Assignment 3 Progress Report
Assignment 3 Progress Report
Assignment 3 Progress Report
Due: Thursday, November 8, 2012 A progress report provides information about the status of an ongoing project or activity that must be monitored to ensure successful completion within a specified period. Searles Description The progress report is your way to keep supervisors in the know regarding your long-term projects. For this assignment, you are to write 3-4 page memo to a real person in the company you are working with (again, you do not have to actually send the report to her/him). The progress report should include the following information: 1. 2. 3. Brief background of the project Specific and detailed accomplishments so far Where you had projected youd be and where you are with respect to project completion first articulated in your proposal. (Here you should be very sure to include explanations for delays or what contributed to on-task completion.) What problems occurred and what did you do to address the problems\ Important decisions you made about the project this week a. Did you change your approach? Why? b. Did you reduce the scope or ambitiousness of your project? Why? c. Did your collaborators shift responsibilities? Why? d. Any other decisions that impact the completion or nature of the project? e. Plans for project completion
4. 5.
Notes and Cautions: Sometimes our projects fall behind for legitimate reasons. Bostons Big Dig project is years behind schedule and millions of dollars over budget, for example. And though we can argue whether these delays are legitimate, the point is that sometimes things do not go according to plan. You task in this assignment is to be clear and direct with where the project is and where it is heading and provide persuasive and concrete explanations for why that is. Clear, mature, and professional communication with detailed explanations are key. It does not help to write Everything is going according to plan if your project is 2 weeks behind. Your bosses, project managers, and instructors can intervene and help if they need to make sure the project gets back on schedule. If a project is falling behind because of collaboration issues or because a team member is not doing his or her job, you need to write about that professionally and then provide ways to account for that that are convincing to your supervisors. Reflective Paper A Reflective paper of between 300 and 600 words will be turned within 24 hours after the assignment is due. The reflective paper will have two components, one major and one minor; Major Component: You will reflect on how the language, formatting, genre conventions and cultural importance of these documents through the lens of any of the theoretical texts we have read this semester (Slaughter, Lewis, Albini, or Anyon). Minor Component: Choose one Style or Grammar component covered in the Williams Style book and explain how you were particularly attentive to it in your work.