The following appeared in a memo from a vice president of a large, highly diversified company.
"Ten years ago our company had two new office buildings constructed as regional headquarters for two different regions. The buildings were erected by two different construction companies—Alpha and Zeta. Even though the two buildings had identical floor plans, the building constructed by Zeta cost 30 percent more to build, and its expenses for maintenance last year were twice those of the building constructed by Alpha. Furthermore, the energy consumption of the Zeta building has been higher than that of the Alpha building every year since its construction. Such data, plus the fact that Alpha has a stable workforce with little employee turnover, indicate that we should use Alpha rather than Zeta for our contemplated new building project."
Write a response in which you examine the stated and/or unstated assumptions of the argument. Be sure to explain how the argument depends on these assumptions and what the implications are for the argument if the assumptions prove unwarranted.
A vice president in his memorandum expresses his opinion that alpha company should be used for the new construction site due to several reasons. More specifically, when instructed to construct the same office building as zeta company, according to the vice president alpha company achieved 30% less cost of building the offices and also the energy consumption of the alpha building during these years is also less than zeta building. also, the workforce in alpha is more stable than in zeta. however, there are several assumptions made in the proccess of supporting the argument the most important of which are being examined in the paragraphs below.
The author in his way of backing up his argument that indeed the company should use alpha construction company instead of zeta is failing to take into consideration that the two construction sites are situated in two different regions. this indicates that the climate, the terrain and the working conditions may have been entirely different between these two construction sites. For example, consider that zeta company had to build the office building in a rocky terrain with a little road infrastructure and the operations had to seize during winter due to heavy snowfall. this example, indicates that the conditions in the buiding construction site by zeta company may have taken more money to build and also the costs of maintaining the offices due to poor roads may be higher. this consideration, undermines the assumption of the vice president that these two buildings had the same weather and climate conditions and therefore that alpha is a more efficient company than zeta.
Furthermore, the vice president states that the zeta building has more energy consumption than the alpha building and this is due to construction malfunctions by zeta company. however, the energy consumption may be more not only from construction issues but from higher work load in zeta building. For example, if the zeta building is situated in a region were it is needed for the employees to work overtime and stay up late, the energy consumption from the lights, computer terminals and heating or cooling may be significantly larger than the alpha building. also, as mention in the paragraph above if the zeta building is situated in a region with heavy winters then the energy consumption from heating the entire building may be larger than heating the zeta building which may be placed in a region with less severe climate conditions. The above examples, undermine the argument made by the vice president and may lead to a change of the conclusion stating that alpha construction company is better than zeta.
Lastly, an unstated assumption the vice president is making is that the workforce on zeta company is less or completely unstable when contrasted with the workforce of alpha company and thus alpha company is a better candidate for constructiong the new office building. however, we should take into consideration the possibility that the changing workforce of zeta company, just because it is changing can achieve better results in order to stay in the company longer. also, there is the issue of time, the vice president fails to give a specific time period in which the two constructions were finished. therefore, there is also the possibility that the more unstable workforce of zeta company to manage and finish the new work in shorter time than the alpha company.
To sum up, in this essay the stated and unstated assumptions used by the vice president in order to support alpha company were demonstrated through examples. The vice president should provide more evidence regarding the climate conditions, the work load and the time of construction in order to back up his assumptions.
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Comments
Essay evaluation report
Attribute Value Ideal
Final score: 4.5 out of 6
Category: Good Excellent
No. of Grammatical Errors: 0 2
No. of Spelling Errors: 0 2
No. of Sentences: 14 15
No. of Words: 614 350
No. of Characters: 3078 1500
No. of Different Words: 212 200
Fourth Root of Number of Words: 4.978 4.7
Average Word Length: 5.013 4.6
Word Length SD: 2.751 2.4
No. of Words greater than 5 chars: 220 100
No. of Words greater than 6 chars: 176 80
No. of Words greater than 7 chars: 118 40
No. of Words greater than 8 chars: 79 20
Use of Passive Voice (%): 0 0
Avg. Sentence Length: 43.857 21.0
Sentence Length SD: 28.963 7.5
Use of Discourse Markers (%): 0.786 0.12
Sentence-Text Coherence: 0.423 0.35
Sentence-Para Coherence: 0.629 0.50
Sentence-Sentence Coherence: 0.18 0.07
Number of Paragraphs: 5 5
Grammar and spelling errors:
Line 1, column 435, Rule ID: UPPERCASE_SENTENCE_START
Message: This sentence does not start with an uppercase letter
Suggestion: Also
... years is also less than zeta building. also, the workforce in alpha is more stable ...
^^^^
Line 1, column 493, Rule ID: UPPERCASE_SENTENCE_START
Message: This sentence does not start with an uppercase letter
Suggestion: However
...e in alpha is more stable than in zeta. however, there are several assumptions made in ...
^^^^^^^
Line 3, column 237, Rule ID: UPPERCASE_SENTENCE_START
Message: This sentence does not start with an uppercase letter
Suggestion: This
... are situated in two different regions. this indicates that the climate, the terrain...
^^^^
Line 3, column 575, Rule ID: UPPERCASE_SENTENCE_START
Message: This sentence does not start with an uppercase letter
Suggestion: This
...ze during winter due to heavy snowfall. this example, indicates that the conditions ...
^^^^
Line 3, column 782, Rule ID: UPPERCASE_SENTENCE_START
Message: This sentence does not start with an uppercase letter
Suggestion: This
...ffices due to poor roads may be higher. this consideration, undermines the assumptio...
^^^^
Line 5, column 177, Rule ID: UPPERCASE_SENTENCE_START
Message: This sentence does not start with an uppercase letter
Suggestion: However
...struction malfunctions by zeta company. however, the energy consumption may be more not...
^^^^^^^
Line 5, column 357, Rule ID: WERE_VBB[1]
Message: Did you mean 'where' or 'we'?
Suggestion: where; we
...e zeta building is situated in a region were it is needed for the employees to work ...
^^^^
Line 5, column 563, Rule ID: UPPERCASE_SENTENCE_START
Message: This sentence does not start with an uppercase letter
Suggestion: Also
...icantly larger than the alpha building. also, as mention in the paragraph above if t...
^^^^
Line 7, column 270, Rule ID: UPPERCASE_SENTENCE_START
Message: This sentence does not start with an uppercase letter
Suggestion: However
... constructiong the new office building. however, we should take into consideration the ...
^^^^^^^
Line 7, column 469, Rule ID: UPPERCASE_SENTENCE_START
Message: This sentence does not start with an uppercase letter
Suggestion: Also
...in order to stay in the company longer. also, there is the issue of time, the vice p...
^^^^
Line 7, column 605, Rule ID: UPPERCASE_SENTENCE_START
Message: This sentence does not start with an uppercase letter
Suggestion: Therefore
...ch the two constructions were finished. therefore, there is also the possibility that the...
^^^^^^^^^
Transition Words or Phrases used:
also, but, furthermore, however, if, lastly, may, regarding, so, then, therefore, thus, for example, in short, to sum up
Attributes: Values AverageValues Percentages(Values/AverageValues)% => Comments
Performance on Part of Speech:
To be verbs : 30.0 19.6327345309 153% => OK
Auxiliary verbs: 13.0 12.9520958084 100% => OK
Conjunction : 17.0 11.1786427146 152% => OK
Relative clauses : 18.0 13.6137724551 132% => OK
Pronoun: 29.0 28.8173652695 101% => OK
Preposition: 80.0 55.5748502994 144% => OK
Nominalization: 24.0 16.3942115768 146% => OK
Performance on vocabulary words:
No of characters: 3138.0 2260.96107784 139% => OK
No of words: 614.0 441.139720559 139% => Less content wanted.
Chars per words: 5.11074918567 5.12650576532 100% => OK
Fourth root words length: 4.977853291 4.56307096286 109% => OK
Word Length SD: 2.80982341801 2.78398813304 101% => OK
Unique words: 223.0 204.123752495 109% => OK
Unique words percentage: 0.36319218241 0.468620217663 78% => More unique words wanted or less content wanted.
syllable_count: 998.1 705.55239521 141% => OK
avg_syllables_per_word: 1.6 1.59920159681 100% => OK
A sentence (or a clause, phrase) starts by:
Pronoun: 4.0 4.96107784431 81% => OK
Article: 12.0 8.76447105788 137% => OK
Subordination: 3.0 2.70958083832 111% => OK
Conjunction: 0.0 1.67365269461 0% => OK
Preposition: 3.0 4.22255489022 71% => OK
Performance on sentences:
How many sentences: 20.0 19.7664670659 101% => OK
Sentence length: 30.0 22.8473053892 131% => The Avg. Sentence Length is relatively long.
Sentence length SD: 56.9917537895 57.8364921388 99% => OK
Chars per sentence: 156.9 119.503703932 131% => OK
Words per sentence: 30.7 23.324526521 132% => OK
Discourse Markers: 6.0 5.70786347227 105% => OK
Paragraphs: 5.0 5.15768463074 97% => OK
Language errors: 11.0 5.25449101796 209% => Less language errors wanted.
Sentences with positive sentiment : 10.0 8.20758483034 122% => OK
Sentences with negative sentiment : 6.0 6.88822355289 87% => OK
Sentences with neutral sentiment: 4.0 4.67664670659 86% => OK
What are sentences with positive/Negative/neutral sentiment?
Coherence and Cohesion:
Essay topic to essay body coherence: 0.271118901585 0.218282227539 124% => OK
Sentence topic coherence: 0.103336661914 0.0743258471296 139% => OK
Sentence topic coherence SD: 0.057120655239 0.0701772020484 81% => OK
Paragraph topic coherence: 0.169559943624 0.128457276422 132% => OK
Paragraph topic coherence SD: 0.0579669050274 0.0628817314937 92% => OK
Essay readability:
automated_readability_index: 18.0 14.3799401198 125% => OK
flesch_reading_ease: 41.03 48.3550499002 85% => OK
smog_index: 3.1 7.1628742515 43% => Smog_index is low.
flesch_kincaid_grade: 15.0 12.197005988 123% => OK
coleman_liau_index: 12.95 12.5979740519 103% => OK
dale_chall_readability_score: 8.03 8.32208582834 96% => OK
difficult_words: 113.0 98.500998004 115% => OK
linsear_write_formula: 13.5 12.3882235529 109% => OK
gunning_fog: 14.0 11.1389221557 126% => OK
text_standard: 14.0 11.9071856287 118% => OK
What are above readability scores?
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Write the essay in 30 minutes.
Rates: 66.67 out of 100
Scores by essay e-grader: 4.0 Out of 6
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Note: the e-grader does NOT examine the meaning of words and ideas. VIP users will receive further evaluations by advanced module of e-grader and human graders.