My main goal of this internship is to find out what skills professional writers most use at their every day job. One skill I rarely consider but is a major component of a writer's daily activities is communicating with others. I went to a meeting with my boss and was surprised at the level of communication employed. Coworkers have to present their work to each other and express opinions about each other's work.
How often have I, as a student, communicated my work to my classmates? How well can I present myself to others? In PWE classes, we peer review each other often, but these activities usually involve filling out a form with prompts from the professor and giving the form to the owner of the text. Writing to someone about their work and telling them about their work are two very different actions. I'm glad that I have learned how the difference between these two professional actions and hope to work on expressing my ideas to others.
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Very interesting stuff here, Jennifer. You've certainly highlighted an important skill that must be part of the professional writer's repertoire. (You might remember that it was part of the "communication skills" that most employers are looking for that we read about a few weeks ago). I'd love to hear a more thorough description of the meeting you participated in. What specific types of strategies would coworkers employing as they expressed their opinions about each other's work? What constituted "effective" and/or "ineffective" communication within that meeting?
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