STUDY GUIDE

Module 1: Workplace Communication

Technical Skills
- are the abilities and knowledge needed to perform specific tasks;
- they are practical, and often relate to mechanical, information technology, mathematical,
or scientific tasks

Soft Skills
- the personal attributes, personality traits, inherent social cues, and communication abilities
needed for success on the job;
- characterize how a person interacts in his or her relationships with others
(interpersonal/people skills)

- communication done in the workplace

- the exchange of information that helps people interact with technology and solve complex
problems
- the message usually involves a technical subject with a specific purpose and audience

**The subject is usually technical, written carefully for a specific audience. The organization is
predictable and apparent, the style is concise, and the tone is objective and businesslike. Special
features may include visual elements to enhance the message.

A. Subject
- technical, factual
- fulfills the special needs of a specific reader

**Technical Writing - writing to share information or to have someone perform an action

B. Audience
- carefully considered, targeted
- the technical writer expects that the reader possesses some knowledge of the topic and its
specialized vocabulary; he also wants the reader to do something after reading
C. Organization
- predictable, apparent (easy to understand)
- technical documents use headings to help the readers perceive the organization at a single
glance; "the organization should allow the eyes to travel quickly to the information needed"

D. Style
- concise, direct, specialized vocabulary
- the way an author uses words and sentences gives the audience an idea of the type of
document they're reading

**Jargon, the highly specialized language of a particular discipline or technical field, is used.

E. Tone
- objective or businesslike
- the way the words make the person feel; describes the emotional character of a document

F. Special Features
- visual elements

Font size and style - boldfaced? italicized? underlined?

Numbered and/or bulleted lists - what kind of bullets?
Columns - one, two, three, or more?
Color
Graphs and Tables
Letterhead and Logo - size? location? middle, upper left? upper right? or side?
Photos and drawings - subject? style? black and white or color?
Sidebars - what information to highlight? where to place?
Clip Art - what purpose? to add humor, to set a tone, or to celebrate a season?

Desktop publishing software - used in the creation of documents using page layout skills on a
personal computer

Prepared by:

Vanrom Kip P. Follosco

Language Instructor, HSC
FEU Institute of Technology

**This guide is not “all-in” approach for the lesson’s contents. For a more comprehensive review and content
learning on the module, please refer to the video courseware and the PPT materials in CANVAS.