GMAT Essays (AWA)

Second attempt at an essay, please rate and review. Thanks everyone!

Sample Analysis-of-an-Argument Writing Prompt

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.

Essay:

Though the memo claims that it's lack of a more casual dress code is proved to be the reason for it's high absenteeism and attrition, it however fails to say anything else might also be the cause for this problem. The memo from HR says that the way software companies comply with their dress codes which includes a more casual dress is seen as a positive thing that prevents the problems that Capital Bank has been facing. As a result, Capital Banks HR memo is not as logically convincing as it could be. One reason is simply not enough, the differences between the Software and Banking industries is not addressed such as the nature of the work, how one job is based on selling the self such as in finance compared to the product being the focus of the software industry. Simply put in Finance the dress codes does affect the bottom line.

Capital Bank fails in realizing that there is more at stake then simply making the dress code more leisurely. They assume a quick fix will resolve all their issues. The only evidence which is weak that is provided is "Moreover, most software firms experience lower rates of employee absenteeism and attrition than companies in other industries, including banking." Yes other industries do benefit but how much more will the Financial one improve. The evidence for the change is not only weak, there isn't much to contend with.

What the HR department at Capital Bank can follow up on is simply adding more proof as to how the absenteeism and attrition problem has been solved by other Financial companies, another thing HR can do is to simply survey it's own employees as to why they think the problem has been arising in the first place. This survey can create a sense of inclusion and also show that the company cares about the opinions of it's employees. If anything, this could help solve the problem, in addition to changing the dress code.

To summarize, the HR department at Capital Bank has the right idea however a weak argument that is stating that one cause will have the needed affect which can easily be hit or miss. Also the HR department is not able to provide enough evidence to say that yes changing the dress code will solve the problem of absenteeism and attrition. The HR department will need to provide more evidence to convince Capital Bank to go ahead and change their dress code. If there was a stronger argument and some more evidence than the HR department would have more weight to change the companies attitude on how to solve the present issue.

Some nice ideas here and the structure is ok. At the same time, the logical flow could be better.

Even the first sentence does not really flow logically from the prompt. "Though the memo claims that it's lack of a more casual dress code is proved to be the reason for it's high absenteeism and attrition ..." Does the memo really say that this is proven? Not exactly.

Also, in that sentence, "its" seems to refer to memo, indicating that the memo itself lacks a more casual dress code.

Continuing through that paragraph, you start talking about one reason being "simply not enough" and then, in the same sentence, jump into why the differences between the finance industry and the software industry mean that the two industries require different dress codes. To create better logical flow you have to complete the discussion of one idea and then go into the discussion of the next.

In the second paragraph you did it again. You start off saying that there is more at stake, and then jump into the weakness of the evidence without really saying what you mean by "there is more at stake". That entire paragraph goes by without really saying much of anything.

The paragraph on what the HR department could do has some decent ideas and finishes pretty well. Still the flow could be better, as, for example, at the beginning of the paragraph, you drop right into talking about what the HR department could do instead of changing the dress code without really connecting the idea of doing something else with the rest of the essay.

Overall, you need to develop your ideas more and connect them better. For instance, you say that the evidence is weak a few times while barely saying why. Other ideas show up suddenly and go by without much discussion. So you have ideas. Now you need to weave them into a more coherent essay.

Thank you for the reply Mr. Murray, I appreciate it. I see, I do have trouble making things concise on essays. I'll try and improve the essay. Thanks again.

Marty Murray wrote:Some nice ideas here and the structure is ok. At the same time, the logical flow could be better.

Even the first sentence does not really flow logically from the prompt. "Though the memo claims that it's lack of a more casual dress code is proved to be the reason for it's high absenteeism and attrition ..." Does the memo really say that this is proven? Not exactly.

Also, in that sentence, "its" seems to refer to memo, indicating that the memo itself lacks a more casual dress code.

Continuing through that paragraph, you start talking about one reason being "simply not enough" and then, in the same sentence, jump into why the differences between the finance industry and the software industry mean that the two industries require different dress codes. To create better logical flow you have to complete the discussion of one idea and then go into the discussion of the next.

In the second paragraph you did it again. You start off saying that there is more at stake, and then jump into the weakness of the evidence without really saying what you mean by "there is more at stake". That entire paragraph goes by without really saying much of anything.

The paragraph on what the HR department could do has some decent ideas and finishes pretty well. Still the flow could be better, as, for example, at the beginning of the paragraph, you drop right into talking about what the HR department could do instead of changing the dress code without really connecting the idea of doing something else with the rest of the essay.

Overall, you need to develop your ideas more and connect them better. For instance, you say that the evidence is weak a few times while barely saying why. Other ideas show up suddenly and go by without much discussion. So you have ideas. Now you need to weave them into a more coherent essay.

I have attempted a second draft below, thanks:

Though the Capital Bank's HR Department attempts to say that lack of a more casual dress code is the reason for it's high absenteeism and attrition, they however fail to look at anything else that may be causing the problem. The memo from HR says that the way software companies comply with their dress codes which includes a more casual dress is seen as a positive thing that prevents the problems that Capital Bank has been facing.

As a result, Capital Banks HR memo is not as logically convincing. Only improving the dress code is not enough to solve Capital Banks problem, also the differences between the Software and Banking industries is not addressed such as the nature of the work, how one job is based on selling the self such as in finance compared to the product being the focus of the software industry.

Some of the assumptions made by the HR Department include "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 job satisfaction", however the HR Department fails to say that what the Software industry accepts may not work in Finance. A more strict dress code is something that tends to work better in Finance. Another assumption made by the HR Department states "Moreover, most software firms experience lower rates of employee absenteeism and attrition than companies in other industries, including banking." This line shows no factual evidence of this statement, it could always be possible that certain software companies could utilized a high end dress code. The HR Department fails to be logically convincing since they base everythning in their memo on assumption rather than fact to change a company policy.

As stated above Capital Bank's HR Department "fails to say anything else might be the cause for this problem. " What the HR Department at Capital Bank can also follow up on is simply adding more proof as to how the absenteeism and attrition problem has been solved by other Financial companies as a comparison, another thing HR can do is to simply survey it's own employees as to why they think the problem has been arising in the first place. This survey can create a sense of inclusion and also show that the company cares about the opinions of it's employees. If anything, this could help solve the problem, in addition to changing the dress code.

To summarize, the HR department at Capital Bank has the right idea however is weak in logically convincing the Corporation how effective a change in dress code would be. If there were fewer assumptions and more fact of how effective changing the dress code would be than the HR department would have more weight to change the companies attitude on how to solve the present issue.