User:Missmj18/Evaluate an Article

Evaluate an article
This is where you will complete your article evaluation. Please use the template below to evaluate your selected article.


 * Name of article: Organizational Communication
 * Briefly describe why you have chosen this article to evaluate.

I chose to evaluate the organizational communication article because this is an area that I believe is closely intertwined with and key to positive leadership.

Lead

 * Guiding questions


 * Does the Lead include an introductory sentence that concisely and clearly describes the article's topic?
 * Does the Lead include a brief description of the article's major sections?
 * Does the Lead include information that is not present in the article?
 * Is the Lead concise or is it overly detailed?

Lead evaluation
The lead for this article should be far more robust. The first sentence is essentially a broad definition of organizational communication. The lead also contains one reference to section 5, but does not do anything to introduce the topic or set the stage for the article or the sections of the article. A solid executive summary for a lead is needed, but probably difficult to achieve until the article takes shape a little more.

Content

 * Guiding questions


 * Is the article's content relevant to the topic?
 * Is the content up-to-date?
 * Is there content that is missing or content that does not belong?

Content evaluation
The topic of organizational communication is broad and this article already contains a lot of information. However, there are some areas such as channels, media/social media and even artifacts and culture that are either not addressed or glossed over briefly that could be included or enhanced in this article.

Much of the information presented early in the article is historical and remains relevant and up to date regardless of time passage.

Tone and Balance

 * Guiding questions


 * Is the article neutral?
 * Are there any claims that appear heavily biased toward a particular position?
 * Are there viewpoints that are overrepresented, or underrepresented?
 * Does the article attempt to persuade the reader in favor of one position or away from another?

Tone and balance evaluation
As mentioned above, there are some things that could help to make this article more robust. The omission of information does not necessarily indicate bias, as it appears that in most cases this article is more incomplete than biased in my assessment.

The final section, current research topics, feels quite biased. There are not citations at all for this entire section aside from two links to referenced topics. I do not feel confident, based on the information presented that this section is representative of current research outside of the author's primary circle based on the information presented.

As a whole, I feel that this article lacks the cohesion of a single voice. It feels like a group project in which each person wrote their section independently and pasted them all into the same paper and turned them without editing.

Sources and References

 * Guiding questions


 * Are all facts in the article backed up by a reliable secondary source of information?
 * Are the sources thorough - i.e. Do they reflect the available literature on the topic?
 * Are the sources current?
 * Check a few links. Do they work?

Sources and references evaluation
The organizational communication article is lacking in the area of sources and references. There are large sections of information that are not attributed to sources, particularly the first section of the Early underlying assumptions in which the main assumptions of early organizational communication are laid out.

There are a variety of sources cited in the article, though this could be cleaned up a bit. Not only does the article appear to be lacking some sources with content, but there is an identical citation listed six times that could be consolidated and reused.

The links in the article are in working order, but the article could benefit from another review of this as several authors and scholars cited in the article are linked while others are not. Pages for these individuals may be newer, but should be linked nonetheless.

Organization

 * Guiding questions


 * Is the article well-written - i.e. Is it concise, clear, and easy to read?
 * Does the article have any grammatical or spelling errors?
 * Is the article well-organized - i.e. broken down into sections that reflect the major points of the topic?

Organization evaluation
Throughout the article, there are some grammatical issues including punctuation and sentence structure, such as ending sentences with prepositions. There are also places where sentences do not make sense or appear to contradict each other.

As I mentioned in an earlier comment, this does not feel like it has one voice. A single edit to bring the content into alignment would benefit the entire article as well as each individual section. If this article does not come from multiple voices, perhaps the author(s) are leaning to heavily on the resources and a deeper dive to assess paraphrasing should be made.

Images and Media

 * Guiding questions


 * Does the article include images that enhance understanding of the topic?
 * Are images well-captioned?
 * Do all images adhere to Wikipedia's copyright regulations?
 * Are the images laid out in a visually appealing way?

Images and media evaluation
There are no images contained within this article. The addition of images could be helpful in several areas where multiple thoughts are offered but not explained. For example, in the communication networks section, the final sentence introduces six patterns of communication but does not expound on any of these patterns. A visual graphic might be a nice way to help reinforce this in the article.

Checking the talk page

 * Guiding questions


 * What kinds of conversations, if any, are going on behind the scenes about how to represent this topic?
 * How is the article rated? Is it a part of any WikiProjects?
 * How does the way Wikipedia discusses this topic differ from the way we've talked about it in class?

Talk page evaluation
This talk page is a great example of why it is important to add your signature to comments. There are quite a few posts with no name or date, making it difficult to determine when conversations happened and progress was made.

Aside from two recent comments, the article appears to have mostly been in limbo since 2013. A quick review of the history confirms that aside from some minor citations or rephrasing, the article hasn't been worked on in some time.

Overall impressions

 * Guiding questions


 * What is the article's overall status?
 * What are the article's strengths?
 * How can the article be improved?
 * How would you assess the article's completeness - i.e. Is the article well-developed? Is it underdeveloped or poorly developed?

Overall evaluation
This article is a great foundation with lots of information to work with and lots of opportunity to grow. If a person came to this article looking for information on organizational communication, they would probably feel like they got a lot of information, but also be left wanting more. This is a fast-changing topic and this article is in need of some new life.

Optional activity

 * Choose at least 1 question relevant to the article you're evaluating and leave your evaluation on the article's Talk page. Be sure to sign your feedback

with four tildes — ~


 * Link to feedback: Talk:Organizational communication