A subsidiary of English 210F: Genres of Business Communication

Dear Applicant,

Im pleased to confirm that youve been offered an internship position with Living4Learning for this
semester. Youll be joining the team of learning creatives (as we call ourselves at L4L) in the
Operations department. Congratulations and welcome to Ops! Please make sure you start reviewing
the Operations resource package to familiarize yourself with the areas that we are expected to have
some expertise in.

As you already know, Living4Learning is a Waterloo-based (simulated) company specializing in

software systems for learning management and educational support. Although were a relatively
new company, this is a fast-growing market, and weve already signed on or had serious interest
from an impressive array of clients among major North American colleges and universities, as well
as several large corporations and professional organizations.

I just returned from an international Operational Planning conference, where the big buzz was
around corporate social responsibility (CSR) on environmental issues. Weve fallen behind in that
area because were so focused on product development and client service theres no interest around
initiatives that dont support that core mission. Your major project for this term is to work
collaboratively with your departmental colleagues on drafting a proposal for a greening strategy to
put L4L on the Canadas Greenest Employers list within the next 2 years. The proposal needs to
convince the CEO and other directors that we can and should invest in greening the company as a top
priority.

There are a lot of bases to consider, and youll be able to ask other departments for information and
recommendations that you can use in preparing your proposal. (You should also be ready to offer
information and recommendations on Ops questions to learning creatives in other departments as
they work on their own proposal projects.) Make sure all your communications properly cite any
research material you used to help establish the credibility and authority of the ideas.

Your Regional Manager requires your departments completed proposal on the due date posted in
your schedule. Ill review the proposals from all regions and take the best one to the next corporate
roundtable as a blueprint for the greening strategy.

See the next page for instructions on making requests for your proposal. Your regional manager has
been briefed on this project and can answer any questions about it.

Sincerely,

Doug Schwartz
Doug Schwartz,
Director of Corporate Operations
 A subsidiary of English 210F: Genres of Business Communication

Making a Request (Assignment 1)

Theres a lot to think about in designing the right greening strategy for L4L. For example: How do
we get our biggest resource consumption departments on board? What about feedback on how well
its going and what kind of buy-in we have from our learning creatives? Your proposal should also
consider who will implement the proposed program and if we can use it to generate some publicity.
Your group might think of other topics that your proposal should include as well.

Learning creatives in other departments have expertise and information on some of these topics, and
would be happy to recommend the most appropriate options if you ask. Remember that the more
specific you can be when making a request, the more likely it is that the recipient will understand
what you are looking for and be able to make the most helpful recommendation.

For this assignment, you will choose one of the following contacts, and draft an appropriate request.
While your requests will be addressed to corporate directors, its unlikely that they have time to
respond themselves. Review everything you know about the project and assignment requirements,
and L4Ls corporate structure and culture, and follow the guidelines presented in the course
materials about how to make an effective, appropriate request. Work with your team to make sure as
many of the topics are covered as possible, but try to avoid overlaptwo people sending the same
request to the same person is an unnecessary duplication of effort for everybody.

Gordon Gluck, Corporate Director, Product R&D [email: ggluck<at>l4l<dot>sim]:

Product R&D is under constant high pressure to develop better and more for our product
line. Their big server banks and high-turnover, always-on hardware inventory consume lots
of electricity and generate lots of e-waste.

Omar Aziz, Corporate Director, User Experience (UX) [email: oaziz<at>l4l<dot>sim]:

This department has experience running focus groups, interviewing users, and using
different types of survey programs to collect feedback. If they know what kind of feedback
data you need and who you need it from, UX can recommend how best to get it.

Andrea Huff, Corporate Marketing Director [email: andhuff<at>l4l<dot>sim]:

Marketing is all about the right messages to the right audiences. They know when and where
to place ads, when to use social media, and even how to use our own website to make sure
we present ourselves in the best possible light.

Franco Botha, Corporate Director, Customer Relations [email: fbotha<at>l4l<dot>sim]:

Franco likes to say his people are the faces of L4L to our customers. Delivering in-person,
onsite training and support separates us from the competition, but it comes with a huge
carbon footprint.

Devin Curtois, Corporate Director, Human Resources [email: dcurtois<at>l4l<dot>sim]:

If you can let Devin know what kind of skills and time commitment (full-time, part-time,
short-term, long-term) we need for the project team, Devin can recommend whether to
manage it in-house or outsource it.