As a Communications major student, writing academic research papers was a large part of my education. Covering topics from intercultural communication, conflict resolution, and public relations practices to media and technical writing, business development, organizational management, I learned a great deal about the ways people communicate and how to effectively manage employees based on their styles. I have provided links to several papers I have written during my Bachelor of Arts studies below.
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As I reviewed all of the blog creations by my classmates, I found some rather consistent challenges across them all. I did not find that any of them truly had a target audience, they had challenges with creating a cohesive look and function. “The design of your blog – font choice, color, layout, column width, and more – will also help to make your blog more readable. Try and keep your design simple and free of visual clutter,” (University of Exeter, 2014). Most of the sites had very busy background images, with some not having enough text background color to delineate the text from the image, while some were just too busy.
Experts also suggest that posts of less than 250 words, or more than 1000, do less well in search results; more on this later (University of Exeter, 2014). All of the blogs I read posted there entire research paper or assignment on the homepage post. There are several schools of thought regarding how long a blog post ought to be; some people say short and sweet, while others think people like longer and more detailed content. The simple fact is that it depends what you’re writing about: a simple observation which rambles on for hundreds or even thousands of words is no good, but neither is a short post that doesn’t fully cover a topic or explain what you mean.
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As the department manager of a mid-sized company providing technology support services, it is my responsibility to maintain a high level of customer satisfaction. This translates to keeping a staff comprised of experts with excellent customer service skills. With data showing an employee is working at a substandard level after two-years of employment, the problem needs to be addressed with a clear plan of action.
According to reports, there have been numerous complaints from customers and coworkers regarding the employees behavior, and more recently the employee has been displaying confrontational behavior, creating a hostile environment for all of the employees to work in. At this time, the employee must be given an ultimatum for immediate improvement of face dismissal from the company.
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Types of media technology
Media technology can be defined as the vast array of methods that support human communication over distances in time and space. The book, Media Technology and Society: A History : from the Telegraph to the Internet, found in the Ashford Library, offers a fascinating timeline of how media has evolved from the telegraph to the internet and everything in between. In flipping through the pages, the book leads its way from the telegraph to the speaking telephone, to capturing sound technology, radio, wireless radio, mechanically scanned television, electronically scanned television, computers, closed circuits, microcomputers, satellites, cable television, to the internet and devices that followed from there until the books publishing in 1998 (Winston, 1998). This assignment will review four media technologies, their uses, information about them, and their target audiences.
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Genetically-modified foods need labeling
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The United States has traditionally been referred to as a "melting pot," welcoming people from many different countries, races, and religions, all hoping to find freedom, new opportunities, and a better way of life (Millet, 2013). Because of this, Americans are often oblivious to the cultural challenges immigrants face while adapting to life in the U.S. In this new, technological world, good cross-cultural communication is a must; therefore, studying the way biases and life experience affect message interpretation is imperative to maintaining successful culturally-diverse communication. The 2009 Census Bureau survey reported the U.S. immigrant population was 12.5 percent of the total U.S. population (Batalova, 2010), and the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics project that globalized IT jobs will increase 22 percent by the year 2020 (Thibodeau, 2012); by embracing and learning from the cultural experiences of those willing to share, cross-culture communication can be greatly improved. In a recent interview, immigrant Ian Arnold shared his experience with cultural differences, feelings, and challenges he faced on his journey from Scotland to American at age 13, in order to support the development of cultural awareness. Read More...
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Conflict is inevitable, especially in the workplace. A recent study on workplace conflict found that U.S. employees spend 2.8 hours per week dealing with conflict, amounting to approximately $359 billion in paid hours, and the equivalent of 385 million working days per year (Lawler, 2010). Learning to recognize, avoid, manage and quickly resolve conflict is imperative for a strong, cohesive work environment. Throughout this course students were asked to evaluate personal situations in order to develop a strong conflict management skills to implement into our careers. This essay will explain what conflict is and how it occurs, presenting pros and cons of conflict, the role of personality types in conflict management, how climate affects conflict situation, and the importance of forgiveness. Read more...
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The telecommuting workforce has grown more than eighty-percent since 2005 (American Community Survey Data, 2012), with 2.6 percent of the United States workforce working from home at least fifty-percent of the time. This includes federal employees, private non-profit employers and employees, for-profit employer and employees, state government workers, local government workers, as well as those who are self-employed. In fact, teleworking even saw an increase in employees when the economy was hit with its largest unemployment numbers in 2011 (American Community Survey Data, 2012). With extreme cost saving advantages including fewer sick days, gas, vehicle maintenance, and meal expenses alongside, the flexibility and comfort, it is easy to see why employers and employees are happy to work from home. However, there are some affects of teleworking that are often overlooked and now that you are becoming a work-at-home employee, there are considerations to be aware of. Potential psychological impacts, workplace culture challenges, and symptoms that can lead to burn out should be reviewed prior to your start date in order to meet challenges head on. This report will detail the pros and cons of working from a home office, highlighting the importance of goal setting in order to obtain work-life balance from your new home office.Read more...
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CoverGirl makeup was introduced by Noxzema Chemical Company in 1958 as a test product makeup line, launching nationally in 1961 with a Clean Liquid Makeup campaign. The company rose to become the leading makeup manufacturer by 1967, launching countless sweet faced, cover girl models’ careers after working as brand ambassadors for the company. Although acquired by Proctor and Gamble in 1989, it wasn’t until 1997 that the company’s infamous brand slogan was introduced, hiring well-known, dynamic spokespeople to debut CoverGirl’s ultimate public relations goal of portraying clean, fresh, natural and approachable makeup as “Easy, Breezy and Beautiful.” During the course of the company’s existence, overcoming image crisis in response to poor ambassador behavior has been a slight challenge, but overall the company has faired well; while being at the front of 21st century public relations practices has seemed effortless from a buyer’s perspective. In this paper I will analyze how public relations has impacted CoverGirl’s success, while applying knowledge acquired and synthesizing coursework from this class to compare and contrast the difference between this for-profit company and non-profit organization’s use of public relations.Read more...
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All law-abiding adults should have the right to own a gun, however there are very legitimate reasons to maintain restrictions for gun ownership. Once a citizen has been convicted of a violent crime, rights should be stripped. Current, legitimate, California gun restrictions include age, criminal history, and the number of rounds a magazine for an assault rifle can hold. Current regulations are legitimate for safety. Though the innate Right to gun ownership has long been debated, the second Amendment right to self-protection and defense of liberty should be granted to all those eligible including everyone of legal age, and those who are not violent criminals.Read more...
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Congratulations on the engagement. I would like to give you some advice on how to build a strong relationship based on interpersonal communications tools I learned in a course I recently took. Quality communication has consistently shown a link between happy marriages (Schoenberg, 2011), and I would like to help you two better understand how to achieve that by giving you examples of five principle concepts that include identifying barriers to effective interpersonal interactions, recognizing how words have the power to create attitude, recognizing how self-concept and behaviors can affect conversation climate, understanding how perceptions, emotions and nonverbal expressions can affect your relationship, and how to evaluate appropriate levels of self-disclosure in your relationship.
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