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ACCA Applied Knowledge · Business and Technology · Communicating in business

A manager sends a long, technical email to a team about a change in reporting deadlines. Several staff later miss the new deadline, saying they did not realise action was needed. Which weakness of written communication is MOST clearly illustrated?

The weakness illustrated is that there is no guarantee the written message was read and understood, and feedback is delayed. The manager could not tell that staff missed the need for action. Written messages can be stored and need no specialist equipment.

  1. AThere is no guarantee the message has been read and understood, and feedback is delayedCorrect
  2. BWritten messages cannot be stored for later reference
  3. CWritten messages always require specialist equipment to produce

Explanation

A well-known drawback of written communication is that the sender cannot be sure the recipient has read or understood it, and feedback is slow. Written messages can in fact be stored, so the second option is wrong. Specialist equipment is not required for most written messages.

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