▶ Your Answer :
In this memo, the author claims that his company should use Zeta rather than Alpha for the company’s new building project. However, there are many unanswered questions in his argument, rendering it unconvincing.
Firstly, it is questionable whether the two places where Alpha and Zeta built have identical condition. The author mentioned that those buildings were built in two regions. The difference of the two regions’ surrounding could explain the expenses for the maintenance and the energy consumption. If the location of the building that Alpha built has extremely cold weather, it would require much more energy to make the places warm than those have mild weather. Even if the two regions have similar weather, there could be other reasons for the different amount of energy consumption. Those buildings may have different purpose, for example. The building that Alpha built could consume energy twice because the purpose of the building requires a lot of electricity. Or it could be considered aberration because the author provided only last year’s statistics. Without an answer to this question, the recommendation cannot be fully evaluated.
The second question the author needs to answer is whether Zeta is more suitable for the new building project. To begin with, even though the building constructed by Zeta cost 30 percent more, it does not indicate that the building that Zeta built is better. Additionally, stable workforce of Zeta does not make Zeta better candidate for the new building. If Zeta provides stable workforce along with insignificant improvement on the construction skills, it would be disadvantageous rather than advantageous. Answers to this question would help evaluate the author’s recommendation with more accuracy.
The third question which would need to be answered is whether it is good specimen to compare the companies with 10 year-old buildings. As time passes, everything could have been changed such as technology. While pursuing better construction company for the new building project, it would be much better to choose the one accepted the innovative technology. It is possible that Zeta does not and Alpha does. To evaluate the author’s argument accurately, he needs to answer this question.
Lastly, it must be answered why the author thinks that last year’s energy consumption as the generalized information. Only with last year’s statistics, the author cannot generalize every building of both of the companies. Last year could be aberration due to special circumstances. If the building that Zeta built needs to be remodeled and the employees were relocated, the build would be empty and only construction crews would consume energy. In this case, the author’s conclusion would have little credibility.
In summary, the author’s argument is logically unsubstantiated as it stands. In order to help us evaluate the argument better, the author must answer all of the above questions with more thorough explanations. |