Using High-Affect Goals in Teaching Proposal Writing

Richard C. Freed and Glenn J.Broadhead

Jim Smith, a young management consultant at an international firm, found himself in a situation similar to one many of our business and technical writing students face. Having spent considerable time drafting a proposal and submitting it to the officer-in-charge for review, Smith was astonished and disheartened by the revisions the officer made. He was astonished at the number and scope of the officer's revisions in a draft that he had thought good. He was disheartened because, though he knew the changes substantially improved his document, he didn’t know why they did. He realized, for example, that the “full-time involvement of Mary McKenna and the active involvement of Jim Smith” (the officers revision) was better than the “full-time involvement of Mary McKenna and the part-time involvement of Jim Smith.” He understood that in changing “specific points we mentioned” to “specific points we discussed,” the officer had created better rapport with the incident. And he also knew that the change from “You have indicated a strong desire to shift manufacturing” to “You have taken several actions to shift manufacturing” made the client sound better or more forceful.

Like many of our students reacting to their teachers’ recommendations, Smith wasn’t sure he could learn from the officer’s revisions or that he would be able to make similar changes in subsequent documents. But also like many of our students, Smith was certainly capable of solving his rhetorical problems; he was not certain, however, how to do so.

The kind of uncertainty Smith exhibited is explained by Linda Rower and John Hayes, who examine in a “A Cognitive Process Theory of Writing” how, during the act of composing, writers create (and re-create) a network of goals and subgoals to help them plan, generate, and revise their texts. These goals condition and are con­ditioned by the writer’s knowledge (schema, stored representations) and the developing text “In the act of writing, people regenerate or re-create their own goals in the light of what they learn," in part "by generating goals and supporting sub-goals which embody a purpose” (CCC 32 [1981]: 381).

Obviously, the purpose of any proposal writer is to persuade a reader. But both Smith and our students are poorly served when they are told only that their documents aren’t persuasive enough. General injunctions (or “top-level goals’) such as “persuade your reader” or “sell your reader” don’t help writers become more per­suasive any more than the injunction “play with feeling” helps a musician become more evocative. Without a suitable repertoire of practical subgoals, Smith and our students know only in general what to do without knowing how to do it. In this article, we identify and examine six such subgoals. Once students understand these sub­goals, they will be in the position to revise their proposals with their readers in mind.

High-Affect Goals

During three years of researching the written products and composing processes of professional proposal writers, we identified 26 subgoals, which we divided into two categories: “low-affect goals” and “high-affect goals.” The writers we studied used 20 different low-affect goals to signal relationships among textual elements; to improve the document’s style; to make the document conform to standard edited English; and generally, to make their texts more accurate, thorough, relevant, and coherent. These low-affect goals address cognitive rather than affective aspects of the rhetorical situation; that is, they focus on the text, writer, reader, worldly context (such as social, political, and economic “givens”), and task to be accomplished by writers and readers within that context. These goals involve the logical rather than the emotional; their affective impact on readers is low.

Six other goals, however, address the affective aspects of the rhetorical situation. The intent of these high-affect goals is not primarily to alter the logic of the discourse or the linguistic or stylistic elements of the text, but rather to affect the reader emo­tionally. To generate high affective impact, they address readers’ attitudes—both positive and negative—toward the task, toward themselves, and toward the writer. For example, in addressing readers’ feelings about the task proposed in a document, the writer tries to feed a wish (positive) or to avoid a threat (negative). Similarly, in addressing readers’ feelings about themselves, the writer tries to stroke the reader (positive) or to avoid an insult (negative). Finally, in addressing the readers’ feelings about the writer, the writer tries to build credit (positive) or to bond with the reader (that is, to avoid a negative situation in which the readers feel alienated from the writer).

To Feed a Wish

In feeding a wish, the writer’s emphasis is on the readers’ desire for certain conditions to exist (for example, their wish for efficiency and effectiveness). The following sentence and its revision illustrate an attempt to feed a wish:
Original: You may also have what is a unique opportunity to search out this optimal location.

Revision: You also have what is perhaps a unique opportunity to search out this optimal location.

This subtle change of the qualifier’s position alters the sentence’s meaning. In the first version, a desirable state or condition, a ‘unique opportunity,” may not exist; in the second, the condition does exist, though it may not be unique. Thus, the revision feeds a wish to the reader—the wish that a plant relocation study present the company with an opportunity, perhaps a unique one.

One wish that proposal writers sometimes need to feed (and sometimes help to create) is the desire for assistance in the first place. That is, even in some non-competitive situations, the pro­posal still must be “competitive” because the client must first decide whether the study is necessary and, if so, whether to bid out the job or attempt to do the study internally. Thus, revisions designed to feed a wish can emphasize a need for the study or highlight its complexity and urgency:
Original: You have reviewed several letters, comments, and discussions with customers and have sensed less than ideal responsiveness and attitude, and excessive complexity of order entry.

Revision: You have described several letters, comments, and discus­sions with customers that have demonstrated Acme’s less than ideal responsiveness and attitude, and excessive complexity of order entry.

Original: We agree that time is short, that the needs are urgent, and that the project has many obvious and some subtle issues within your organization.

Revision: We agreed that time is short, that the needs are urgent and that the project involves many obvious and other more subtle issues within your organization.

A revision designed to feed a wish can emphasize the potential success of the study or the benefits that may accrue. Again, the revisions often point to a condition or state of being desired by the readers:
Original: The team will have the necessary training background, and expertise in the following areas related to manufacturing.

Revision: The team will have the necessary training background, and expertise in the following areas essential to carrying out a successful study.

Original: It is our experience that such opportunities for cost improve­ment are identified as the work progresses.

Revision: It is our experience that such opportunities for immediate cost improvement can significantly offset the cost of the study.

Because revising to feed a wish helps the writer focus on readers, it can help the writer move from what Rower calls “writer-based” to “reader-based” prose. In writer-based prose, the writers seem to talk to themselves rather than transact with specific readers in particular rhetorical situations. In the first sentence below, for example, the writer is almost speaking to herself about a matter that must be taken up during the course of a study; in the revision, the writer is transacting with a reader about a condition that ought to exist at the end of the study:
Original: Management believes that the inevitable question, “Why not the Sunbelt?” will have to be addressed.

Revision: Management believes that the inevitable question, “Why not the Sunbelt?” must be definitively answered.

The following sentence is also writer-based:
In this section, we will work with you to develop your plant location criteria.

This first-draft sentence begins a workstep in the proposal’s methods 5 section, and the cataphoric (forward-looking) tie helps the writer get going and moves the reader from one step of the workplan to another. ‘In this section” doesn’t really serve as a forecasting device by which the writer helps readers, since the sentence doesn’t really initiate a section. The phrase probably exists because in the first draft the writer senses something ought to go there, and thus it serves as a kind of place-holder for a subsequent revision. That is, the phrase doesn’t serve a reader’s purpose but a writer’s in the act of compos­ing. In the revision below, the writer makes the tie anaphoric, building credit in doing so:
Once logistics issues are resolved, we will work with you to develop your -plant location criteria.

Each of the revisions above transforms the sentence’s writer-oriented concern to a reader-oriented wish or desire.

To Avoid a Threat

This goal involves the writer’s removing a claim or implication that might threaten readers. Meeting this goal is important for proposal writers because the proposed study can pose various threats to clients and their firms. For example, jobs can be on the line reporting relationships affected, and the client’s culture shaken. For instance, a study was requested by a company’s president who was convinced that staff support costs were too high in one of the company plants. The plant manager, however (who was to be the primary decision-maker on the proposal), did not share this con­viction, and therefore the following sentence could have posed a threat:
The conviction remains that staff support costs are higher than they should be.

Tto avoid the threat, the writer made the following revision in a subsequent draft:
There is a feeling that staff support costs are higher than they should be.

Other potential threats can relate to the large amount of time the proposed study can require of clients to gather and analyze data. Normally, the tasks of both parties are described in the “Approach” section, as they were in the proposal from which this sentence was taken:
Due to the rather extensive data collection required on your part to support such a study, it will probably require from four to six weeks elapsed time.

The writer eventually deleted “on your part” to de-emphasize the threat of additional work.

Still other threats can involve the potential clients’ feelings about the writer’s firm coming in to study their organization. In management consulting, the working relationship between the client and consulting teams must be sound; thus, bonding with readers (a goal discussed below) can be extremely important, as is avoiding the threat of an unequal relationship. To avoid the threat of impersonality (and the unequal relationship it implies), one writer revised his sentence as follows:
Original: As we agreed, the present study will be confined to what we normally refer to as the first phase of a comprehensive manufacturing facility relocation study.

Revision: As we agreed, the present study will be confined to the first phase of a comprehensive manufacturing relocation study.

To Stroke the Reader

In achieving this goal, a writer can include claims or implications that commend or flatter readers. Such statements may compliment readers or their firm by emphasizing their prior efforts to solve the problem at hand, stressing appropriate qualifications of the clients team, or underscoring appropriate strategies, objectives, or ideas the client has expressed. Rather than building credit (increasing their own credibility), writers in meeting this goal give credit to readers or their organization. The following revised sentences either commend readers’ ideas or recognize their firm’s previous efforts or abilities:
Original: In that context, you define customer service as a result of any 5 interaction between anyone in the company and the public.

Revision: In that context, you appropriately define customer service as a result of any interaction between anyone in the company and the public.

Original: Such control is important because you will be able to reduce costs.

Revision: Such control is important because you are able to reduce costs.

Although the revisions above add information to the text, they do not significantly change meaning; however, they do help to compliment readers. In the following examples, the writer strokes readers by segmenting the text for emphasis:
Original: It was a pleasure discussing the symptoms and problems at Acme as well as the improvcments which have been made thus far.

Revision: It was a pleasure discussing the symptoms and problems at Acme, as well as the improvements you have made thus far.

Original: We especially appreciate the time which you took and the openness and candor of the group.

Revision: We thank you for the time you took, and we especially appreciate the openness and candor of your group.

To Avoid an Insult

In meeting this goal, a writer avoids a claim or implication that might insult or ridicule readers. Especially in highly sensitive rhetorical situations, increased attention to this goal is necessary. It is easy to overlook insulting statements because they are often matters of connotation. For example, “Should a unified marketing group be advisable” is potentially insulting to a firm whose marketing group is already unified, and therefore the writer replaced “unified” with “organization-wide.” “Appropriate other managers” is insulting to the reader-manager and thus needed recasting to “other appropriate managers.” “Current marketing activities com­municate separate messages and may result in extra costs” suggests that the activities always communicate separate messages. Thus, the writer inserted “often” before “communicate” to avoid ridicule. ‘The importance of marketing was recently recognized” insultingly suggests that the dullard executives should have recognized it long ago, and thus the revision: “Marketing has taken on an increasingly important position in recent years.”

To Build Credit

In achieving this goal, the writer adds claims or implications that will impress readers or that will eliminate self-damaging claims or Implications. Although many revisions insert extensive passages in the qualifications sections that build upon the writer’s or the firm’s experience relevant to the proposed study, others involve minor insertions (such as “in your industry” and “personally experienced”) that relate to the specific project being addressed. Other small but important changes in the qualifications section can build credit by explaining, not what the writer could or intends to do, but what he or she will do. For example, passages such as “we would plan” and “it is our intention” are frequently replaced with “we will,” a revision that projects an image of active problem-solvers.

Because building credit can be accomplished when a writer avoids losing credit, some alterations can avoid self-damaging claims or implications, such as the following:
Original: Management believes that the inevitable question, “Why not the Sunbelt?” will be asked and must be definitely answered.

Original: We are extremely pleased at this opportunity to submit this proposal.

The first sentence could be self-damaging, portraying the writer as weary of clients’ silly questions; thus, the writer replaced “in­evitable” with “common.” Because the second sentence could make the writer sound greedy or gloating, she replaced “We are extremely pleased at” with “We appreciate.”

To Bond with the Reader

In achieving this goal, a writer attempts to establish rapport with readers. Such rapport can be especially important in studies that employ a two-team approach, the proposing team working with the client’s team to share expertise and transfer skills and technologies. For this reason, proposals can often stress joint goals, processes, and teamwork, as illustrated by the following sentences:
The effort to justify or refute your decision to go ahead requires the very best of professional capability—both yours and ours.

We plan to review and understand all prior relocation planning activities and work with you to identify all major relocation project tasks.

This kind of bonding serves to reinforce commonality, equality, and partnership. The following sentence and its revision reveal how subtle textual changes can help establish these themes:
Original: We appreciate the time you spent with us last week to dis­cuss your requirements for truck sales forecasts. We have re­viewed those interviews in preparing this proposal.

Revision: We appreciate the time you spent with us last week to dis­cuss your requirements for truck sales forecasts. We have re­viewed those discussions in preparing this proposal.

Changing “interviews” to “discussions” helps begin the proposal with writer and readers on equal footing.

To help establish this necessary chemistry, the proposal can take letter form (so that the reader can be directly addressed) and can use personal pronouns (“our team” “your team”):
Original: We will work with management to select the weighting factors.

Revision: We will work with you to select the weighting factors.

A Final Note

We have used these six subgoals in senior technical writing and in graduate proposal writing courses, as well as with Jim Smith and many of his colleagues. Smith's experience is typical by categorizing the officers revisions—by giving them names to distinguish among them and by expressing them as subgoals, Smith could determine what the officer was doing and begin to see how he too could revise. Once he understood that the phrase "part-time involvement" posed a potential threat to the reader because It suggested Smith’s less than full-time commitment to the project, he could see why a revision was necessary. Once he understood that "specific points we mentioned,” suggests a one-way communication that does not bond with the reader, he could see why "specific points we discussed” did. And once he understood that “You have indicated a strong desire to shift manufacturing" does not credit the reader nearly as much as “You have taken several actions to shift manufacturing,” he could see how he missed an opportunity to stroke the reader.

In short, after students are shown, several examples of each goal, they will be able to begin identifying possible revisions in their documents to meet the goals more consistently in later documents. They will be able to look for specific kinds of problems in their text, identify specific categories of defect or opportunity, and then solve their rhetorical problems, not through trial and error, but through goal-directed actions.

Iowa State University
Ames, Iowa

This article is based on our book The Variables of Composition: Process and Product in a Business Setting, NCTE Studies In Writing and Rhetoric (Carbondale Southern Illinois UP, 1986).