A major component of any type of writing, professional or non-professional, is understanding who the audience is. Specifically who is the writing being directed to and who is intended to be the main consumer of it. In writing for engineering, it is essential to understand who the audience of the writing is. By researching and analyzing, you are able to determine certain aspects of your intended audience, such as education level, culture, language, location and many more. These all factor into the tone and language of the writing. This information that is gained, can then be filled out into an audience analysis sheet, which breaks down the selected audience into many aspects which help to reference while writing. 

An example of this was selecting Vatthana Mendez, the Facilities Planning Director at CCNY as the audience for my memo. This memo’s goal was to inform and persuade the audience to improve the labeling and signage around the campus to be better understood. It wouldn’t make sense to direct this type of issue towards the president of CCNY, Vincent Boudreau, as this is a rather minor detail. For this reason I chose to direct it towards facilities management, an audience who this would be of concern to.

Audience Analysis Sheet:

Reader’s Name:  Vatthana Mendez

Reader’s Job Title:  Facilities Planning Director of CCNY

Education:  College Education

Professional Experience: Staff coordination and building planning

Job Responsibilities:  Plan projects and maintenance to facilities

Personal Characteristics: Leader

Cultural Characteristics:  Coordinative

Attitude Toward the Writer:  Open minded

Attitude Toward the Subject:  Interested

Expectations About the Document:  Be presented a problem about the campus from a student.

Reasons for Reading the Document:  To study the document

Reading Skills: Fluent in the english language, college level

Reader’s Physical Environment:  Leadership role in his office and meetings.