmetrical, informative and easily scanned.
When you decide how to structure your headings, remember that
it does not matter the grammatical structure of the heading (or list),
as long as it is consistent and parallel.
Other Heading Considerations
As you are considering when, where, and how to use headings, you also want to keep in mind the following related design
guidelines:
• Page Breaks: Keep heading with the section it covers even if it
means adjusting the page break.
• Spacing: Put more space before the heading than after it. The
heading separates text from the section above it, but is related
to the section below.
• Table of Contents: Match headings to table of contents
A Rhetorical Approach to Workplace Writing 50
(when applicable). Both the table of contents and your heading
are roadmaps of the document.
• Section Introduction: Do not use words like “this” or “it” to
start the first sentence after the heading (e.g., Section heading
“Kittens” followed by, “They are the fuzziest.”). The heading
is not part of the document text; it describes or identifies the
subject of a section.
• Online Documents: Incorporate more headings in online documents to accommodate online reading styles and the absence
of page breaks.
Lists
When highlighting specific information or when you need to
break up information, consider using lists. The most common types
of lists are the bulleted list and numbered list.
Bulleted lists highlight a set of components, items, or ideas.
Numbered lists highlight a sequence or amount of components,
procedures, items or ideas.
In addition to the advantage of breaking up information on the
page, list elements are isolated by surrounding white space. This
white space lends emphasis and significance to each list item, while
visually establishing that list items as related and this connects list
items in the reader’s mind.
Other List Considerations
When using bullets you should also consider the following design decisions:
• Do Not Overuse. Too many lists will fragment your text, and
you’ll lose continuity.
• Be certain a list meets your goals. Lists show relationships
between list items (as a set or sequence). If you’re not trying to
show a relationship, don’t use a list.
• No Such Thing as a List of One. You need at least two items
to make a list, preferably three.
• Be consistent in design. Like all other design elements, pick a
Chapter 4: Design 51
list format (e.g., type of bullets, spacing, parallel grammatical
structure, etc.) and stick with it throughout the document.
Other Design Features
Other design features you should consider incorporating when
planning your documents include the following:
• Visuals
• Text boxes
• Lines/borders
• Header/footer
Visuals
Visuals enhance not only the aesthetic appeal of the page, but
visuals can provide compelling support to your document through
the incorporation of a functional or motivational graphic.
For more information on visuals, see the Visual Design chapter.
The remainder of this chapter focuses on visual elements that augment textual elements.
Text Boxes
Text boxes, call-outs, pull quotes, or marginal glosses are a way to highlight specific information. You do this by selecting the information you want in the body of your text and
displaying it as a visual element separate from
the body of your text.
Different fields call them different things.
No matter what you call it or how you format
it, when you pull a particular quote or line of
text away from the body, it draws attention to to the quote and also
adds an aesthetic element that draws the reader’s eye. And, just like
all the other design elements we’ve discussed, you’ll want to decide on
the style of your text boxes (i.e., fonts, font size, color(s), boarders,
A Rhetorical Approach to Workplace Writing 52
placement on page, etc.), and then stick to those choices.
Lines and Borders
You can also add borders or lines to add visual appeal and
another way to help break up information and allow easy access for
the reader. If you choose to incorporate borders and/or lines, think
carefully about the design you will use. Borders and lines command
your readers attention. Stars or other cute borders (e.g., paw prints)
are generally not appropriate in a business environment, but a simple
border may well be a good design decision.
Lines or horizontal rules provide a way to help break up information and can function as a divider between major (or even minor)
points. Horizontal lines can be used to complement heading, as long
as you use them thoughtfully. Using lines with headings draws added
attention to the change of topic, and amplifies visual appeal.
Headers and Footers
Figure 7 provides a visual example of a header and footer. Headers and footers represents the placement of information that you
want to appear on every page of your document.
Figure 7: Running Header and Running Footer
Chapter 4: Design 53
Your page numbers will be in either a header or a footer, but you
can include other information as well: company name and/or logo,
date, revision number or date, title of document, client name, etc.
Including this information on every page helps your readers keep
track of which document they are reading, and where they are in
the document. Headers and footers are especially effective in longer
documents.
Visuals and Graphics
Contemporary tools and technology allow you to present data
to your audiences in visually appealing ways using tables, charts,
graphs, and illustrations. Building these visual representations has
never been easier, and the impact of visuals on your audience is substantial. Microsoft Word, and other word processors, have built in
functions that will create tables, graphs, and charts, as well as insert
illustrations. In spreadsheet applications like Microsoft Excel or
Google Sheets, you can input data in a spreadsheet, and then convert that data into visualizations like bar graphs or pie charts. Using
Canva, one of many online document design applications, you can
use any of hundreds of templates that combine images with text to
produce projects such as infographics, logos, and newsletters. As you
can see, visuals often can be created using simple interfaces, drawing
and editing tools, and templates. This chapter will develop your understanding of when and how to deploy visuals, so you can integrate
them successfully in your work.
Using Visuals
Why add visuals? Visuals are more interesting than text. Text is
abstract and reading requires extended concentration. It takes time
and effort for readers to follow a textual message. Visuals, on the
other hand, are immediate and viscerally engaging. This visceral
appeal is a key aspect of what makes visuals so useful, even in professional and technical writing. Readers get the message quickly and
directly, engaging with the information both logically, and, to varying degrees, affectively. Remember, even colors and shapes suggest
A Rhetorical Approach to Workplace Writing 54
mood. Visuals present data to your audience for quick access and
interpretation in a tidy, eye-catching package. Visuals are interesting.
As discussed in the Design chapter, your audience often is reading
not because they want to, but because they have to. Anything you
can do to increase the audience’s interest, focus, or comprehension
would be appreciated, and an appreciative audience is more favorably inclined toward your document.
However, like the textual design elements, visuals should be used
thoughtfully and sparingly. Not only will the impact of the visuals
be diminished through overuse, but your document will seem to the
audience to lack deep analysis or critical thought, more like a comic
book than a technical report. Think of visuals as the life of the party;
they’re exciting, but they can get really annoying after a while.
Visual Design Decisions
When you are making design decisions regarding visuals, you
have two decisions to consider:
• What type of visual will be most useful and appropriate for
your audience?
• Where will the visual be most effectively placed to serve your
purpose?
You’ll notice that designing visuals presents you with a smaller
PAD rhetorical situation. To make an effective visual, you will need
to know what purpose it serves based on the needs of the audience,
then you can design the visual. As you consider purpose and audience, keep in mind that the same data can accomplish different
purposes for different audiences depending on the visual design you
choose. For example, if you have data that describes the environmental impact of runoff from commercial farming, an audience of
technical experts might want to see a table or line graph describing
the amounts of different types of runoff over time, but a lay audience might benefit from an infographic that visualizes the sources of
runoff in different seasons. Same data, completely different visuals to
suit different audiences’ needs.
Chapter 4: Design 55
Integration of Visuals into Your Text
Norms for integrating visuals generally are consistent for all
types of visual elements. Prior to a discussion of different types of visuals and what they do, you’ll want to know how to include visuals
in your document.
Visuals should be named based on type and with a number that
corresponds to their position in the document—e.g., “Figure 1” or
“Table 4.” When naming figures and tables, start with “Figure 1”
or “Table 1,” and then count up for each additional figure or table.
Depending on your document conventions, you may number figures
and tables sequentially throughout the entire document, or you may
start over at “1” with each new chapter or major section. Note that
while naming conventions generally distinguish between figures and
tables, everything that’s not a table usually gets labeled as a figure.
To integrate a figure/table into your document, you must observe
the following conventions:
• Introduce a visual by name and refer the audience to a
visual in the body text—e.g., “(See Figure 1)” or “Figure 1
illustrates…”
• Supply a full explanation or interpretation of the information a visual represents or communicates in the body text after
introducing the visual. A full discussion of the visualized data is
necessary to fully integrate a visual into a document.
Introducing a visual by name and description should happen
before you present the visual whenever possible. You shouldn’t ask
your audience to go back and find the visual after you have described
the information it presents. The audience should be able to refer to
the visual while reading your interpretation. However, you can introduce the visual, provide the visual, and then continue in your explanation or interpretation of the visual after it has been presented.
When you are ready to place the visual in your document, note
the following label convention:
• Label the visual with the name and a caption above or below
the table/figure—e.g., “Figure 5. Ratio of cuteness to fluff
in baby bunnies.”
You can put the label (name and caption) above or below the
A Rhetorical Approach to Workplace Writing 56
visual. These labels will have a consistent typographical style in your
document—e.g., body text font, bold, 10pt. You also may need a
citation under the label, if the visual came from another source. See
Figure 8 as a guide for labeling visuals.
Figure 8. How to label visuals.
The work you do to standardize the integration of visuals in your
document organizes visual elements within the larger project, and
ensures that references to visuals can be added easily to an Index of
Figures or Table of Contents.
In discussing how to integrate visuals, you’ve seen that the text
and the visual work together in a document to add depth to your
audience’s understanding of your information. However, each visual
should be intelligible and useful if it were to be examined alone.
For each visual you design—before you integrate it into your document—ask yourself if, on its own, the visual stands up as:
• An accurate representation of the data/information.
• A thorough representation from which conclusions may be
logically drawn.
If the visual you have made passes the above test, it can be added
to your document for the benefit of the audience.
Types of Visuals
Knowing which kind of visual to use is as important as knowing when to use them. The most common types of graphic visual
aids may be grouped into five different categories, each with its own
unique purpose:
• Tables
• Graphs
Chapter 4: Design 57
• Charts
• Illustrations
• Numerical Equations
Tables
Tables allow you to display and compare data in an efficient,
compact format that is organized and easy to read. Table 1 supplies
a company’s sales, overhead, and profit over a period of ten years.
The information in Table 1 represents a decade of information
about three different data points, and puts those figures in conversation with each other, allowing the audience to draw some quick
conclusions about financial trends within the company. The body
text of the document in which this table would be included would
explain the data and conclusions in more detail, but the key information may be gleaned with a glance at the table.
Effective tables should:
• Display exact quantities of data clearly and accurately
A Rhetorical Approach to Workplace Writing 58
• Display descriptive column and row labels
• Present multiple variables
• Compare sets of data to each other
When deciding whether or not to use a table, consider that tables
supplying too much data are not effective. Tables put datasets in
conversation. If you have too many conversations—too many datasets—in a table, your audience will lose track of what’s being said.
Also, make sure that the information displayed is clearly labeled
both within the table and in the caption. Without proper labeling,
tables are just a meaningless assortment of letters and numbers.
Graphs
Graphs allow you to display the relationships and interactions
between multiple variables. Graphs have horizontal and vertical axes
that display these variables: the horizontal axis (x-axis) displays the
categories to be compared (independent variables), and the vertical
axis (y-axis) acts as a baseline, displaying the range of values for
comparison (dependent variables) or a measure of the categories.
As with tables, graphs need to be titled, captioned, and cited (if
applicable). The name of a graph should be “Figure 1,” or whatever
number is next in sequence, so that you can refer to the information
within your document. The two most common types of graph are
bar graphs and line graphs.
Line Graphs
Line graphs typically display the relation between variables
over time. In Figure 9, notice that the x-axis is in years. Time is a
common set of independent variables against which the dependent
variables on the y-axis are compared. Line graphs generally do not
display exact values very well. The audience must estimate the exact
values by approximating the position of the line on the x- and y-axes
at a given point. However, line graphs display trends in the data
over time (or other independent variables) more effectively than bar
graphs.
Chapter 4: Design 59
Figure 9. Sample Line Graph
Bar Graphs
Bar graphs display the values of multiple variables and are
well-suited for comparing variables to each other along an axis of independent variables (See Figure 10). Like line graphs, the exact values at specific points on the bars must be estimated, but bar graphs
effectively represent comparisons between groups or between groups
over another variable, like time.
Figure 10. Sample Bar Graph
A Rhetorical Approach to Workplace Writing 60
Keep in mind that there are many line and bar graph formats and
styles to choose from. The right one for your document depends on
the variables you need to represent and the desired appearance of the
graph.
When designing a graph, ask yourself:
• Who is my audience?
• What do I want my graph to say to them?
• Which type of graph will be the most effective at conveying
the data?
• How should that graph look?
Do some research, look at examples, and select the graph format and
style that best suits your data and your audience’s needs.
Charts
While graphs let you see how variables interact with each other,
charts allow you to visualize relationships of individuals parts within
a whole. There are a variety of charts to choose from depending on
your purpose.
Pie Charts
Pie charts (See Figure 11) are easy
to interpret and visually appealing,
but do not display complex dynamics
well. They visualize ratios efficiently,
but they can reduce complex issues to
percentages of a single variable. If you
have one variable and you want to
show ratios of the variable, a pie chart
may be the right choice. However, always consider whether the pie chart
oversimplifies the issue or condition
being presented by highlighting only
one variable, and then consider whether
Figure 11. Sample Pie Chart
Chapter 4: Design 61
the oversimplification renders the data in the chart misleading.
When designing pie charts, you also need to consider color and
texture. The effectiveness of the visualization depends on the ability of your audience to easily identify parts of the whole. Consider
whether the pie chart will be printed in black and white or color,
and whether you will need to add texture or grayscale to ensure that
all pieces of the pie are clearly visible.
Effective pie charts should:
• Display the exact percentages for each segment
• Add up to 100 percent
• Include at least two segments (charts may become overly
complex if you include too many segments)
Organizational Charts
Organizational charts divide things, such as organizations, into
multiple parts of the whole, however, unlike pie charts, the organizational chart can show relationships between the parts. For a typical
business setting, the top of an organizational chart would contain
the President or CEO of a company and the bottom would contain
the lowest level employees, displaying a hierarchical structure (See
Figure 12).
Figure 12. Sample Organizational Chart
A Rhetorical Approach to Workplace Writing 62
Flowchart
Flowcharts typically describe a process from start to finish, accurately displaying things such as algorithms and
workflows. You probably have seen
many of these throughout your lives.
Flowcharts frequently are used to display multiple possible decisions and outcomes as part of a process. A flowchart
is deterministic or causal—that is, the
choice made determines the response.
Tree Chart
Tree charts are like flow charts
in their illustration of processes, but
where flowcharts are deterministic or
causal, tree charts, or decision trees, viFigure 13. Sample Flow Chart
sualize probabilities or cost/benefit relationships. Tree charts illustrate conditional or joint probabilities based on a thread or stream of choices.
Tree charts can be used to strategically make decisions and assess the
probability of multiple outcomes.
Figure 14. Sample Decision Tree
Chapter 4: Design 63
Gantt Chart
Gantt charts are used to display the a process as a function of
time. Gantt charts map out the total amount of time to be spent on
a process or project, and then break that time up into segments that
visualize specific tasks to be completed during specific time periods along the project timeline. This type of chart displays the steps
needed to complete a project, allocates the amount of time needed to
complete each step, and represents both concurrent and consecutive
tasks. Gantt charts are useful in project management and proposals.
If you have used Google Calendar or a similar digital calendar system, then you have turned your life into a Gantt chart.
Figure 15. Sample Gantt Chart
Illustrations
Illustrations allow you to show your audience representations or
depictions of places or objects. By using illustrations in your documents, the audience can better understand the relationship between
the appearance and information. For example, a labeled illustration
of a bunny a) points out the location of its little nose; and b) identifies that the nose is the seat of bunny cuteness, as you are discussing
in your cute report. The bunny illustration, therefore, augments
A Rhetorical Approach to Workplace Writing 64
your report on the cuteness of bunny noses by allowing the audience
to not only understand the information in your text, but see it for
themselves on the bunny illustration.
Because of this relationship between information about an object
and an illustration of the object itself, you will want to consider the
following when designing an illustration:
• What medium will this document be published in?
• How does this medium affect your illustration?
• Will the document be available to the audience in black and
white tones or color?
• What type of illustration should I use?
These questions ask you to consider the type and scope of illustration appropriate for your document. To “illustrate” something
simply means to “demonstrate” or “show” it, and you can illustrate
information using many different types of illustrations. Below are
some common illustrative visuals you might consider:
Pictograms
Pictograms are pictures or icons that stand for words or phrases.
Pictograms for a non-technical audience makes information and/or
data more accessible and appealing. Pictograms also can resonate
with multicultural audiences. An apple icon communicates “apple”
clearly and to many different cultures. That’s why pictograms often are used in infographics, on street signs, and in any number of
different types of public communication. However, pictograms can
be misleading if the picture is unclear, or if a target audience identifies an icon as something other than you intended. It’s also possible
that a picture or icon could be mean different things to different
audience, and this could lead to offense. To mitigate these risks,
you will want to choose your pictogram carefully, and include a key
when appropriate, so all your readers will understand the data being
presented.
Photographs
Photos are useful for displaying how something looks in real life.
Chapter 4: Design 65
They give the audience vivid representations of places, living things,
or objects. The photographs you provide should show the subject of
the photo from a perspective and/or in a context that is most relevant to your work. Try to give the audience a realistic and useful
view, and make sure you crop the photo to eliminate any unnecessary details. You may wish to add labels to the photograph to point
out important details. You may also be helpful to include a familiar object in the frame to give your audience a sense of scale. If the
image is not your own, you will need to obtain permission from the
owner, and make sure the image is cited properly.
Maps
Maps display relative positions, locations, and relationships between physical locations or among an array of data. Two important
factors to consider when designing maps are a) resolution; and b)
keys. When you are integrating a map into your document, you will
need to be sure that the map is large enough and of sufficiently high
resolution to ensure legibility for your reader. You also will need
to provide a sufficiently detailed key to the map to ensure that your
readers can identify relevant information. A scale may also be necessary to communicate relative distances.
Schematic Drawings
Schematic drawings, such as blueprints and wiring diagrams, are
useful for depicting complex systems in a simplified, easier to understand manner. This type of illustration helps to display the arrangement(s) of internal mechanisms within complex technologies.
Figure 16. Sample Schematic
Drawing
A Rhetorical Approach to Workplace Writing 66
Diagrams
Diagrams present a schematic representation with highlighted
elements of structure, appearance, and/or mechanism. Exploded diagrams include cutaways that show the interior of the place or object
within the diagram, giving the audience a more in-depth portrayal of
its structural features and internal workings.
Figure 17. Sample Diagram
Clip Art
Clip art describes readily available, pre-made digital illustrations
of simple design. Stock photo are not usually included in the clip art
category. Clip art was developed to provide a wide range of general
purpose subjects and styles in multiple file formats. They are easy to
find and use, and, for the most part, generic and indistinctive. Because clipart tends to commonplace, its use will not distinguish your
document as unique or visually innovative. However, clip art has its
advantages. Often clip art is free. It’s easy to find clip art images that
are not associated with licensing restrictions. And the neutral and/
or conventional characteristics of clip may be effective for a broad
range of general audiences. If you want a unique, distinguishing, or
highly engaging visual, you probably don’t want to consider clip art.
But if you are looking for a quick, readily accessible, and generally
recognizable image, clip art may be worth a look.
Chapter 4: Design 67
Numerical Equations
Visuals of numerical equations illustrate calculations. Showing
your math can support or validate your conclusions drawn from
your data. Visualizing equations also can represent to your audience
how to perform complex calculations.
Equations and calculations should be placed within the document in the order that they would be performed, and calculations for
engineering should include the following:
• Information required to perform the analysis or design (i.e.
drawings, material information, design criteria, etc.)
• Problems and solutions organized to be read from the top to
the bottom of the page
• A summary of the solution
For more complex equations, as when equations exist within
equations, show both equations first, and then repeat the second
equation with values substituted. The source or sources for the equations must be cited, if they are not your own.
Lastly, your calculations should be detailed enough that your
work can be easily replicated by other professionals within your
field. Replicability is fundamental to your credibility with your
audience.
Infographics
Infographics, like most visuals, represent information in graphic
form. However, unlike most of the visuals discussed in the is chapter, infographics are notable for their ability to communicate large
amounts of information and/or thematic concepts (See Figure 18). A
single infographic can convey a significant amount of data, represent
data patterns and relationships, and identify changes in variables
over time or in space. Further, infographics often are highly visually
appealing and frequently create visual narratives that make engaging
with infographics even more enjoyable for an audience.
A Rhetorical Approach to Workplace Writing 68
Figure 18. Sample Infographic
However, infographic can be visually challenging. Because of the
volume of information infographics can present, and because infographics include engaging visuals and textual information, “reading”
an infographic can require as much effort as reading text. They also
tend to be vibrantly colored and employ symbols and icons to signify
variables, so they can present to your audience like a picture book.
Not every audience will appreciate being asked to read a picture
book. Further, while infographics can tell dynamic stories with
Chapter 4: Design 69
data, those stories tend not to be very nuanced. In general, infographics are more useful for general audiences and broad concepts,
but not appropriate for highly technical information or complex
interpretations.
Infographics use words, numbers, and pictograms, and can incorporate photographs, or other types of visuals, as well. In general,
infographics
• Create a strong visual narrative
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