Make The Audience Stock Price Essay - 1,270 words

At what cost does a company deserve to be taken off of life-support? While Gregory Peck would say that a surviving, long-lived company is worth saving, Danny Divito sees it differently. "Who cares?" he asks. The company is actually an investment, and no investment in need of life-support is worth saving. Not only do Peck and Divito see the company differently, they also relate to their audience on different levels. In their speeches in Other People's Money, Peck and Divito use ethos, pathos and logos with varying amounts of success in their stockholder addresses. By analyzing the way that ethos, pathos and logos effected the audience for first Peck, then Divito, it is possible to determine for whom to vote and why.


Beginning with wonderful composure backed by a familiar audience, Gregory Peck begins creating creditability for his case by mentioning his experience and personal relationship with the voters. The audience is to believe what he has to say because of his history and because some of them have worked side by side with him. They are supposed know that through the experiences they have shared with him, he is competent and has good character. Peck also reminds the audience that this is "the 39 th (meeting) of which I am addressing you as your Chief Executive. " This one statement brings up history, Peck's high position and his connection to the audience. By emphasizing his similarity to the audience, as well as bringing up his position in the company, Peck does an excellent job of building his credibility (Adler and Elmhorst 428).


Peck's attempt at logos comes next and is provided through examples in the past where the company had its better days. He mentions that once, the company was strong. Twice, Peck mentions that this is the company's 73 rd annual meeting, an obvious attempt to transfer some of the company's positive results from the past to the present. According to his logic since that was true then in the future the company will become prosperous again. This is by far the weakest part of Peck's argument. Perhaps because he has no logical reason to keep the company, he relies on ethos and pathos to persuade the audience.


Peck relies heavily on pathos to encourage the audience to vote for him (Adler and Elmhorst 429). He speaks of days past when investing in the company made people feel good about themselves. He also tells his audience that they should have faith and believe that the company will become strong again although he has no proof. Peck constantly speaks in the past tense and encourages the voters to use this past as good enough proof that their dream for the future is possible. This also incorporates the idea that people should see the individual people working in the company and feel sorry for them.


Peck's personal attacks against Divito could fall in any of the ethos, logos, pathos categories, but they seem to be highly based in and targeted toward emotion. Peck has known the audience for a long time. He plays upon that fact and the idea that they are all friends. By using this technique he hopes to make the audience his friend and have them band against Divito. He is searching for brotherhood and using and past relations in hopes of swaying the audience to his side. Peck uses a "Motivated Sequence" approach to first show that Divito is the problem, and why the voters need to do something about him (Adler and Elmhorst 433).


He then presents his solution to the problem: hold on to the stock. Peck next paints a rosy picture depicting the stock price rising if they follow his solution. He calls his audience to action by asking them to send a message "to every Garfinkle in thi ...................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................

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Essay Tags: peck, make the audience, life support, made people, stock price

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