Workplace texts: what do they tell us about the ways in which writing is used in small businesses?


Sue Grief Sue worked as a teacher, manager, development adviser and research manager in the field of adult literacy. She was involved in a number of research projects for the National Research and Development Centre for Adult Literacy and Numeracy (NRDC), including several that focused on writing. Now retired, Sue is undertaking a PhD at the Institute of Education, University of London.


The workshop focused on evidence that has been gathered as part of a small research project undertaken for a PhD. This took the form of examples of everyday texts from four small businesses and extracts from interviews with the writers. I was keen to know how the participants in the workshop would respond to the texts I am currently analysing; and, in turn, I hoped the participants would find them of interest in relation to their various roles as teachers, teacher trainers and researchers. In this article, as in the workshop, I will first provide some background to the project and attempt to give a flavour of the types of the texts in question and the contexts in which they are used. I will then summarise the observations we made on the roles the texts play in the workplace and the nature of the writing they include. There are a number of theoretical strands to the analysis of the data but this is still a work in progress and as space is limited I will not attempt a discussion of these here.


The research project arose from personal interest. Towards the end of my career I was involved in several research projects on the teaching of writing in adult literacy but became increasingly aware that I understood very little about the writing the students who I encountered, actually did at work. I sensed that what many of them were looking for, when they enrolled for classes, was success in the type of writing used in education, writing they felt they had not fully mastered at school. They seemed not to value the writing they undertook at work. My initial question was very open: 'How is writing used in small businesses?'


The project is based around case studies of four small businesses. These could be classed as micro-businesses as all have fewer than 10 employees. All are located in the same small town and were selected after initial interviews with personnel from 20 businesses of this type. In none does writing constitute the product of the work. They include a hairdressing salon, a florist's shop, an independent garage and a self-employed builder. I have approached writing in these case studies as a situated social practice and, although I cannot claim to have undertaken a full ethnographic study, my methods were guided by ethnographic principles. I used semi- structured interviews, observation, my own experience as a customer and detailed examination of texts. I have chosen not to approach the study from an educational perspective. I have positioned the people who work in these businesses as the experts in relation to their work, including the writing this involves, andIhave deliberately avoided any focus on literacy needs. At least three of the people I interviewed made reference to individual problems with different aspects of writing but, aside from light-hearted references to other people's handwriting, no one I interviewed thought writing was ever the cause of problems at work.


Two seemingly contradictory responses that I received, from almost all of the owners I interviewed, provide a starting point for understanding the role writing plays in businesses of this type. The first was to insist that the staff did very little writing, coupled with surprise that I should find their writing of interest; the second was to stress that writing was of real importance in their work.


One example that sheds light on these responses is the use of the florist's order. This is an A5 form, designed specifically for florists and obtained from a supplier. It is filled in, standing at the counter, as the person in the front of the shop speaks with the customer, face to face or on the phone. The writer uses simple phrases and


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