FBC Writing Assignment

You work for McMillon-Hunt (MH), a manufacturer of refrigerated shipping containers (the insulated, temperature-controlled units used to transport food, medicine, and other perishable goods that must stay cold from the factory to the store shelf).

Your coworker Sam, a recent Walton MBA graduate, was assigned a 12-month rotational project management role by MH. Sam’s job was to oversee the production launch of a new line of refrigerated containers at a partner manufacturing facility in Mexico. Almost all the supervisors and floor staff working on the project are Mexican nationals. While all official and written work is conducted in English, Sam is conversational in Spanish, so no language barrier exists between Sam and the staff; Sam can engage in quick chats with colleagues as needed. Sam’s new production team has been manufacturing the key components of the refrigerated shipping containers and had hoped to begin first-article inspection—a final quality check on the first finished units before full production is approved—by the third quarter of 2025.

Sam recently returned to Mexico to monitor the project but has experienced many communication challenges upon returning. Sam has continually asked subordinates to provide a more detailed update on the production progress of the insulation panels and door seals that keep the containers airtight and cold. To date, Sam has only received only cursory responses as to whether these components are on schedule and being built correctly. Sam attempted to solicit feedback from the engineers in weekly meetings and in private, but no one responded with anything substantive. As a result, Sam noticed that some of the components were not built to specifications: the door seals were failing pressure tests, meaning they let warm air leak in. These parts will need to be largely reworked before first-article inspection can begin.

Sam’s supervisor and the VP have asked Sam to write a memo laying out a plan for how the team’s problems should be addressed to get the project back on schedule. Sam drafted that memo, which is attached below, but wants you, a coworker, to review it before sending it to the unit’s supervisor for final approval.

Your task is to help assess and propose necessary changes to Sam’s initial memo. You are not tasked with rewriting the memo but will instead write to Sam and outline as well as justify whatever proposed changes you have in detail. Information on how to accomplish this task are provided in the subsequent section. Note that you must use Sam’s plan as your starting point. In writing the original memo, Sam drew on research to support all recommendations; your first step should be to consult those same sources yourself to understand how Sam reached those conclusions and locate areas where Sam’s reasoning or understanding of Mexican business culture may have gone wrong. You should preserve what Sam got right, but should correct where Sam’s reasoning or understanding of the situation or cultural dynamics went wrong and  lay out a stronger plan in its place. To understand where Sam’s plan has gone wrong, you should consider the following questions:

• Will Sam’s plan work with this team? Sam’s staff are working in Mexico, which has a specific cultural and professional context that is different to the US culture Sam is most familiar with. Based on the research, are the recommendations am provided likely to be effective with this team, or do they assume a different set of cultural norms regarding power dynamics and avoiding conflict?
• Has Sam correctly diagnosed why feedback is not being provided? What does Sam think is causing the team not to speak up, and does the research support that explanation?
• How does Sam use sources and secondary information? Does the research Sam cites support the recommendations draw from it?

You will be permitted to use Generative AI tools for this assignment. We also encourage you to meet with a CRLA certified tutor at the Business Communication Lab. The most common mistakes students make on this assignment can be avoided by a short meeting with a tutor.

Your submission will be a maximum of 2.5 pages:

• A one-page maximum response to Sam outlining and assessing his work and summarizing your findings. Focus on being selective in this document rather than listing everything that Sam did wrong.
  • Begin with a single sentence that identifies the biggest error you found in the plan. Do not provide a list of things that went wrong in the original memo. Evaluation matters more than listing everything out.
  • Include at least one thing that Sam did correctly and why it should be preserved in the final draft
  • Use Sam’s exact phrasing each time you describe the larger issues with and/or best aspects of the original memo; then, explain why that phrasing or idea is problematic
• An edited version of the original memo Sam sent you that uses tracked changes and margin comments explaining your proposed changes. This annotated version will likely be 1.5 pages, similar to the original memo.
  • Each margin comment should have three things: (a) a clear statement of the problem, namely what is wrong with the specific phrase or idea, (b) a source justifying why this idea or phrasing is wrong, and (c) a proposed fix for Sam, namely what Sam should say instead. For item (b) sources, you must state the author’s name as well as a link to the source. You also must cite the author’s direct words that support your counterclaim; if you must use a long sentence or multiple sentences to support your counterclaim, do this: “As [author name] states, “start of long phrase....end of phrase” (insert hyperlink)” instead of stating the whole claim verbatim.
  • You must have 5-7 substantive comments and must propose actual revisions to his text rather than simply deleting things. You must have a minimum of 5 substantive comments and a maximum of 7 comments; anything beyond these thresholds will be penalized
  • At least one comment must defend something Sam got right; at least one comment must locate a source that is misapplied or misinterpreted
  • Instructions on how to use Track Changes in MS Word can be found below. All submissions must be in MS Word, must be visible/not accepted prior to submission, and comments should not be inserted into the text but added using the Insert > New Comment feature in Word

This assignment is designed to help you become more comfortable with the sort of professional communication challenges you will encounter early in and throughout your career.

If, in addition to using the mandatory sources we provide, you find quality sources on your own, please follow APA guidelines for parenthetical in-text citations and reference list citations.