Please evaluate my essay-Argument. (1st attempt)

This topic has expert replies
Master | Next Rank: 500 Posts
Posts: 162
Joined: Mon Jul 28, 2008 8:33 pm
Location: San Jose,CA
Thanked: 1 times

Please evaluate my essay-Argument. (1st attempt)

by ddm » Fri Aug 22, 2008 1:56 pm
The following appeared in a report presented for discussion at a meeting of the directors of a company that manufactures parts for heavy machinery.

" The falling revenue that the company is experiencing coincide with delays in manufacturing. These delays, in turn, are due in large part to poor planning in purchasing metals. Consider further that the manager of the department that handles purchasing of raw materials has an excellent background in general business, psychology and sociology, but knows little about the properties of metals. The company should, therefore move the purchasing manger to the sales department and bring in a scientist from the research division to be the manager of the purchasing department.”


The discussion at the meeting mentions that the company is experiencing delays in manufacturing. The manager of the purchasing department is held responsible for this delay. The directors of the company believe that the current manger should be moved from the purchasing department and they should bring in a scientist from the research division. The directors of the company feel that though current manager has an excellent background in general business, psychology and sociology, he does not know much about the properties of metal. The argument is full of gaps and loops since it provides fragmentary evidence. Neither are the premises convincing nor the conclusion compelling.The argument is very evidently the result of hasty generalization. There are many factors that contribute to a weak conclusion and a flawed argument.

The biggest fallacy in the argument is that the directors assume that bringing in a scientist from the research division will solve the problems of the delay in manufacturing. The directors commit a faulty analogy in believing that the scientist from the research division will be able to take general business discussions. Moreover, the scientist may not have any background in the business world,compared to the current manager who is believed to have an excellent business background. Though the scientist may have expert knowledge in purchasing metal, lack of business experience weakens this solution.

The second assumption made by the directors of the company is, that the manger is responsible for the poor planning in purchasing metals. They hold him responsible for the falling revenues of the company. The directors fail to take into view other factors that might be affecting the manufacturing. There may be delays from the other department except the purchasing department. There is also a possibility that the metal provided by the supplier is not up to the mark and the manger is not satisfied with the product.

The argument clearly lacks sufficient evidence and stastical data to make such superogatatory claims. The argument does not provide any statistical evidence of the revenues falling down. There might be various other reasons for the fall in revenue.There might even be delay in some other department.Though the argument looks appealing at first, on closer scrutiny,the argument falls apart on many fronts.The argument relies on certain anecdotal evidence.

The argument is a result of huge speculation in which the directors of the company have assumed a considerable amount of data. Had they taken the above discussed factors into view, it would have rendered the argument irrefutable. But whatever presented fails to provide a holistic picture to the superfluous claims.

GMAT Instructor
Posts: 1223
Joined: Thu May 01, 2008 3:29 pm
Location: Los Angeles, CA
Thanked: 185 times
Followed by:15 members

by VP_Jim » Sun Aug 31, 2008 10:42 am
I can't find much fault with this one. Great work! The only thing I might add is that you could go into more detail regarding how to strengthen the argument.

I think you're on track for a 5 or 6, for sure. Keep it up.
Jim S. | GMAT Instructor | Veritas Prep

Master | Next Rank: 500 Posts
Posts: 162
Joined: Mon Jul 28, 2008 8:33 pm
Location: San Jose,CA
Thanked: 1 times

by ddm » Sun Aug 31, 2008 11:12 am
Hey...Thanks a lot for your comment....

Junior | Next Rank: 30 Posts
Posts: 16
Joined: Thu Jul 07, 2011 6:09 pm

by Abhi7 » Fri Aug 05, 2011 8:22 am
Pl evaluate my essay - any suggestion is welcome.

The following appeared in a report presented for discussion at a meeting of the directors of a company that manufactures parts for heavy machinery.

" The falling revenue that the company is experiencing coincide with delays in manufacturing. These delays, in turn, are due in large part to poor planning in purchasing metals. Consider further that the manager of the department that handles purchasing of raw materials has an excellent background in general business, psychology and sociology, but knows little about the properties of metals. The company should, therefore move the purchasing manger to the sales department and bring in a scientist from the research division to be the manager of the purchasing department."


The argument given is presented in the meeting of the directors of a company which is facing falling revenues. The falling revenues are corelated with delays in manufacturing. Hence, the argument presented suggets at shufling the managers of the purchasing & sales dept. This solution is very commonly given in such situations. But the poorly reasoned argument, is based on several questionable premises and assumptions, and based solely on the evidence the author offers, we cannot accept his argument as valid.

The primary issue with the report lies in its unsubstantitated premises. Their is no evidentiary support to suggest that delays are due to poor planning only. The supporting software may not be good enough for proper planning or their maybe shoratge of staff to handle the workload. The author's premises lack any legitimate evidentiary support & render his conclusion unacceptable.

In addition, the author makes several assumptions that remain unproven. By suggesting to make a scientist as the manager, the author assumes that purchasing requires more of scientific knowledge then business and inter-personal skills. This assumption is clearly unwarranted and the author weakens his argument by making assupmtions and failing to provide explication of the links between purchasing and scientific knowledge.

While the author does have several key issues in his argument's premises and assumptions, that is not to say that the entire argument is without base. The author could provide evidence of availabilty of a good support tool(software) with the purchase dept to stress on the poor planning part of the manager. He could also provide an example of a good performance by a scietist in the purchase dept.

In sum, the author's illogical argument is based on unsupported premises & unsubstantiated assumptions that render his conclusion invalid. If the author truly hopes to contribute with a solution, he would have to largely restrucure his argument, fix the flaws in his logic, clearly explicate his assumptions & provide evidentiary support.

User avatar
Newbie | Next Rank: 10 Posts
Posts: 1
Joined: Fri Mar 16, 2012 9:49 am

by Glenn Carlos » Fri Mar 16, 2012 10:01 am
"The falling revenues that the company is experiencing coincide with delays in manufacturing. These delays,
in turn, are due in large part to poor planning in purchasing metals. Consider further that the manager of the
department that handles purchasing of raw materials has an excellent background in general business,
psychology, and sociology, but knows little about the properties of metals. The company should, therefore,
move the purchasing manager to the sales department and bring in a scientist from the research division to
be manager of the purchasing department."

Discuss how well reasoned ... etc.

The argument that the company must bring in a scientist to replace the manager so that purchasing metals could be done faster and delays could be avoided so that company does not face falling revenues is a well reasoned one. The fact that the current manager has an excellent background in general business, psychology, and sociology, but knows little about the properties of metals could be a determinant for delays in the purchasing of metals and hence replacing him with a scientist, who would be used for purchasing the right materials without making any delay, could be the best plausible solution at hand.


As the company manufactures parts for heavy machinery, it should buy materials well before time so that manufacturing can start at the right time. If the company has a manager who handles purchasing of raw materials but lacks knowledge in properties of materials then significant delay is expected to hinder the progress. On the other hand, a scientist in his place would have an in-depth knowledge about the materials used in the manufacturing process and would be able to suggest the best material to be used and would also be able to make that decision much faster than the manager.


Also, the argument assumes that delays in manufacturing is the root cause for falling revenues of the company owing to the fact that both these events coincided. There could also be a possibility of low-quality products manufactured by the company. Their products would have lost the reputation in the market and consequently the consumers would have stopped purchasing from the company. Even if the cause is attributed to the low-quality of the products manufactured, a scientist would be in a position to identify the root cause better and solve the issue; this is something which we can not expect from a manager who lacks technical knowledge in the properties of materials.


Furthermore, as the scientist would be brought in from the research division of the same company, he would already be having sufficient knowledge about the practices of the company, products they manufacture and the processes they handle. Thus, orientation program and on-job training could be avoided as the scientist himself would be well versed with manufacturing processes of the company. In addition to that, he would be in a position to recommend better products if he had been exposed to such products during his research period. Thus, not only significant time could be saved by avoiding training but also higher efficiency in purchases could be anticipated.


Finally moving the purchasing manager to the sales department would be the best decision for the company as well as the manager as he would be in a platform where he would be able to better apply the knowledge he gained in general business, psychology and sociology.

Junior | Next Rank: 30 Posts
Posts: 10
Joined: Tue Apr 10, 2012 2:43 am

by jenniferpass » Tue Apr 10, 2012 2:50 am
Good Essay.You can also go for a search of further details this topic through open discussions which helps to attain more knowledge.Reviews are helpful in this.