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Business Communication
Q:
Which of the following best exemplifies a communicator's professional context influencing communication?
A. Medpace Inc.'s hierarchical structure causes its employees to expect a formal style in communications from their superiors.
B. Jose, an optimistic person, likes to put an inspirational quote at the end of his email messages.
C. Gordon, a graphic designer, prefers to communicate ideas visually.
D. Melissa refuses to apologize to her subordinate after yelling at the subordinate in public.
E. Trevor often uses social media sites at work because his company's products are marketed to young adults.
Q:
A document which looks appealing always works well with an audience.
Q:
In order to make a home page easy to use, provide navigation bars horizontally in the middle of the screen.
Q:
Which of the following best exemplifies a personal context influencing communication?
A. Because of Medpace Inc.'s hierarchical structure, employees are expected to use a formal style when communicating with high-ranking executives.
B. Jose, a freelance software trainer, prefers to use technical jargon when communicating with vendors.
C. Paula, a fashion designer, writes a fashion blog.
D. Jason, stressed because of a tight deadline, writes a rude email to a coworker.
E. Gemini Inc.'s employees use social media in their communication at work.
Q:
To keep visitors long enough on a home page to find or buy what they want, the first screen should be extremely easy to use.
Q:
Which of the following is true about contexts for communication?
A. Communication can be influenced by the communicators' professional roles.
B. The communicators' personal contexts do not influence their communication.
C. The largest context in which business communication takes place is the organizational context.
D. The organizational context does not influence either external communication or the grapevine.
E. Customs and cultures have no effect on business communication.
Q:
Infographics inform and educate an audience about a specific topic using a mixture of statistics, color, text, and visuals.
Q:
Which of the following approaches will be most effective for solving business communication problems?
A. Use trial and error.
B. Treat all situations involving communication as well-defined problems.
C. Use what has worked for other companies.
D. Consider the likely effects of a number of different solutions, and choose the solution with the best likely effect.
E. Use a formula that works for solving well-defined problems.
Q:
While creating a brochure, it is good to use fixed fonts and avoid repeating design elements.
Q:
Which of the following statements is true about ill-defined problems?
A. Ill-defined problems can be solved by using a set formula.
B. There are few ill-defined problems in a well-run business.
C. Ill-defined problems are always negative.
D. Solving ill-defined problems requires analytical skill and good judgment.
E. Ill-defined problems have unique and perfect solutions.
Q:
People are more likely to read brochures if the text has interesting headlines and selling points.
Q:
All forms of business communication should begin by considering both the audience and purpose.
Q:
Which of the following best illustrates an ill-defined problem?
A. How to calculate the annual profits of a company
B. How to calculate the money left in a department's budget
C. How to count the number of hours an employee stays in the office
D. How to communicate a dip in profits to a company's stakeholders
E. How to fill in a monthly production report
Q:
It is good to use full justification when a document has very short line lengths.
Q:
Which of the following statements is true about the actual organizational culture of a company?
A. It is invariably the same as the company's official organizational culture.
B. It is a dynamic, living realm of meaning constructed through communications at the topmost level of the company.
C. It is always reflected in the company's mission statement.
D. It is announced through formal communications by the management of the company.
E. It is the medium of preferred values and practices in which the company's members do their work.
Q:
Which of the following statements is true about organizational culture?
A. The concept of organizational or corporate culture was popularized in the early 1930s.
B. A company's organizational culture can be determined by management.
C. The focus on organizational culture by management consultants and theorists has drastically decreased over time.
D. The official organizational culture of a company is exactly the same as its actual organizational culture.
E. Organizational culture refers to an organization's customary, but often unstated, ways of perceiving and doing things.
Q:
Margins justified only on the right where lines all end at the same place on the page are called ragged right margins.
Q:
Which of the following statements is true about business communication within an organization?
A. An organization's communication patterns are independent of the industry in which it operates.
B. Organizations in a stable environment tend to depend on established types of formal communication.
C. Simpler organizations typically require more communication than complex organizations.
D. The geographic dispersion of an organization tends to have an adverse impact on its external communication.
E. The communication of a homogeneous organization requires more adaptation to participants' values than that of a multicultural organization.
Q:
It is important to choose the style of fonts carefully, because they shape a reader's response just as the size of a font does.
Q:
Skillful managers are most likely to deal with their organization's grapevine by _____.
A. controlling it with rules and regulations
B. establishing communication procedures to control the network
C. recognizing its presence and using it for a positive purpose
D. ignoring it
E. deregulating the use of social media during work hours
Q:
Fixed fonts allow wide letters to occupy more space than narrow letters.
Q:
The grapevine of an organization is best defined as _____.
A. a network that follows a set pattern of communication within the organization
B. a network that is highly dependent on the computational skills of the organization's employees
C. a collection of the simple, well-defined communication streams within an organization
D. the informal network used by the employees within the organization
E. the network used by the organization to communicate with its core business partners
Q:
Headings make pages look difficult to read, because they are larger than the rest of the fonts.
Q:
Which of the following is true about the informal network of an organization?
A. The informal network consists of organized, well-established channels for information exchange.
B. The informal network can be controlled by the manager's network.
C. The informal network carries insignificant information.
D. Use of the informal network should be discouraged.
E. The informal network follows no set pattern and is usually a complex relationship of smaller networks.
Q:
Increasing white space helps improve the look of a message.
Q:
Which of the following is true about the formal network of an organization?
A. The formal network does not include the upward and lateral movement of information in an organization.
B. The formal communication network never includes external audiences.
C. The formal network is the only important communication network in an organization.
D. The formal network is unrelated to an organization's business plan.
E. The formal network constitutes the main lines through which the bulk of operational communication flows.
Q:
White space in a document can be created by eliminating headings and using uniform paragraph lengths.
Q:
A _____ refers to the major, well-established channels for information exchange within an organization.
A. personal communication network
B. formal network
C. supply chain
D. regulatory network
E. grapevine
Q:
Visual communications expert, Charles Kostelnick, distinguishes four levels of design, which provide an organized way to think about the design choices one can make.
Q:
Which of the following best exemplifies personal communication?
A. A team's discussion of how to improve work performance
B. An acknowledgement that an order has been received
C. A note to a supplier thanking him for the Christmas card he sent
D. A business proposal written to the general manager of a company
E. A team meeting to discuss the progress of an ongoing project
Q:
Violating conventions is risky, because they may not be interpreted correctly.
Q:
Which of the following statements is true about personal communication?
A. Personal communication is an official part of a business's operations.
B. Personal communication should be avoided as it is often counter-productive to the organization's goals.
C. Personal communication is regulated by the formal network.
D. Communication with external parties will often include elements of personal communication.
E. The attitudes of the employees and those with whom they communicate are not influenced by personal communication.
Q:
The same conventions work well with all audiences.
Q:
Communication with an external audience should be undertaken with careful attention to both content and tone because _____.
A. front-line employees now have a higher level of decision-making power
B. new media are increasing the need for employees with social intelligence
C. external audiences tend to have low literacy
D. such messages can be regarded as public-relations messages, conveying a certain image of the company
E. communicating with external audiences is far more important than communicating with internal audiences
Q:
Effective design, like most aspects of communication, is unaffected by conventions.
Q:
Which of the following is a form of external-operational communication?
A. Discussions among the board members to decide the future course of the organization
B. Coffee-table conversations between employees regarding the progress of their respective projects
C. Monthly sales reports created by an automated software
D. Meetings that executives hold with leaders of community organizations
E. Messages that employees write to their team members regarding project-related issues
Q:
The designing process needs to be planned and implemented only when one has completed writing a document.
Q:
Which of the following is an example of external-operational communication?
A. Discussions held by the senior management to determine the goals and processes of a business
B. Orders and instructions issued by supervisors to employees about handling irate customers
C. Discussion between the CEOs of two companies regarding a possible merger of their companies
D. Employees' reports concerning sales, production, inventories, finance, and maintenance
E. Messages written by employees to their supervisors regarding the progress of their work
Q:
What should you look for when you are revising a document you have written?
Q:
An angry customer calls the public relations department of Neptune Inc. to complain about a defect in the company's product. This form of communication can be categorized as _____.
A. internal-operational communication
B. external-operational communication
C. personal communication
D. informal communication
E. grapevine communication
Q:
What is a topic sentence? How does it strengthen a piece of writing?
Q:
A memorandum reporting the shortage of certain goods written by the warehouse supervisor of Yellow Lamination Inc. to the company's purchasing department would be best classified as a form of _____.
A. internal-operational communication
B. external-operational communication
C. personal communication
D. grapevine communication
E. internal-external communication
Q:
What are simple, compound, and complex sentences? Explain each type with the help of an example.
Q:
Which of the following is an example of internal-operational communication?
A. A letter written by a consumer to the customer care service
B. An advertisement put on a company's website for the general public
C. An order form submitted to an organization's supplier for raw materials
D. A businessperson's posts on Twitter or LinkedIn
E. A memo concerning the production and sales targets for an organization
Q:
Define active voice and passive voice and explain how they differ.
Q:
Which of the following constitutes an internal audience for a business?
A. The company's competitors
B. The company's customers
C. The company's employees
D. The company's suppliers
E. Government officials
Q:
Describe the two main kinds of jargon and explain how they should be used in business writing.
Q:
Which of the following is true about external-operational communication?
A. It includes the ongoing discussions that the senior management undertakes to determine the goals and processes of the business.
B. It includes all of the business's efforts at selling, from sales letters and emails to ads, tradeshow displays, and customer visits.
C. It includes the orders and instructions that supervisors give employees, as well as written and oral exchanges among employees about work matters.
D. It includes company reports that employees prepare concerning sales, production, inventories, finance, maintenance, and so on.
E. It includes the messages that employees write and speak in carrying out their assignments and contributing their ideas to the business.
Q:
"Never have a sentence with more than 20 words, or a paragraph with more than 8 lines." Explain why this statement is considered a half-truth in business writing.
Q:
Which of the following is true about internal-operational communication?
A. It includes a business's communication with its customers.
B. It includes a business's communication with its suppliers.
C. It includes the orders and instructions that supervisors give to their employees.
D. It includes the instructions that the supervisors of a business give to its vendors.
E. It includes a business's communication with government agencies.
Q:
The widespread use of the Internet has _____.
A. forced companies into focusing harder on developing a socially responsible image
B. restricted negative information from spreading quickly and widely
C. reduced the likelihood of culturally diverse people working together on a global team
D. made organizations less accountable to society and removed them from public scrutiny
E. reduced the amount of time employees can spend on tasks that require deeper interpretation
Q:
What are the key points to keep in mind while choosing a level of formality for a business document?
Q:
Cross-cultural competency is best defined as the ability to _____.
A. understand and adapt to the preference for individualism or collectivism, religious beliefs, political environment, and ideas about social hierarchy of different countries
B. interact with data, see patterns in data, make data-based decisions, and use data to design for desired outcomes
C. determine the deeper, underlying meaning or significance of messages
D. manipulate people into accepting one's viewpoint regarding religion
E. create and interpret graphics
Q:
Raj Gupta works for a high-end clothing boutique and needs to submit a report to his supervisor on the strategies they can implement to market a new line of eco-friendly clothing. What standard guidelines should he follow that will help him manage his time better while preparing the report?
Q:
What activities does the planning process in writing involve?
Q:
The ability to meaningfully, accurately, and efficiently create and interpret pictures and other graphics is known as _____.
A. cross-cultural competency
B. social intelligence
C. computational thinking
D. ethical reasoning
E. visual literacy
Q:
How do writers with good writing skills differ from those with poor writing skills in composing documents?
Q:
The automation of tasks by smart machines _____.
A. improves the average social intelligence of employees
B. enables employees to spend more time on tasks that require strong interpretive skills
C. offers employees the opportunity to develop visual literacy and ethical reasoning
D. develops a high level of information literacy in employees
E. improves the technological competence of employees
Q:
Which of the following is true of readability formulas?
A. They attempt to measure objectively how easy something is to read.
B. They take many factors into account and are an efficient guide to good style.
C. They do not depend on analyzing word length and sentence length.
D. They take into account factors that influence the complexity of ideas.
E. They consider the layout and design of a document while analyzing it.
Q:
Computational thinking is best defined as the ability to _____.
A. interact with data, see patterns in data, make data-based decisions, and use data to design for desired outcomes
B. understand and adapt to other people's preference for individualism or collectivism, political environment and ideas about social hierarchy of different countries
C. quickly assess the emotions of those around and adapt one's words, tone, and gestures accordingly
D. create visuals and determine the deeper, underlying meaning or significance of messages
E. manipulate people into accepting one's viewpoint regarding ethics and social responsibility
Q:
Which of the following is an advantage of using boilerplate while writing business documents?
A. It helps writers focus on subtle differences in situations and audiences.
B. It helps to create documents with compatible styles and tones.
C. It helps writers to save time and energy.
D. It helps writers use new and fresh language that does not need to be legally approved.
E. It helps writers to be creative and create customized documents.
Q:
Which of the following statements is true about increasing globalism and workplace diversity?
A. Businesspeople, on a global level, have the same understanding of punctuality and efficiency.
B. Countries and cultures become less interconnected as businesses expand across the world.
C. The requirement for cultural agility in workplace communication has increased significantly.
D. People around the world share standardized notions of business and communication.
E. The differences in cultures are solely responsible for workplace diversity.
Q:
The process of drafting, getting feedback, revising, and getting more feedback is known as _____.
A. framing
B. cycling
C. bypassing
D. typesetting
E. plagiarizing
Q:
_____ is best defined as the ability to understand and adapt to the preferences for individualism or collectivism, religious beliefs, political environment, and ideas about social hierarchy of people in different countries.
A. Cross-cultural competency
B. Ethical reasoning
C. Computational thinking
D. Visual literacy
E. Corporate social responsibility
Q:
When you edit a document, you typically need to check for:
A. sentence structure.
B. clarity.
C. layout.
D. style and tone.
E. content accuracy.
Q:
Baby Boomers refer to those people who _____.
A. have more than three children
B. were born after the year 1979
C. were brought up in multi-cultural societies
D. oppose population-control strategies
E. were born soon after World War II
Q:
Which of the following guidelines should be followed while editing a document?
A. The editing process should always be followed by the revision process.
B. The editing process should ensure that there is subject-verb and noun-pronoun agreement.
C. Acknowledgements should not be made when information is borrowed from outside the organization.
D. A spell-check should be performed instead of manual proofreading.
E. The editing process must not make changes in language.
Q:
Social intelligence is best defined as the ability to _____.
A. choose the right format for a given document
B. quickly assess the emotions of those around and adapt their words, tone, and gestures accordingly
C. interact with data, see patterns in data, make data-based decisions, and use data to design for desired outcomes
D. determine the deeper meaning or significance of data
E. observe proper business etiquette
Q:
Albert has just completed a report for his journalism class. While revising it, he realizes that the report contains several instances of sexist language. Albert immediately replaces all instances of sexist language with non-sexist language. He does this because the use of sexist language diminishes the _____.
A. design of his report
B. clarity of his report
C. logic of his report
D. style and tone of his report
E. organization and layout of his report
Q:
Which of the following is a current challenge for business communicators?
A. Increased popularity of hierarchical structures in organizations
B. Decreased diversity of employees at the workplace
C. Increased focus on corporate social responsibility
D. Increased rejection of new media in family-owned businesses
E. Decreased usage of electronic correspondence by business writers
Q:
Jenny is revising her term paper before submitting it to her professor for grading. She is currently asking herself whether the message uses you-attitude and positive emphasis. She is also focusing on whether her message builds goodwill. On which of the following aspects of her paper is Jenny primarily focusing?
A. Content
B. Clarity
C. Style
D. Organization
E. Layout
Q:
Identify the impact of new media on communication.
A. New media have increased rigidity in thinking and reduced people's problem-solving skills.
B. New media have decreased the average social intelligence of people at work.
C. New media have increased the ease of tapping the intelligence of people outside an organization.
D. New media have reduced the need for cross-cultural competency.
E. New media have lowered the quality of communication at the workplace.
Q:
Which of the following questions asked by a writer during the revision process indicates a focus on the style and tone of the message?
A. Is the logic clear and convincing?
B. Is all the information accurate and clear?
C. Does the message build goodwill?
D. Is the message free from apparently contradictory statements?
E. Are the first and last paragraphs effective?
Q:
Which of the following questions asked by a writer when revising a document reflects an interest in organization and layout?
A. Is the logic clear and convincing?
B. Is the message easy to read?
C. Does the message build goodwill?
D. Is the message friendly and free from sexist language?
E. Are the first and last paragraphs effective?
Q:
The advent of new media has _____.
A. increased the need for employees who have social intelligence
B. eliminated the need for traditional modes of communication such as face-to-face conversations
C. limited the demand for digital networking and virtual collaboration
D. increased the hierarchical nature of organizational setups
E. reduced the decision-making power of front-line employees
Q:
The process of _____ refers to making changes in content, organization, and tone that will better satisfy the writer's purposes and the audience.
A. editing
B. proofreading
C. revising
D. brainstorming
E. planning
Q:
Which of the following statements is true about email?
A. Email came into existence during the 1950s.
B. Email has entirely replaced the need for phone conversations.
C. Email is the primary form of oral communication.
D. Email allows a communicator to reach out to only one person at a time.
E. Email is the most heavily used communication medium in business.
Q:
Which of the following is of particular significance during the editing stage of a document?
A. Content and clarity
B. Grammatical correctness
C. Organization of content
D. Style of writing
E. Tone of writing
Q:
Bypassing is a communication problem that occurs when a sender and receiver attach completely different meanings to the same words.
Q:
_____ refers to checking if a document is free from typographical errors.
A. Revising
B. Brainstorming
C. Freewriting
D. Proofreading
E. Clustering