The following is from a recent email from the Diord Corp. Human Resources Manager:
“Tobor Technologies found that mental health problems and mental illness were responsible for about 15 percent of employee sick days. Tobor amended its employee insurance plan so that workers receive the same coverage for mental illness as they do for physical illness. In addition, the company hired an on-site psychologist and created a system that allows workers to schedule confidential counseling appointments. After one year, the number of sick days used by employees declined by 10 percent. Diord Corp. has had an increase in employee sick days over the past two years, so we should introduce a similar insurance plan and counseling program. These measures will surely reduce employee absenteeism and cause an increase in productivity.”
Write a response in which you examine the argument’s unstated assumptions, making sure to explain how the argument depends on the assumptions and what the implications are if the assumptions prove unwarranted.
Tobor Technologies has added some prudent and generous support for their employees in an effort to improve employee attendance. Although their efforts appear to have been rewarded, there are missing links between decreased employee mental health and absenteeism in general. Diord Corp espouses this fallacious logic and compounds it by assuming conditions at Diord are the same as Tobor. Lastly, no substantial proof has been offered definitively connecting an employee’s presence in the office with actual increase in productivity. Of any of the above mentioned assumptions are false, Diord could be making a poor investment in their company.
Mental health is cited to be the reason for 15% of employee sick days. One year later, a decline in sickdays is presumed to be a result of increased mental health support at Tobor. However, several other causes may have created this change. Physical rather than mental illness may have declined, given that there is no delineation between the two in the second year of the study. Additionally, a placebo effect of sorts may have occurred: respondents may have changed behavior simply as a result of being studied, than than for any true benefit from increased mental health days or counseling opportunities.
Secondarily, there is no substantiation of the assumption that Tobor Tech’s working conditions and causes for absenteeism are the same at Diord Corp. If mental health does not contribute to absenteeism to the same degree as Tobor Tech, then implementing similar insurance and counseling may be unnecessary. For example, Diord may already have a work-from-home option which decreases mental health impacts on work. Absenteeism may have different a different definition if employees are in sales and traveling for work, thus with more flexibility to seek counseling outside the office. Such factors need to be investigated before Diord adopt’s Tobor’s approach.
Lastly, although employees are present in the office more than the year prior, it is presumptuous that this equates to increased productivity. If the company is in sales, perhaps sales’ figures are a more appropriate point of comparison. If Tobor Tech is performing equipment repair, how many devices are repaired per month? Such considerations should be taken in line with actual staff attendance.
Diord Corp Human Resources has begun their investigation into possible methods for improving employee attendance and productivity. However, a more substantial dossier is needed before the company should take any action. It may not be possible to generalize Tobor’s results to Diord. Ultimately, correlation may not be causation for all implementing insurance modifications and counseling support.
Comments
Essay evaluation report
Attribute Value Ideal
Final score: 4.0 out of 6
Category: Good Excellent
No. of Grammatical Errors: 0 2
No. of Spelling Errors: 0 2
No. of Sentences: 22 15
No. of Words: 419 350
No. of Characters: 2246 1500
No. of Different Words: 218 200
Fourth Root of Number of Words: 4.524 4.7
Average Word Length: 5.36 4.6
Word Length SD: 2.954 2.4
No. of Words greater than 5 chars: 176 100
No. of Words greater than 6 chars: 133 80
No. of Words greater than 7 chars: 91 40
No. of Words greater than 8 chars: 69 20
Use of Passive Voice (%): 0 0
Avg. Sentence Length: 19.045 21.0
Sentence Length SD: 8.375 7.5
Use of Discourse Markers (%): 0.636 0.12
Sentence-Text Coherence: 0.292 0.35
Sentence-Para Coherence: 0.511 0.50
Sentence-Sentence Coherence: 0.053 0.07
Number of Paragraphs: 5 5
Grammar and spelling errors:
Line 1, column 543, Rule ID: OF_ANY_OF[1]
Message: Consider simply using 'of' instead.
Suggestion: Of
... with actual increase in productivity. Of any of the above mentioned assumptions are fal...
^^^^^^^^^
Line 1, column 654, Rule ID: WHITESPACE_RULE
Message: Possible typo: you repeated a whitespace
Suggestion:
...ing a poor investment in their company. Mental health is cited to be the reason ...
^^^^^^^
Line 5, column 519, Rule ID: ENGLISH_WORD_REPEAT_RULE
Message: Possible typo: you repeated a word
Suggestion: than
...or simply as a result of being studied, than than for any true benefit from increased men...
^^^^^^^^^
Line 9, column 155, Rule ID: WHITESPACE_RULE
Message: Possible typo: you repeated a whitespace
Suggestion:
... absenteeism are the same at Diord Corp. If mental health does not contribute to ...
^^
Line 9, column 680, Rule ID: WHITESPACE_RULE
Message: Possible typo: you repeated a whitespace
Suggestion:
...ord adopt's Tobor's approach. Lastly, although employees are present i...
^^^^^^^
Line 17, column 406, Rule ID: WHITESPACE_RULE
Message: Possible typo: you repeated a whitespace
Suggestion:
...e modifications and counseling support.
^^^^
Transition Words or Phrases used:
but, however, if, lastly, may, second, so, then, thus, as to, for example, in general, as a result
Attributes: Values AverageValues Percentages(Values/AverageValues)% => Comments
Performance on Part of Speech:
To be verbs : 27.0 19.6327345309 138% => OK
Auxiliary verbs: 13.0 12.9520958084 100% => OK
Conjunction : 9.0 11.1786427146 81% => OK
Relative clauses : 4.0 13.6137724551 29% => More relative clauses wanted.
Pronoun: 13.0 28.8173652695 45% => OK
Preposition: 48.0 55.5748502994 86% => OK
Nominalization: 15.0 16.3942115768 91% => OK
Performance on vocabulary words:
No of characters: 2346.0 2260.96107784 104% => OK
No of words: 419.0 441.139720559 95% => More content wanted.
Chars per words: 5.59904534606 5.12650576532 109% => OK
Fourth root words length: 4.52432199235 4.56307096286 99% => OK
Word Length SD: 3.12822557541 2.78398813304 112% => OK
Unique words: 222.0 204.123752495 109% => OK
Unique words percentage: 0.529832935561 0.468620217663 113% => OK
syllable_count: 720.9 705.55239521 102% => OK
avg_syllables_per_word: 1.7 1.59920159681 106% => OK
A sentence (or a clause, phrase) starts by:
Pronoun: 2.0 4.96107784431 40% => OK
Article: 3.0 8.76447105788 34% => OK
Subordination: 6.0 2.70958083832 221% => Less adverbial clause wanted.
Conjunction: 0.0 1.67365269461 0% => OK
Preposition: 1.0 4.22255489022 24% => More preposition wanted as sentence beginning.
Performance on sentences:
How many sentences: 23.0 19.7664670659 116% => OK
Sentence length: 18.0 22.8473053892 79% => The Avg. Sentence Length is relatively short.
Sentence length SD: 38.5819041395 57.8364921388 67% => OK
Chars per sentence: 102.0 119.503703932 85% => OK
Words per sentence: 18.2173913043 23.324526521 78% => OK
Discourse Markers: 4.26086956522 5.70786347227 75% => OK
Paragraphs: 5.0 5.15768463074 97% => OK
Language errors: 6.0 5.25449101796 114% => OK
Sentences with positive sentiment : 11.0 8.20758483034 134% => OK
Sentences with negative sentiment : 4.0 6.88822355289 58% => More negative sentences wanted.
Sentences with neutral sentiment: 8.0 4.67664670659 171% => OK
What are sentences with positive/Negative/neutral sentiment?
Coherence and Cohesion:
Essay topic to essay body coherence: 0.300956106174 0.218282227539 138% => OK
Sentence topic coherence: 0.0923503958324 0.0743258471296 124% => OK
Sentence topic coherence SD: 0.0703198312613 0.0701772020484 100% => OK
Paragraph topic coherence: 0.170226415535 0.128457276422 133% => OK
Paragraph topic coherence SD: 0.0586711425602 0.0628817314937 93% => OK
Essay readability:
automated_readability_index: 14.1 14.3799401198 98% => OK
flesch_reading_ease: 44.75 48.3550499002 93% => OK
smog_index: 8.8 7.1628742515 123% => OK
flesch_kincaid_grade: 11.5 12.197005988 94% => OK
coleman_liau_index: 15.2 12.5979740519 121% => OK
dale_chall_readability_score: 9.13 8.32208582834 110% => OK
difficult_words: 122.0 98.500998004 124% => OK
linsear_write_formula: 10.5 12.3882235529 85% => OK
gunning_fog: 9.2 11.1389221557 83% => OK
text_standard: 9.0 11.9071856287 76% => OK
What are above readability scores?
---------------------
Rates: 83.33 out of 100
Scores by essay e-grader: 5.0 Out of 6
---------------------
Note: the e-grader does NOT examine the meaning of words and ideas. VIP users will receive further evaluations by advanced module of e-grader and human graders.