Burning Ideas

Process Writing

When we write, we do more than just put words together to make sentences. Good writers go through several steps to produce a piece of writing.

1. Choose a topic. Before you write, your teacher gives you a specific assignment or some ideas of what to write about. If not, choose a topic yourself.
2. Gather ideas. When you have a topic, think about what you will write about that topic.
3. Organize. Decide which of the ideas you want to use and where you want to use them. Choose which idea to talk about first, which to talk about next, and which to talk about last.
4. Write. Write your paragraph or essay from start to finish. Use your notes about your ideas and organization.
5. Review structure and content.  Check what you have written. Read you’re writing silently to yourself or loud, perhaps to a friend. Lock your places where you can add more information, and check to see if you have any unnecessary information. Ask a classmate to exchange text with you. Your classmate read your text, and you read his or hers. Getting a reader’s opinion is a good way to know if your writing is clear and effective. Learning to give opinions about other people’s writing helps you to improve your own. You may want to go on to step six now and revise the structure and content of your text before you proofread it.
6. Revise structure and content. Use your ideas from step five to rewrite your text, making improvements to the structure and content. You might need to explain something more clearly, or add more details. You may even need to change your organization so that your text is more logical. Together, steps five and six an be called editing.

• Proofread. Read text again. This time, check your spelling and grammar and think about the words you have chosen to use.
• Make final corrections. Check that you have corrected the errors you discovered in steps five and six and make any other changes you want to make. Now your text is finished!

Marketing strategy must reflect a coordinated effort of product performance and two-way communication. Within the communication process must be integration of marketing efforts and messages. Further, what is communicated about the product must be accurate, or the position won’t be supported. How can a company make certain that such integration occurs?
Several factors can encourage the appropriate level of integration within the marketing program. Clear strategic decisions, personnel stability, compensation systems that support the marketing strategy, and formal communication and organizational structures that encourage cross-functional interaction are among the more important.

Clear Strategic Decisions
In one study that examined mismatches between marketing and sales strategies, an issue that surfaced was a lack of decisiveness on the part of senior marketing executives. For example, two sales managers said that, although formal strategy indicated that a product would be on the market for the next few years, informal signals from marketing management indicated that the product might be withdrawn. As a result, the sales force was not putting any effort into those products. Sales and marketing strategies are neither immediate nor irreversible; if management waffles on strategic decisions, then marketing and sales investments could be wasted and relationships (both internal and external) damaged.

Personnel Stability
Relationships take time to build. As mentioned earlier, internal relationships go through the same stages as external relationships. Moving people rapidly through the organization can mean that relationships between areas of the marketing department are never built. One manager in one study reported three marketing executives in five years; one salesperson told us he had three different sales managers in one year! While each successive manager had to try to quickly build rapport with each subordinate and superior, the whole sales team suffered because new relationships had to be built between each new manager and all of the other functional areas. When rapid personnel turnover occurs, the relationship cannot get past the exploration stage.

Compensation
A key issue that creates ill will is the fact that different groups within marketing compete for the same budget. Fights over budgets can create bad feelings and damage relationships. Budgets, though, are not the only “money” issue that can damage or enhance relationships. Many companies are evaluating and testing compensation plans that encourage teamwork. For example, marketing managers may find that their pay contains incentives based on sales or contribution margins. When that is the case, they are incented to work more closely with the sales force. Morehead Supply is one company that pays quarterly bonuses to all marketing personnel if sales targets are achieved. Unlike profit sharing plans that the company also uses, these bonuses are specifically designed to encourage teamwork within the marketing–sales interface. Compensation can also help turn budgeting into teamwork. By using a joint compensation system, all of those competing for budget end up being paid based on the same performance. As a result, they are more determined than ever to see that the budget results in effective marketing. The issue, though, also affects how areas such as manufacturing, engineering, and other functional area bonuses are paid. When those areas are also compensated for customer satisfaction and teamwork, then those outcomes are more likely.

Organizational Structure
Compensation plans, though, should be supported by the appropriate organizational structure. The structure of the organization can enhance or inhibit the ability to create internal partnerships. In the next section, we discuss different types of organizational structures, as well as the different groups within marketing between whom partnerships are created.