[b]The following appeared in a report presented for discussion at a meeting of the directors of a company that manufactures parts for heavy machinery:
“The falling revenues that the company is experiencing coincide with delays in manufacturing. These delays, in turn, are due in large part to poor planning in purchasing metals. Consider further that the manager of the department that handles purchasing of raw materials has an excellent background in general business, psychology, and sociology, but knows little about the properties of metals. The company should, therefore, move the purchasing manager to the sales department and bring in a scientist from the research division to be manager of the purchasing department.”[/b]
Discuss how well reasoned you find this argument. In your discussion be sure to analyze the line of reasoning and the use of evidence in the argument. For example, you may need to consider what questionable assumptions underlie the thinking and what alternative explanations or counterexamples might weaken the conclusion. You can also discuss what sort of evidence would strengthen or refute the argument, what changes in the argument would make it more logically sound, and what, if anything, would help you better evaluate its conclusion
The report mentions that the primary reason that company revenue has declined is manager of department. Because he does not have enough knowledge about metal properties and it causes that company cannot gain its required metal on time, and finally delivery time decreases gradually and it this way revenue has fallen. Though this argument seems reasonable, nevertheless it has some serious flaws in its premises and its assumption. So, I cannot accept this report as valid.
Primary, this argument lies on unsubstantiated premises. We cannot neglect this truth that delay in manufacturing disrupts revenue, but we cannot attribute whole the issue to this problem. The directors did not notice to other possibility like bad economic condition, advent of strong competitors in heavy machinery market and so on. Each of these possibilities can change the sale ratio of the company and finally decrease the revenue of the company.
Secondly, the report does not give any information that how they know delay in manufacturing is related to metal purchasing. Maybe production management or sale department does not work well. For instance, if they cannot deliver products to their customers in appropriate time, customers may think production encounter to delay, however in this hypothesis the major culprit is sell department.
In addition, this argument is based on unproven assumptions. The directors assume that the scientist from research division knows more about metal properties. They do not give adequate information that someone that wants to be manager of production department knows more about metal properties.
Although this report has some flaws in its premises and assumptions, we cannot say this argument is totally without base. If the directors of the company give additional information to clarify why they attribute delay only to poor metal purchasing and not to other possibilities, it can persuade readers better. Also, they should give intellectual reasons why they have considered falling in revenue only to delay in manufacturing and again neglected others possibilities. Furthermore, the directors should explain the abilities of new manager and his knowledge in metal properties to convince people who read this report.
In sum, this report is created based on unproven premises and unsubstantiated assumption. At the present it cannot convince its readers. The author should restructure it and give some adequate information, Provide more examples and look at the subject with more precisely.
TOEFL listening discussions: Why does the young man have grapes for lunch?