- UID
- 860304
- 在线时间
- 小时
- 注册时间
- 2013-2-25
- 最后登录
- 1970-1-1
- 主题
- 帖子
- 性别
- 保密
|
69. The following appeared in amemo from a vice president of a large, highly diversified company.
"Ten years ago our company had two new officebuildings constructed as regional headquarters for two regions. The buildingswere erected by different construction companies—Alpha and Zeta. Although thetwo buildings had identical floor plans, the building constructed by Zeta cost30 percent more to build. However, that building's expenses for maintenancelast year were only half those of Alpha's. In addition, the energy consumptionof the Zeta building has been lower than that of the Alpha building every yearsince its construction. Given these data, plus the fact that Zeta has a stableworkforce with little employee turnover, we recommend using Zeta rather thanAlpha for our new building project, even though Alpha's bid promises lowerconstruction costs."
Write a response in which you discuss whatquestions would need to be answered in order to decide whether therecommendation and the argument on which it is based are reasonable. Be sure toexplain how the answers to these questions would help to evaluate therecommendation.
In this argument, the author recommendsusing Zeta rather than Alpha for their new building project. To testify thisargument, the author points out that according to identical floor plans, thebuilding's expenses for maintenance last year were only half those of Alpha'sand energy consumption of the Zeta building has been lower than that of theAlpha. The author also reasons that Zeta has a stable workforce with littleemployee turnover.
Firstly, does the building's expenses formaintenance for only one year represent all the maintenances forever? This isnot the case. It is entirely possible that little offices are used last year inZeta and maybe the extra cost of Zeta at first is due to its carelessness orirresponsibility. To better support his contention, the author assumes that theenergy consumption definitely shows a better quality of the building. Yetpeople working or living in this building Zera built might have a notion toprotect the environment by saving the energy which makes the energy consumptionfewer, not the function of this building. Without considering and ruling outother explanations readily answering this question cannot the author convincesme.
Secondly, is a stable workforce with littleemployee turnover equal to a good quality of the buildings it established? Thisonly shows that the workforce is loyal to their employers to some extent. Maybethe remained workers are not very diligent when doing their own work or theyare not creative to design multifunctional buildings, likeenvironmental-friendly. Or perhaps the reason for them to stay is that thiscompany won't resign any employees at all.
Eventually, the author assumes that thereare no alternatives with these two companies , which poses a doubt. It islikely that there are many building companies for the author to choose from.And the author can compare these companies more carefully to make an accurateoption. Even if only 2 companies are existed, it doesn't follow that Zeta havethe capability to build all types of buildings. The author neglects that theAlpha may be able to build a better one and the ability of Zeta to build abuilding might have changed during the past ten years.
In sum, there are some specific questionsneeding clarifying to support this argument. The author has to provide moreevidence that the building's expenses for maintenance of Zeta are always lowerthan that of Alpha and the fewer energy consumption of Zeta is really owing tothe function of buildings and the number of all competitors in this market. Weshould also need to know about the ability of Zeta's workforce. To betterassess this argument, we would need to be offered more information aboutwhether the ability of Zeta has remained unchanged or not and if it is anall-round company. |
|
京公网安备11010202008513号 京ICP证101109号 京ICP备12012021号
发表于 2013-3-21 16:34:22
收藏
收藏
楼主
