SCENARIO-BASED QUESTIONS ?Email Request To Employees ? Revise the following paragraph from an email message to employees. Focus on the voice, appropriate sentence length, and word selection to make the passage effective. ? With the approach of the

Question

end of this fiscal year, it has been recommended by our accountant that the monies allocated in the budget to capital equipment be used as soon as it is expedient. Therefore, as has been our practice in the past, we are requesting that each of you compile a comprehensive detailed list outlining your requests for new equipment that you may have put on the back burner, so to speak. It would be appreciated if you could provide this information to me by the first of next month so that I can begin to process all orders prior to the expiration of the fiscal year. It is anticipated that a multitude of requests will be simultaneously submitted by department heads; it is highly probable that requests for equipment will be processed in the order received and delayed requests may not be funded. I sincerely appreciate your cooperation in our efforts to upgrade some of our capital equipment.

Answer 1

The solution should reflect active voice, to increase emphasis and clarity. Some complex sentences can be shortened and unnecessary clauses eliminated. Difficult words can be replaced in some cases with simple words. Important ideas can be better emphasized by careful placement in sentences and the paragraph.

A proposed solution follows:

It is now the end of the fiscal year, and our accountant suggests that we spend the rest of the capital equipment money that we budgeted this year. I would like everyone to send me a list of the new equipment that you would like to purchase, including the catalog item number and price, if available. Many departments are submitting similar requests, and past experience shows that it is "first come, first serve." Our orders may not be funded if there is delay in submission of the request. So, please submit your information by next Monday so that our department can submit the requests immediately.