2. Social or Political Focus
• The term white paper was originally used to
describe a report that states the social or
political position of an organization.
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3. IT Marketing Focus
• Sometimes a white paper is a marketing
document aimed at selling a certain technology
or products.
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4. Technical or Research
White Papers
• At other times, a white paper presents the results
scientific research or findings from a usability test of a
product(s).
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5. White Papers Can Be
• Written for internal audiences – coworkers,
project managers, high-level decision makers.
OR
• Written for external audiences – clients or
customers.
• In both cases, document design is important.
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6. The Importance of Document Design
• Document design supports (or can work against) the
brand personality of a business or organization.
• Enforcing a consistent document design has traditionally
been done by giving employees style guides and having
editors make certain that the style is consistently
maintained.
• In today’s workplace, however, the volume and
complexity of documents means that traditional methods
are often very inefficient.
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7. Here’s an Example
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• This is a list of the literature that
Schweitzer Engineering
Laboratories (SEL) produces. Under
each menu item are often up to a
hundred or more documents.
• Because many different employees
will write this literature, SEL needs
to have a means of ensuring that
those documents will be consistent
in design, reflecting their brand, and
also a way of doing this efficiently.
• Structured authoring provides the
means of doing both.
8. Structured Authoring Technology
• When writers use structured authoring technology, they complete a
series of steps within a writing environment controlled by software
that enforces style rules and organizing patterns for sets of
documents.
• Writers must complete these steps by using the software before the
document can be published.
• What this means is that content can be easily separated and stored
in a database, and then used again when creating documents that
need similar language for sections or used in a way that allows
writers to easily repurpose prior writing.
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9. Adobe FrameMaker is a Popular Software
for Structured Authoring
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Most white papers are produced using structured
authoring. Let’s look at an example.
10. 10
Notice how tableau’s website and
white papers have a common look and
feel.
There is some variation in the pages of
these white papers, but the design and
structure is consistent.
11. These are examples of data sheets by
SEL. These sheets describe the
features and benefits of the products.
Notice they have a consistent look and
feel that supports the brand.
12. In this project,
• You will not be using structured authoring technology,
but you will be able to practice structured authoring
conceptually.
• I’ll provide a rule for the structure of your white paper
that you should follow.
• The design, however, will be your choice.
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13. The Structure Rule is Based on IMRaD
IMRaD stands for:
– Introduction
– Methods
– Results
and
– Discussion
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This is a common structure for
presenting the results of research, and it
evolved out of the need to separate:
• Methods: how the research was done.
• Results: what the research found.
• Discussion: what the findings mean.
Using this structure allows readers to
decide the validity of methods, findings,
and interpretation. For example, the
methods may be valid but the
interpretation is questionable etc.
14. Structure Rule:
Use Either IMRaD or Modified IMRaD Structure
• Title Page
• Executive Summary
• Table of Contents
• Introduction
• Methods
• Results/Discussion
• Conclusion and/or
Recommendations
• Bibliography
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These major headings need to be in your paper.
You may modify the IMRaD structure to put
results and discussion together or separate
them if that works best for your content.
You will also need a clear conclusion and/or
recommendations and a works cited or
bibliography page.
As you work on the document design,
remember to apply those principles you
learned about graphic design.
15. Title Page: Poor Design Choices
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Color choices and
design elements
convey meaning.
Clearly, these are not
the best rhetorical
design choices.
16. Title Page: Improved Design Choices
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These rhetorical
design choices match
the purpose of the
white paper.
When designing your
title page, be certain
the design supports
your purpose.
17. Word: Title Page Tip
• If you change the background color of the title page (or
any page) in Word, that background color will be in all
pages.
• To avoid that problem, use a text box, and stretch it the
width and length of your cover page.
• NOTE: there are other solutions to that problem.
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19. Focus on Audience and Purpose
• Keep the hypothetical writing situation in mind to help
you focus on audience and purpose as you write:
– You work for Kirchmeier Industries, and you’ve been tasked with
doing this specific research about the UI’s change in athletic
conference to act as a model for other schools interested in
doing the same thing.
– The purpose of your white paper is to present the findings from
your research about the specific crisis communication event to
PR professionals.
– These readers will visit your company’s website to download and
read the final draft of this white paper.
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20. Writing the Executive Summary
• Executive Summaries (ES) evolved out of the need to
provide high-level decision makers with a summary of a
larger document.
• An ES is read by the decision maker as preparation for
meetings and/or other presentations that will be given to
help him/her make decisions.
• An ES today can be aimed at reaching key readers
outside the organization. Your white paper will be aimed
at reaching readers interested in research about crisis
communication.
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21. Writing Your Executive Summary
• It’s necessary to write the ES last, as information from
each section of your white paper should be included in
the ES.
• Use these tips to write an effective ES:
– Take time to write it.
– Avoid pulling out excerpts and tacking these together.
– An ES that is written for a research-based white paper will need
to present what you did, why, how, and key findings.
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22. Table of Contents
• The purpose of a TOC is to help readers find information
quickly by going to the page it’s on.
• It’s a good idea to learn how to create an automatic table
of contents, but you may use a manual method.
• To create a table of contents manually, you need to
create a tab and use the dot leaders function. If you
don’t know how to do this, try looking online for tutorials.
• A TOC should be balanced on the page. Look at a few to
get an idea of how it should look.
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23. Writing the Introduction
• You can make one of several rhetorical moves
for the introduction.
• You could start with a short summary of the
crisis event and then lead your reader to the
purpose of your white paper or you could do this
in reverse.
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24. Example 1: Starting with purpose statement.
This white paper presents research findings from an analysis of the
crisis event and communication surrounding it that significantly
damaged Paula Deen’s brand in 2013.
Background
On May 17, 2013, Paula Deen and her brother were sued by their
former restaurant manager, Lisa Jackson, for 1.2 million. Jackson
claimed that the Deen’s tolerated a racist workplace environment and
made racist comments themselves.
Although a judge ruled in favor of the Deen’s, what Paula Deen said
during a deposition triggers a crisis event that significantly damaged
her brand in just a little over a week.
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25. Example 2: Starting with the background.
Background
On May 17, 2013, Paula Deen and her brother were sued by
their former restaurant manager, Lisa Jackson, for 1.2 million.
Jackson claimed that the Deen’s tolerated a racist workplace
environment and made racist comments themselves.
Although a judge ruled in favor of the Deen’s, what Paula Deen
said during a deposition triggers a crisis event that significantly
damaged her brand in just a little over a week.
Purpose
This white paper presents the findings from analyzing this crisis
event and the communication surrounding it.
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26. The introduction should also include:
• The specific objectives of your research.
This means what your goals were—what
you hoped to find and why you wanted to
find these things.
• Think of putting the objectives into a
bulleted or numbered list.
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27. Example of Objectives
Objectives
Specifically, the research objectives included
investigating the following:
• how prior scandals involving Deen influenced public
perceptions about this crisis,
• how the media reported and influenced perceptions
about the crisis,
• how Deen and her employer, Food Network, responded
to the crisis.
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28. Methods
After the introduction, you will need to describe
your research methodology.
Include the types crisis communication data you
gathered, the organizing principle (framework) you
applied using one or more of the scholarly articles
posted on BbLearn, etc.
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29. Example
Methods
Communication data was gathered from popular digital sources
and included excerpts from articles about the crisis found in
online news sources as well as samples of public comments
from readers.
The data was organized according to three phases of crisis
communication as described by Tulika Varma in [article title] and
David Wahlberg in [article title]
Phase 1: Denial
Phase 2: Minimize Effects
Phase 3: Resolution
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30. Results/Discussion
• How you write the results will depend on the organizing
strategy you chose based on one or more of the
scholarly articles.
• In the case we’ve been working with, the writer would
organize and present the findings using the three phases
identified in the methodology section.
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31. So, first-level headings under results might be:
• Phase 1: Denial
• Phase 2: Minimize Effects
• Phase 3: Resolution
A more complete definition of each phase would be useful to readers.
Next, the writer would want to logically order the findings under each
corresponding phase, use subheadings, and interpret the significance
of the findings for readers. Including some supporting graphics would
be useful as well.
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32. Another possible choice for this writer is to add dates to the
phases.
May 13 to June 20, 2013
Phase 1: Denial
June 21 to June 25, 2013
Phase 2: Minimize Effects
June 26, 2013 to February 28, 2014
Phase 2: Resolution
Notice how this choice would help the writer make the point that the
crisis occurs over a few days but is not resolved for months. is
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33. Graphic
• You will need to include at least one graphic that
represents a finding(s) from the data.
• See the lecture: Graphically Representing Data for more
information about types of graphics and how to choose
one appropriate to your findings.
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34. Conclusions and/or Recommendations
• How you conclude your white paper will depend on
where the findings lead you.
• You should write a conclusion that includes
recommendations for what the PR professionals can
recommend to their future clients based on your findings.
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35. Works Cited or Bibliography
• It’s important that you cite sources in your white
paper.
• Use any standard documentation style and refer
to the lecture on Citing Sources for help.
• The last page will be a Works Cited or
Bibliography depending on the documentation
style you use.
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