One of your colleagues was in charge of organising an annual executive conference, and he/she has been successful in doing it. You want to congratulate your colleague on that. Write a letter to this colleague. In your letter: - congratulate your colleague for successfully organising the event - mention what you liked about it the most - say how much you would like him/her to organise other events as well
Sample Response
Dear Jeremy, I hope you are doing well.Hope you are doing excellent. I am writing this letter to congratulate you on organizing this year's annual executive conference quite successfully. DeleteBut, you deserve this compliment even more because you have organised the conference successfullymanaged to organize this conference successfully aton rather short notice as we were not sure until the last minutehour whether or not our CEO would be able to attend the conference. I think it was an outstanding conference this year as everybody loved it. What I liked the most about the conference is its choice of theme becausetheme selection where the theme “Stronger as a team” inspired all attendeesall the attendees to engage in serious, honest and stimulating conversationsto have some serious, honest and stimulating conversations with one anotheramong themselves. Even our company’scompany CEO, who doesn’t normally take much interestthat much interest in our annual conference, was pleased with your theme selection. Besides, your choice of venuevenue selection for the conference was also very practicalwise because everybody was able to reach it easily by public transportarrive there easily in public transportation without taking an expensive taxiinstead of using some expensive taxi ride. So, it looks like you have a natural talentthe natural ability and talent to organize events. Therefore, I would be really glad if you start organizing other events like annual inter-departmental sports and annual corporate picnics from now on. Yours sincerely, Andy Moore
Why this response received Band 7.5
The letter communicates its congratulatory purpose immediately and develops all three bullet points with specific, relevant details about the theme, venue, and future events. Its main limitation is presentation: the entire message forms one dense block, while a few awkward collocations and grammatical choices reduce polish. The highest priority is to divide the content into purposeful paragraphs and refine expressions such as the transport and closing-request phrases.
IELTS Writing Criteria Scores
Task Achievement
The purpose is fully achieved, all bullet points are clearly covered, and the supporting details are relevant and well developed.
Make the request for future event organisation slightly more tactful to sustain the collegial register throughout.
Coherence and Cohesion
Ideas progress logically from congratulations to highlights and then to the future request, with clear linking despite the absence of paragraph breaks.
Use separate paragraphs for the opening purpose, event highlights, and final request so the letter is easier to follow.
Lexical Resource
A good range of topic-appropriate vocabulary conveys praise and specific event details, although several collocations are awkward or repetitive.
Replace phrases such as "arrive there easily in public transportation" with more natural collocations and reduce repetition of "conference" and "organize".
Grammatical Range and Accuracy
The letter uses varied complex sentences with generally good control, while minor article, preposition, and punctuation errors remain noticeable.
Check adjective and preposition choices, especially "doing excellent" and "in public transportation," and avoid unnecessary commas after linking words.
Write this task while it is fresh
Try the same task now. It helps you remember the feedback and write better next time.
IELTS General Training Writing Task 1
One of your colleagues was in charge of organising an annual executive conference, and he/she has been successful in doing it. You want to congratulate your colleague on that. Write a letter to this colleague. In your letter:
- congratulate your colleague for successfully organising the event
- mention what you liked about it the most
- say how much you would like him/her to organise other events as well
Your response
Write the task yourself, then compare your choices with the annotated response.