Month: December 2020

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final self-assessment reflection

Writing with clarity and preciseness is my biggest weakness. I also do not have a lot of experience in writing in a professional tone. However, things changed after taking this course. One of the most important lessons I have learnt is how to write with the You attitude. I tend to use imperative verbs and I did not even notice how rude and forceful it sound when I write. I hope that I didn’t offend anyone in the past and I think I will be more equipped for the workforce once I graduate soon in June.

Throughout the course, I wrote a few peer reviews where I examined other team members’ work and provided them opinions. Providing feedback is hard for me because at first, I was not able to point out anything particularly meaningful. However, as I looked at the instructor’s blog and observe how other classmates did it, I slowly understand and got better at it in the subsequent peer reviews.

Another thing that I have to mention is the final report. The initial planning phase was tough as i scramble for ideas that I am able to write. I understand that I am not a fast writer but it took me lots of time to get the task done. I should practice more to improve my writing skills. However, once I got the direction of the plan, writing the report was manageable and the course schedule definitely helped me stay on track. This lesson taught me how to write a proper final report for professional use and all the key elements to help support my report. Overall, I have learnt lots of writing skills through reading the textbook and from comments provided by our professor. What a way to end the term with all the courses being taught online.

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Web Folio Reflection

For the final assignment for the English technical writing course, students are tasked to create a final web folio. In this web folio, I am going to include key information that is required to showcase my work to my potential employer. I have no experience in creating a web folio and this is quite a new experience for me.

In this web folio, i have included my resume, cover letter, reference letter request letter and some of my best works on the website. What is the most challenging task in this task is that I have to highlight my marketable skills that are relevant to my career choice in a logical and creative way. I have done research online searching for examples and photographs for inspiration but I don’t seemed to have the expertize to achieve such sophisticated level of website interface. However, I have tried my best to set up a web folio with the exisiting resources and time I have right now.

In the process of making this web folio, i find that organization of the website is one of the most demanding tasks as there are lots of materials I have to present. It took time but I sorted them out eventually.

In my opinion, I do not think a web folio is that important to me as a business student. A LinkedIn profile has a lot more importance than a web folio because it basically serves a similar purpose to showcase your achievements. Unless I have multiple projects to showcase such as art works or interior designs, I may not need a web portfolio since most job opportunities did not ask for one. Nevertheless, this is a solid learning experience and an important skills to have in my back pocket. I can organize my work and reflect on my personal work and past experience and see if I was lacking anything that I am suppose to have in order to be successful in the job market.

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Assignment 2.3 Memo re. Formal Report Progress Report

To: Dr. Erika Paterson, ENGL 301 99A Professor

From: Barton Lui, ENGL301 99A Student

Date: November 13th, 2020

As per the course schedule, below is my progress report of my formal report on how to encourage Vancouverites to consider using a more environmentally sustainable method of transportation.

Purpose

The purpose of the report is to explore whether or not Vancouverites can use rely on a sustainable transportation method.

The audience of the report

  • Mayor’s Office of Vancouver- The mayor has the power to influence a lot of major decisions regarding infrastructure, legislation, bylaws and policies.
  • CEO of Translink- Currently this position is vacant but the most recent holder of the top executive position is Kevin Desmond.
  • Daily Commuter.

Significance of the report

This report will investigate why some people are not using sustainable transportation methods such as bikes and electric cars to get to work/school. By knowing what is preventing them from doing so, we can provide recommendations to the authorities to make some changes to the existing situation.

Research Plan

  • Problem: Can Vancouver use a more sustainable method of transportation?
    • As the population continues to increase in Vancouver, more people will be required to travel around which in turn will generate more pollution. We have to explore the behaviours of commuters and implement suggestions to encourage positive behaviours that will benefit the environment.
  •  The primary data source will be from the online community, family and friends
  • Interview with Translink management team for insights, current plan and future plans to address the problem
  • secondary data

Writing Schedule

  • Nov 16 2020: Start emailing friends and family. Send them the survey and start emailing Translink managers for interviews. Post survey link on Facebook groups
  • Nov 19 2020: Begin secondary data collection
  • Nov 20 2020: Interview with Translink managers
  • Nov 27 2020: Use the collected primary and secondary data to start writing the report
  • Nov 30 2020: Final revisions of formal report draft
  • Dec 1 2020: Post formal report draft on the team forum
  • Dec 4 2020: Write peer review of formal report draft
  • Dec 9 2020: Post peer review of teammate’s formal report draft
  • Dec 12 2020: Revise the formal report draft based on peer review
  • Dec 15 2020: Make final revisions to the formal report
  • Dec 17 2020: Formal report deadline. Post as .pdf or .doc on the team forum

Survey link:  https://forms.gle/eZZz4r6aqJyEVkHj9

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Assignment 3.1, Business Letters: Complaint & Bad News letter

Letter #1 Complaint letter

November 27th, 2020

Mr. David Green, Customer Service Manager
1006 Granville Street, Vancouver
BC, V4J 3K2

Device battery problem

Hi David,

I have purchased a GPS tracker (Device ID: 1504105) for my rental car business last month from your company and even though the tracker was able to give me an accurate location update through the cellphone application, the performance of the battery life of the tracking device was less than satisfactory. The run time was far less than what the advertisement has claimed and I am fairly disappointed with the outcome.

I suspect that the GPS tracker I have received could be one of the faulty products from the manufacturing process and if you can replace my device so I can try it out again, that will be wonderful.

My customer support ticket number is 503953 and I am looking forward to hearing from you soon.

Sincerely,

Image result for signature examples

Barton Lui

Email: bartonlui.ca@gmail.com
Phone: 604-123-4567

 

 

 

Letter #2 Bad News adjustment Letter

November 30th, 2020
Mr. Barton Lui
1234 Main Street, Vancouver
BC, V5J 2K9

Re: Device battery problem

Hi Barton,

Thank you for contacting us about the problem. Your feedback will help us improve our product in the future.

First of all, I would like to apologize for the inconvenience this may have caused you. In regard to ticket number 503953, I have already contacted the engineering department to initiate an investigation of a possible manufacturing problem but unfortunately, so far we are unable to find the cause of your battery problem. We take our customer’s concern seriously and I would like to offer you a replacement device but we can not do that right now due to the high demand for the product and lower than normal production rate during the pandemic. Until we can get you a new replacement device, please consider a few suggestions that may improve your device’s battery performance.

  1. Ensure the GPS tracker has reasonable access to the sky for better signal reception. Places like underground will require the GPS tracker to search harder for signals and therefore uses more battery.
  2. Consider turning off the real-time location tracking option and switch to a 4hour location refresh interval for lower battery usage.

If the problem still persists, please do not hesitate to notify me again. I will be happy to replace a new device for you when our warehouse received the shipment.

Best Regards,

Image result for signature examples

David Green,

Manager, Customer Service
Email: davidgreen@gpstracking.com
Phone: 604-122-4532

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Lesson 1.3 Definition assignment

This page features all of my best works completed throughout the course.

Lesson 1.3 Definitions of Absorption rate

Objective: The objective of this exercise is to define a relatively complex term in three ways: a parenthetical definition, a sentence definition, and an expanded definition. The definitions should vary in detail depending on the audience. This exercise is to practice explaining a complex term to an audience with little to no technical background on the subject.

Term:

Absorption rate

 

Situation and audience:

Real estate analysts use this term to explain to developers, real estate salesperson or investors how fast houses are selling in the current market environment.

 

Parenthetical definition:

Measures how fast available homes or newly built houses can be sold after completion.

 

Sentenced definition:

The absorption rate can be used to estimate the rate at which houses in a particular market are sold over a specific time frame. The rate can be expressed in units, months, or percentages.

 

Expanded Definition:

In the real estate market, the absorption rate will provide investors insight into how quickly or slowly houses are selling. A high absorption rate indicates that the supply of houses will run out quickly as the inventory (newly built houses) will deplete rapidly. This shows that sellers can demand more money for their property as more buyers are seeking to buy from a limited source of inventory. On the other hand, a low absorption rate indicates the opposite where sellers are seeking to sell to a limited pool of buyers. Vancouver has an absorption rate of 80%, this is considered very high (Avison Young, 2019).

 

Example showing how to calculate the absorption rate:

If a city has 1,000 homes currently listed on the market to be sold and buyers purchase 100 homes per month, the absorption rate is 10% (100 sold homes divided by 1000 available for sale).

Source: https://corporatefinanceinstitute.com/

The absorption rate can also be converted into a time period to estimate how long will it takes to sell the current inventory. Using the previous example, there are approximately 1000 newly built homes in an area and buyers are purchasing 100 homes per month, it will take approximately 1000/100= 10 months for all the listed properties to be sold. According to Remax, a leading residential and commercial real estate sales firm, six months or more is considered a buyers market where buyers have more bargaining power. In Vancouver, it has been a seller’s market for most of the time.

Source: https://www.remaxreinvented.com/sellers/how-can-we-help/what-are-absorption-rates/

In conclusion, the absorption rate gives real estate market participants an idea about how much activity has happened in a specific area and time frame. It does not tell what the future market behaviour is going to be like but land developers and investors still use this as one of the many tools they have to estimate future price movements.

 

Work cited:

Avison Young (2019). 2019 Year0End Market Report. Retrieved October 26th, 2020, from https://www.avisonyoung.ca/documents/95750/1691318/Avison+Young+Office+Market+Report_2017+Year+End.pdf

Somer G. Anderson (2020). Absorption Rate. Retrieved October 26th, 2020, from https://www.investopedia.com/terms/a/absorption-rate.asp

 

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Unit 3 reflection Reflections Blog

In week three, I have learnt how to write with the “You Attitude” to Evan Crisp. This type of communication works best in professional settings and the focus is to avoid using pronouns and imperative verbs when providing feedback. I have this problem of writing with imperative verbs and I finally understand why it is not suitable because it makes my writing sound too assertive.

The research process is very interesting, I have asked my friends and family who live in Vancouver about their transportation habits and how they approach the topic of sustainable living.  It was challenging for me to draw a conclusion for my report because i was not able to gather a large enough sample size to give me a definite answer for writing my report.

I did the review on Phoebe’s formal report and I found out that her report has a lot of graphs and the process was very clear to understand. I enjoyed her writing style which is very descriptive. Some points might need more elaboration but I think I can learn from her report.

This week was very busy and it seems like there will be three assignments due for this course next week. I am quite worried that i might be able to finish it on time. Anyway, i have learnt a lot from this unit and looking forward to the next unit.

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