The following appeared in a memorandum issued by the human-resources department of Capital Bank:
"Capital Bank has always required that its employees wear suits at all times while at work. Last month, Capital’s employee absenteeism and attrition rates both reached all-time highs. In order to reverse these trends, Capital should adopt a company-wide "casual Friday" policy, under which all employees would be permitted, and even encouraged, to dress casually for work every Friday. After all, most companies in the software industry allow their workers to dress casually for work anytime they want; and those workers often remark that this policy enhances their job satisfaction. Moreover, most software firms experience lower rates of employee absenteeism and attrition than companies in other industries, including banking."
Discuss how logically convincing you find this argument. In your discussion, you should analyze the argument's line of reasoning and use of evidence. It may be appropriate in your critique to call into question certain assumptions underlying the argument and/or to indicate what evidence might weaken or strengthen the argument. It may also be appropriate to discuss how you would alter the argument to make it more convincing and/or discuss what additional evidence, if any, would aid in evaluating the argument.
The aforementioned argument asserts that in order to decrease the attrition rates and absenteeism in Capital Bank, a "casual Friday" policy should be incorporated company-wide in the office.At first glance, this argument seems to be fairly convincing and coherent. However, on closer examination , a number of flaws become evident to such an extent that it renders the argument and the conclusion unacceptable.Among the most pivotal of argument's shortcomings is its inability to recognise or acknowledge the assumptions as well as negligence of information substantiating its claims.
The primary pitfall of the argument is that the HR department of Capital Bank wants to address the problem of attrition and absenteeism just by changing the dress policy of the bank for a day. It is inadvertently assumed that the inflexible dressing policy is causing people to take a day off or move to another company.The other major reasons due to which this could be possible are not being considered at all. For instance, factors such as better opportunities in other banks, pay package issues or just because the personnel is sick. The HR department should dig deeper to find all the plausible causes and then reach at a conclusion.
Furthermore, the memorandum compares two different verticals of industries- the banking and the software industry. It is not necessary that an approach followed in one industry might totally work in the other industry.The software industry professionals mostly work for their clients through computers, needing less scope for face to face interactions and thus having no need to strictly flow any dress code rule, while the banking professionals have to interact with their clients face to face on daily basis.In short, the way these industries work and operate is totally different.
Thirdly, the people in the HR department have illogically tried to related the causes for absenteeism and attrition to totally unrelated event of dressing up at work. This is precisely, comparing apples to oranges. Moreover, job satisfaction has nothing to do with the way you dress up for work.
Although the argument lies on questionable assumptions and premises, it would be presumptuous to say that the argument as a whole is completely baseless.If the HR department wants to convince the authorities of implementing the policy, it would have to take steps to remedy the fallacies of the argument cited in the paragraphs above.Possibly, the HR department could dig deeper and try to find the actual reasons for absenteeism and attrition rate.Also, they should be comparing themselves to other industries of their own verticals before drawing out any ideas and arriving at any conclusions.In a nutshell, the memorandum issued by the HR department is poorly articulated and totally unacceptable.The solutions cited by them for solving the problem contains many fallacies, leading to question its validity.
- The following appeared as part of a mayor's proposal to the city council:Traffic in the central city is the number one complaint of our residents, so I urge you to consider this solution. We should invest in doubling our bus service and adding a light rai 50
- Traffic in the central city is the number one complaint of our residents, so I urge you to consider this solution. We should invest in doubling our bus service and adding a light rail system, giving more options to those who don't want to drive through th 70
- The following appeared in the health section of a magazine on trends and lifestyles:“People who use the artificial sweetener aspartame are better off consuming sugar, since aspartame can actually contribute to weight gain rather than weight loss. For ex 40
- The following appeared in a memorandum issued by a large city’s council on the arts:“In a recent citywide poll, 15 percent more residents said that they watch television programs about the visual arts than was the case in a poll conducted five years a 50
- The following appeared as part of an annual report sent to stockholders by Olympic Foods, a processor of frozen foods:“Over time, the costs of processing go down because as organizations learn how to do things better, they become more efficient. In colo 80
Let's analyze the structure of the statement:
condition 1:
Last month, Capital’s employee absenteeism and attrition rates both reached all-time highs. //part of your argument 1. a lot of other reasons may cause the high rates.
condition 2:
After all, most companies in the software industry allow their workers to dress casually for work anytime they want; and those workers often remark that this policy enhances their job satisfaction. //maybe dress casually is only the very minor one among job satisfactions for IT people.
condition 3:
Moreover, most software firms experience lower rates of employee absenteeism and attrition than companies in other industries, including banking. //your argument 2. it works for A, but it doesn't mean it works for B.
conclusion:
In order to reverse these trends, Capital should adopt a company-wide "casual Friday" policy, under which all employees would be permitted, and even encouraged, to dress casually for work every Friday. //need to find out the true reasons.
----------------------
Attribute Value Ideal
Final score: 4.0 out of 6
Category: Good Excellent
No. of Grammatical Errors: 0 2
No. of Spelling Errors: 0 2
No. of Sentences: 13 15
No. of Words: 471 350
No. of Characters: 2409 1500
No. of Different Words: 238 200
Fourth Root of Number of Words: 4.659 4.7
Average Word Length: 5.115 4.6
Word Length SD: 2.983 2.4
No. of Words greater than 5 chars: 180 100
No. of Words greater than 6 chars: 147 80
No. of Words greater than 7 chars: 108 40
No. of Words greater than 8 chars: 72 20
Use of Passive Voice (%): 0 0
Avg. Sentence Length: 36.231 21.0
Sentence Length SD: 22.351 7.5
Use of Discourse Markers (%): 0.692 0.12
Sentence-Text Coherence: 0.326 0.35
Sentence-Para Coherence: 0.623 0.50
Sentence-Sentence Coherence: 0.081 0.07
Number of Paragraphs: 5 5