As a math major, I depend on numbers, formulas, and measurements to perform my duties. As a college student I depend on computers and phones to e-mail projects, send messages, and even create this blog to have discussions with others on important topics. One day when I asked my friend in school to write down some notes on the news, I saw his handwriting and I couldn’t recognize a single word he wrote down. When I questioned his writing skills he told me, “I am a computer science major and thus I do not have to know how to write things down on a piece of paper.” The question of whether this was his opinion or some kind of thinking brought up by this profession is one of the major topics I’m trying to find out hear along with our forgotten ways.
After hearing that, I was shocked at the seemingly stupid remark and so I have to see this issue from his point of view. We live in a digital age when so much is done with computers and other technological innovations. In fact, some professionals say that we have ascended into the age of technology given our extensive use of electronics. You can ask anyone what an iPod or Tablet is without any problem, but if you show them an abacus or a slide rule they’ll give you a weird look and have no idea what those things are. Even common things like compasses can be found on a device in seconds while knowledge of the physical tools is slowly dying out. There was even a point where we used calculators and GPS’s so much that we can’t actually function without them. This leads to terrible consequences if we have an energy crisis or lose power in our electrical devices without being able to charge them for a long period of time.
Due to my intended profession, I have to see if other people in the mathematics field succumb to this kind of thinking. Before high school I was raised to avoid using calculators to use math problems because my family believed I would become far too dependent on it. By the time I was in high school I was required to use a calculator in my studies and ever since then, I (and I’m guessing many other people) find it harder to do certain math problems without the use of a calculator. But then when I went to college I discovered that there are websites and computer tools I can use for the more complex problems. Websites like www.wolframalpha.com allow people to type in a particular formula that could be too difficult or too long for people to find for themselves, which is qualitatively better. There is also the use of Microsoft excel, which allows me to use special formulas multiple times using each cell as the units, which is quantitatively better. It’s great to have these innovations for my profession, and yet I still feel like there are many people who are losing thier touch with certain basic math skills.
It’s important to know the difference between math and writing. As a math major, I deal with a lot of numbers and formulas which require special symbols and patterns. This is very different from writing because while someone rights words from left to right or some other pattern, math formulas can go left to right and top to bottom at the same time. This means that a paragraph can fill up 6 horizontal lines on top while a math problem takes up an entire quadrant of a page (imagine you fold a piece of paper horizontally and vertically and then you fill up one of those rectangles created). Another important difference is that writing paragraphs is just putting together words to make sentences and using those sentences to make a paragraph, while a math problem will involve taking pre-made formulas and plugging in numbers (like raw materials placed in a machine in a factory) in order to create a new answer. The point I’m trying to make here is that writing a story is just like taking puzzle pieces and making a work of art, while mathematics is like using the same templates over and over again to make a limitless number of solutions to help solve real world problems.
This not to say technology is bad for writers or that writing isn’t important to humanity and mathematicians. Without writing we wouldn’t have lectures, historical documents, scientific reports, amazing stories, and many more things. I’m just trying to point out that we have to remember the old ways of writing to protect ourselves from unexpected situations, and that my experience as a mathematician can change how I view the importance of writing and penmanship. How do you feel about writing given your particular profession?

When someone writes for their own profession, the general idea is to convince the company or organization they’re applying for that they are the person meant for the job. That means the person must provide information relative to the job as well as any special skills which make the individual seem well rounded and adaptable to various situations. However the more I think about it, writing for your profession is really just an indirect approach to something that many people fear to do. That being public speaking.

Public speaking requires many of the qualities needed for writing in your profession. For one thing both require a professional outline and format. When someone speaks in front of a professional crowd, they have to look presentable and speak in a very adult and professional dialect. If you present yourself like you got dressed at the last minute or use vulgar and inappropriate language, then the crowd won’t take you seriously and feel they have no reason to listen to your advice. The same goes for writing since using a sloppy font and format, inappropriate wording, and/or bad grammar would cause the reader to think what your saying is not important, or even not worth their time.

Another thing to point out is that both speaking and writing require you to stay focused on your topic and make it sound appealing. For instance, when you speak to the public about how to run a company, you should talk about what the company does, what tools and skills are needed to build up the company, and so forth. When writing to a company about becoming an engineer, you need to state your previous work experiences related to engineering, your basic skills relative to what an engineer does, your degrees in engineering, and so forth. Although a person can put some general information like leadership skills and contact information, getting off topic with things like a random sports update or your random likes and dislikes will confuse and loose the attention of the reader or listener.

It is true that writing for your profession is easier for people than public speaking. After all, writing doesn’t require face to face contact at first and its easy to edit what you write before publishing. Public speaking requires contact in front of several people and you need to make a good first impression without making mistakes. I just wanted to point out that both require a professional image, a strong focus/outlook, and determination to get your point across.

Everyone will eventually have to write a letter for whichever business practice they intend to pursue. However, there are several ways to tackle this issue. I was rereading some articles on how to write a letter to customers. Specifically, I am referring to the ones focusing on writing a negative message letter and using things like you attitude and positive emphasis. Despite the fact that each of these articles center around their own unique topic, all of those guides were centered on making the reader feel comfortable and convincing them that what you say is true. They are a way to convey ideas without sounding unprofessional, selfish, or mean spirited in any way.

It was at that point I realized that this kind of writing is very similar to how most advertisements are presented in magazines and other forms of media. The point of advertisements is to convince the consumer to buy whatever good or service they are selling is worth the cost. In other words, the one making the advertisement is telling the consumer what they need to do even if it isn’t essential. This is just like how we should write for our profession, except this time we tell the reader to believe in our thoughts and ideas even if the reader didn’t have an opinion or an idea of their own. Both advertisements and how we write for our profession are essentially meant to persuade others. The only real difference is advertisements use both images and writing to convey their message while writing for your profession is strictly written and far more professional. It’s almost as if advertisements are more childish while writing for your profession is more adult.

I’m not saying writing for your profession and advertising are one in the same. After all, each one is studied in a different academic field. What really matters is how each method is structured, and what kind of people are performing each task. Sometimes a person has to target their mission in a different way to deliver a unique outcome that will appeal to others.