Task
You started in your present job two years ago. You now feel it is important for your career development to move to a different department in the same company.
Write a letter to your manager. In your letter
- say what you have learned in your present job
- suggest how the company would benefit from moving you to a different department
- explain why you do not wish to leave the company
Candidate’s Answer
This is an answer written by a candidate who achieved a Band 6.0 score.
Dear Sir,
I am writing to ask for a permition about changing my position. As you know, I have already work in sales department for two years which let me learn a lot of skills of sales and helped me becoming the best sales man the season. However, I would like to to require moving to Design department and I would state my reason in the following paragraphs.
First of all, I would like to thank you for giving me many chances to equip my sales skills, such as negotiating with clients, promoting product and most importantly, getting over fears of meeting strangers.
However, inspite of sales skills, I eager to learn more skills in the company. Especially, I am always interest in design our company’s product. Moreover, I have got some certificates from self learning and understand some design skills when I was asistanted my colleague from design department.
Besides, I really love this company. The environment and working feeling are perfect here. So, those are why I am keen to stay in this company.
Thanks you for your reading and I look forward to hearing from you soon.
Yours faithfully,
Examiner’s Comment
This letter is a good response to the task and the letter format is appropriate and helpful. However, the second bullet point, which is to suggest how the company would benefit, is not well covered. In the third paragraph, there is mention of an increased understanding of design skills from another department, but it is not entirely clear how this benefits the company. More could be added on this point to improve the response.
Nevertheless, ideas are arranged coherently and there is good progression. Some useful linking devices are used [However | First of all | Moreover | Besides], although they all come at the beginning of the sentence. We also have reference and substitution [in the following paragraphs I are perfect here], but there are errors [those / that is].
There is some good vocabulary, but there are also errors which detract from the score [permition / permission | asistanted / assisting] but do not have too much impact. Grammatical structures contain some stronger examples [would like to thank you for | why I am keen to stay], but overall, the level of error is quite high.
In order to score more highly, the candidate should clearly highlight all three bullet points and extend responses. There should also be greater accuracy in spelling and fewer errors in the grammatical structures.
