Week Three began with learning about “writing with YOU attitude”. Through the modules posted online by Dr. Paterson and the materials in the textbook, we focused on how to write professionally without the excessive use of pronouns and imperative verbs. The assignments under Unit 3.1 proved to be somewhat difficult as we are actually very used to writing exactly the way we would say it verbally, thus, making our writing very unprofessional and wordy. Learning to write with YOU attitude trained me to write concisely yet respectfully.
I faced a number of difficulties when writing the formal report draft especially with confidentiality issues with the interviews and not receiving enough data from the surveys posted. In order to collect insights on Urban Outfitters China and its positioning in the Chinese fashion market, I interviewed two senior members of staff from the URBN CHINA team, which was less successful than I had hoped it to be due to confidentiality issues which restricted the two members from revealing too much information. The best I could do, therefore, was to rephrase my questions at times and ask them to answer more general questions. Additionally, I’ve been asking friends, families, and colleagues to send around the survey for more submissions but some have responded saying Google Form is not easy to use in mainland China due to China’s block on Google. With the survey results continuously coming in at a rather slow rate, it was hard to set a time on writing the report draft. Eventually, I decided to write the survey section last and will make sure I edit that section for the final version of the report according to the latest amount of surveys collected.
I enjoyed peer-reviewing my team-member Nicholas’ formal report draft. Having peer-reviewed so many of my team’s pieces throughout this course already, this process has become much smoother. I knew the details I had to look out for and paid extra attention to writing with YOU attitude and the unnecessary usage of imperative verbs. I greatly appreciated Nicholas’s peer-review of my draft, too, as it provided a new perspective to my work that I would not have had before. He pinpointed the mistakes I have missed out on and guided me on how to perfect my final version of the report.
Overall, I learned a significant amount from this unit, particularly on how to write professionally with the YOU attitude and without imperative verbs. I believe these skills will come of great use when writing in formal settings and I look forward to adopting these writing styles in the near future.