GMAT Essays (AWA)

Dear Members and Moderators,

My GMAT is nearing and this is my first attempt at AWA. I request you to review it and provide your feedback. If any of the experts can comment on this essay and rate it, I would be really happy. I look forward to hearing your feedback on this essay.

Argument:

"When the Apogee Company had all its operations in one location, it was more profitable than it is today. Therefore, the Apogee Company should close down its field offices and conduct all its operations from a single location. Such centralization would improve profitability by cutting costs and helping the company maintain better supervision of all employees."

Essay:

The argument states that the Apogee company should close down its field offices and conduct all its operation from a single location to improve profit. However this conclusion is not backed up by concrete analysis and evidence. There are significant loopholes in the author's premises and assumptions and there is the absence of any form of supporting evidence.This makes the conclusion really weak. The author states that the profit will be increased by having all operations in one location but there is no real evidence as to how the profit will be increased by the centralisation of the Apogee company's field operations.

First, the author assumes the Apogee company was profitable while it had its operations in a single place and is not profitable when its operations are spread over multiple locations. The author fails to take into account that there are a number of other parameters such as quality of product, service, pricing of the product etc. that influence the profit of the company.The author has not touched upon any of the other parameters and has assumed that the spread of field officers location is the primary reason for the fall in profit.The author does not provide any supporting evidency to indicate that the spread of field office location is the primary cause for the decline in the profit of the company.

Secondly, the author assumes that by closing the field offices and conducting its operations from a single location the profit could be increased. Again, here, the author has not provided any data to back up this claim. There is no evidence to indicate that by conducting its operations from a single location, the Apogee company could increase its profit. It is possible that there could be a further drop in the profit if the Apogee company was serving customers in different locations and it will not have an easy and quick access to those many customers if it has to conduct its operations from a single location.

Thirdly,the author assumes that profitiability could be improved because of centralization. Though there might be some truth to it, for example the employee travel costs could be reduced if all employees are based out of one location and the company could cut down on the cost incurred by the employees to travel from one field office to another. But this might potentially increase the overall travel cost when the Apogee company has to send its field operation officer for a survey or to a customer location. The officers might end up travelling long distances to order to visit a customer premise or to do a survey.

Although there could be some benefits in doing location centralisation to some degree, the author has not really pointed out the real reasons for the fall in profit and how centralised operations will cut down the cost and improve the profit. The argument makes several assumptions which are not reliable and are not backed up by supporting data. If the argument had backed its reasoning with real data and supporting proof then it would have sounded more convincing.

First, I'm not a good writer. And I just wanna make a suggestion, not any critism on your essay.

The first point you delivered does not sound very good. The given information cites that

When the Apogee Company had all its operations in one location, it was more profitable than it is today

it does not suggest that

... Apogee company ... is not profitable when its operations are spread over multiple locations

The company is just less profitable.
The ideas in the second and third paragraphs somewhat overlap:
From the 2nd paragraph

Apogee company was serving customers in different locations and it will not have an easy and quick access to those many customers if it has to conduct its operations from a single location.

From the 3rd paragraph

the Apogee company has to send its field operation officer for a survey or to a customer location. The officers might end up travelling long distances to order to visit a customer premise or to do a survey.

Are delivering goods, getting feedback, or providing services in a same category - quick access to the customers?
They should be combined into one passage.
The last paragraph could be used to talk about the convenient access to resources such as cheap labor, abudant raw materials, etc.

@limestone, Your feedback is much appreciated. I will certainly keep these points in my mind when I frame my next essay.

"When the Apogee Company had all its operations in one location, it was more profitable than it is today. Therefore,
the Apogee Company should close down its field offices and conduct all its operations from a single location. Such
centralization would improve profitability by cutting costs and helping the company maintain better supervision of all
employees."


Flaws:
1.Maybe some locations are more favorable than other.
2.Some operations may not be performed from the other location
3.The cost of relocating would reduce the profits
4.Closing down the office would bring bad publicity

Also follow a similar structure ,use firstly instead of first. And lots of overlap in your ideas.You tend to repeat the same thing in starting of a new paragraph and providing an informal approach.Use words However,moreover etc to provide good structure.