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 regions. The buildings were erected by different constructio

The vice president concludes that they should have their new building constructed by Zeta instead of Alpha. He supports his assertion by citing the fact that while Zeta has higher construction costs, energy consumption as well as maintenance for their Zeta building is lower than that of their Alpha. Whilst this argument may eem plausible, closer inspection reveals that it lacks sufficient evidence to bolster its claims.

Firstly, the argument suffers from a lack of quantification as there is no information about the amount of dollars that it costs to build Zeta or the amount of money that their Zeta building saved (as a result of lower energy consumption and expenses). If the cost of Zeta buildings are significantly greater than the money they save, it would not be wise to do business with them as their company will lose money in the long run. Hence to strengthen his argument the author must provide information about the amount it costs to construct Zeta buildings and the amount saved. Furthermore this information must clearly show that savings outweigh the cost of construction.

Secondly, there is not enough information to suggest that Zeta buildings will save money in the first as the author bases his assertion by a comparison between two buildings. In other words the sample size is too small. Even if their Zeta building did cost them less than their Alpha, this does not necessarily mean that these findings can be generalized to all buildings such that one can say that all Zeta buildings are more cost effective than Alpha. It may very well be that Alpha buildings are more cost effective but for some reason, it just so happened that Zeta costs less for those particular buildings. Thus to strengthen the argument the author must provide information about a greater sample size which shows that on average, Zeta buildings are a better investment than Alpha.

Finally, the author does not provide any information as to the location or what activities the two buildings were apart off. Regardless of the fact that they both had the same floor plan, an accurate comparison of the two cannot be made unless the two buildings were built in the same conditions and housed the same activities. If the Alpha building was house to an activity which consumed a lot of energy (for example smelting) or was situated in an environment with extreme temperatures, it is only obvious that energy costs for Alpha will appear higher than that of Zeta. However, this does not mean that Zeta buildings are more cost effective (especially if those buildings were built situated in conditions opposed to those stated. Thus to strengthen the argument the author must provide information which shows that both buildings shared similar environments.

In conclusion, there is not enough evidence to make a claim as bold as that of the author’s as key elements of the discussion have been left out. One must have knowledge of all aspects of a situation before statements can be made hence unless the author can provide this evidence to bolster his proposition, the argument is one of wishful thinking as opposed to something that would yield actual results.