Persuasive Communication - How Audiences Decide. 2nd Edition

86 Understanding Rational Decision Making

On the next page is a salary request from a manager in an engineering fi rm to his upper man-

agement (note: the dates, the position and its attributes, the names of the fi rm’s employees, and the

locations of the teams have been changed). The think-aloud comments are those of an experienced

business manager who was asked to put himself into the role of a high-level manager and to make

a decision based on the information provided. The expert manager’s comments are numbered and

inserted into the salary request memo in bold and brackets.

Notice that the expert’s comments about the request are quite skeptical. What is missing from

the salary request is information that addresses the audience’s decision criteria about the cost of the

TABLE 2.6 Experts’ Comments That Reveal Their Decision Criteria for Making Budgetary Decisions

Comments on a Purchase Proposal by an

e-Business CEO

Comments on a Purchase Proposal by

a Manager in a Credit Company

Nature and
cost of the
expenditure

1. Do we have to spend that much
   [$392,515] up front? Why can’t we phase
   this in?


2. Why are you pushing JAVA? Give me
   some industry or company perspective on
   your premise.


3. This techie stuff could be rolled up into
   concepts that map to a business goal.
   
   
   1. What exactly is it that you’re
      proposing?
   
   
   2. Are you also proposing changes
      to how the mail is processed?
      I can’t tell from the information
      you provide just what you’re
      getting at.
   
   
   3. You indicate that there is an
      additional expense in reordering
      envelopes for the mail stuffer. Is this
      a big cost? I would have to know
      this in order to make a decision.
   
   
   
   

Impact on
strategy and
operations

5. I would have expected business goals or
   something to start with. This section on
   background information is not the best
   lead material.


6. What are the factors that were used
   to evaluate our options? This should be
   shown up front. For example, “Here are
   the key challenges for us. Here are the
   factors we used. Here’s where the industry
   is going. Here’s how we can get there.”


7. You get into factors like scalability and
   reliability but they are buried.
   3. You’ve provided lots of facts and
   fi gures about costs and options,
   but why? What problem are you
   trying to resolve? Your proposal
   just presents a lot of information,
   but never explains why you’re
   providing it.

Financial
benefi ts

2. Cost savings are always hard to even
   estimate. I would not lead with something
   like this.
   4. By reducing the manpower
   required to stuff envelopes, doesn’t
   that save money as well? How
   much?

Risks
involved with
implementation

12. How about the cultural fi t and ability
    for our e-company to support this? How
    about vendor stability, market momentum?


13. Did anyone tire-kick this stuff by
    laying hands on it?

[Perhaps because of the small up-

front cost—$6,240—this expert

did not indicate whether or not he

noted the proposal’s lack of a risk

assessment.]

Urgency of
request

18. Even if it is stated that we need this
    now, how do you draw this conclusion?
    In other words, traffi c, load, etc. Do you
    reference our current platforms?

[This expert did not indicate

whether or not he noted the

proposal’s lack of urgency.]

Qualifi cations
of requester

22. I’m not sure on the bias of the writer
    of this proposal. Were business unit folks
    consulted? At a minimum, marketing folks?

[This expert knew the requester

well and did not indicate a need for

further information about him.]