Now halfway through the course as we are wrapping up Unit 2, I am looking back on the process of creating a LinkedIn profile, preparing the report proposal, peer reviewing my partner’s proposal, and finally the peer review process.
LinkedIn is a useful tool while navigating professional online networking. I created a profile many years back and have finally gotten around to updating it in this course. The main changes to my profile were: adding a summary, and writing descriptions for work and volunteer experiences. I learned that having a (personal) summary boosts the chances of being viewed on LinkedIn by 27 times. This must have been true, as the number of views and requests to connect on my profile increased following the addition of a summary.
While the summary was easy to write, I struggled with adding details to my profile without making them sound boring. I wanted to find the balance between having enough information while being easy to read. So I opted for bullet points under my “Experience” section and included 3 – 4 pieces of information for each experience. Overall polishing my LinkedIn was a valuable opportunity. I will continue to keep my profile updated in the future.
In this unit, we also worked on our formal reports. My topic of interest came to me easily but I had a lot to learn about writing formal reports. I wanted to tackle the issue of plastic waste at Geering Up because it was something I dealt with everyday, cared about, and has a fairly easily attainable solution. I found information and examples in the “Technical Communication” textbook helpful in writing my proposal. The proposal made me consider and reconsider many things including which questions I should include in the Scope” section, whether the goal of the report was to reduce plastic waste or to lower financial spendings for the company, and what methods of data collection would be least biased.
After deciding that this report could promote both reducing single-use plastics and potentially lowering costs, I narrowed down the questions I included in “Scope”. For data collection, I initially planned to interview and survey Geering Up staff, but Dr. Paterson suggested surveying participants too. This was a good idea that I am still considering implementing because reaching out to participants could be unprofessional. I am hopeful towards producing an informative formal report but also realize the process is just getting started.
As part of the writing process, peer review plays an important role. I reviewed Tom Howey’s proposal for the formal report and picked up on a few things that were valuable to my assignment as well. I noticed when examining other people’s work, having a fresh pair of eyes helps with noticing the details and coming up with things that perhaps the author missed. Tom’s proposal was about making use of under-used study spaces on campus. I suggested considering the problem in more detail, because there could be many factors influencing the popularity of a location that should not be overlooked. The issue did not seem like a lack of good spaces, but rather an issue of convenience. I used my knowledge as a student who had been at UBC for 4+ years to reflect on why some spaces were less favorable and concluded that it was mainly concerning location and convenience rather than the inherent nature of the space. Reviewing Tom’s work was interesting and shed light on the multifaceted nature of problems.
My formal report proposal was in turn reviewed by Tom. I appreciated the peer review process because each editor’s contributions were unique. Tom pointed out that my structure was good and the content was detailed, but there were a few details I overlooked during the self-editing process. I learned that decreasing the use of personal pronouns, and paying attention to punctuation and typos would strengthen my writing. Reading other peer feedback from my writing team also helped with asking questions about my own proposal, such as: Is the addressed issue too vague? Are my methods unbiased? What will my audience gain from the report?
For the upcoming weeks I will stick to my research schedule and work on collecting data. While one report may be insignificant in the grand scheme of things, it is a good start on raising awareness on the issue of plastic usage. I am anticipating some changes to my report as I discover things along the way, but excited to compile data from the surveys and interviews.
Enclosure:
Revised Report Proposal: ENGL 301 Jenny Zhu Lesson 2_1 – Revised Formal Report Proposal
Tom’s Peer Review: https://blogs.ubc.ca/engl301-99a-2019wa/2019/10/06/2-1-peer-review-of-formal-report-proposal/