The Pennsylvania State University

ENGLISH 202C: Technical Writing

MEMORANDUM

To: J onathan Lehtonen, Instructor
From: Gaukhar Balkassynova, Student
Subject: Usability Evaluation of Guide: Fundamentals of a Workplace First-Aid Program
Date: J anuary 24, 2014

The purpose of this memo is to assess the applicability of the Best Practices Guide:
Fundamentals of a Workplace First-Aid Program by U.S. Department of Labor Occupational
Safety and Health Administration, which was published in 2006. Namely, the document needed
to be carefully reviewed and examined to draw accurate conclusions on its usability by the
intended audience.

Summary
The guide meets all the requirements of an appropriate, practical document. It speaks to the
anticipatorily projected audience consisting of parties interested in safe and healthy workplace
environment. It also assists them with certain tasks related to the subject matter. Along with
being collaboratively produced by US Department of Labors Occupational Safety and Health
Administration team, the guide distinctively mirrors the OSHAs goals and culture. Moreover,
the document is well structured and organized in terms of graphics and formatting. For more
detailed evaluation please proceed to the following part of this memo.

Discussion
It can be concluded that the guide corresponds to the characteristics of an advanced technical
communication document, and can be easily used by the audience it is targeted for. The guide
certainly addresses particular group of people and helps them resolve the problems associated
with their topic of interest. The following paragraph discusses where exactly in the document
reader can see who the addressee of the information is.

Introduction and Purpose Analysis
According to the document, the projected audience of the guide is employers, which aim to
provide healthy and safe environment for their employees. It also includes an outline of the
essential elements of safe and effective first-aid training for the workplace as guidance to
institutions teaching first-aid courses and to the consumers of these courses. The purpose of the
document explicitly stated and kept repeated throughout the whole paper. For instance,
Elements of a First-Aid Training Program paragraph, restates the purpose of the guide again. It
helps the user to be always concentrated on the issue being solved and goals being pursued in the
context of occupational injuries, illnesses and ways of avoiding them. Potential users of the guide
might be trying to solve the problems associated with the workers safety in private industries.
Guide provides some data on occupational illness and injuries that can sometimes lead to fatal
endings, such as death, permanent disability or prolonged recovery. It proves the reader that
those are highly undesirable consequences for the employers, not only in ethical, but also in
financial context, thereby underlining the importance of the given documents purpose. Further,
the document literally guides the reader through the document clarifying each statement and
explaining how correctly to make use of it.

Credibility analysis of the document
In addition to descriptively explaining each step needed to be taken in order to reach the ultimate
goal, this document successfully integrates the requirements of U.S. Department of Labor
Occupational Safety and Health Administration. Thereafter this guide accurately mirrors
OSHAs goals and culture, even taking for it whole unit denominated OSHA Requirements. In
the textbook, Markel also discusses the importance of collaboration involved in production of
documents, which are aimed to technically communicate. All the references listed in the
bibliography, and mentioned throughout the document shows that the document undoubtedly
was produced collaboratively.

Organization and Readability Evaluation
Although the guide includes some complex and sophisticated information, competent data
organization makes it easy to follow the concepts. First of all, the guide is divided into several
separate parts according to the content and purpose of the information being provided. There are
sixteen of such unit-parts, mostly consisting of no more than three to four paragraphs. The
lengths of the paragraphs are no more than three to four sentences. Moreover, bullet points are
made in relation to the data delivered. For instance, one of the passages entirely consists of bullet
points, showing that all information being said is extremely important and requires more
attention. The language of the document is though simple (easy to understand), concise, and
not ambiguous. Some visual graphics from external resources are also provided to support the
particular facts stated in the document.

Recommendation
With all the above being said, the Best Practices Guide: Fundamentals of a Workplace First-Aid
Program by U.S. Department of Labor Occupational Safety and Health Administration is
considered to be one of the best examples of competent technical communication document. It
accomplishes its goal, providing understandable, easy-usable guidance for employers and other
parties interested in providing safe and accident-free workplace environment.