Importance of Communication in Workplace - Paper Example

Effective Communications is essential for the development of an organization. It determines primary managerial functions such as planning, organizing motivating and controlling. Whether written or oral, communication is the foundation of business activities. Benefits of effective communication include

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Effective communication motivates staff by providing performance feedback thus improves performance. As a source of information, it helps the organization in the decision-making process and provides for an alternative course of action. Communication also helps build people's attitude by increasing confidence because people can make informed decisions. Effective communication provides a tool for socialization thus contribute to enhancing interpersonal relationship which helps in conflict resolution. In this case, employees can interact well. Effective communication also provides a framework where the management communicates policy matters to staff and receive from a subordinate in the form of feedback. This way management can boost morale as workers as they feel part of decisions. Finally, effective communication provides feedback to areas like customer service resolution for maximum efficiency (DeVito, 2000).

Summary of the current Situation

Our organization is currently experiencing the various communication problems that have impacted negatively on service delivery. Currently, there is a mismatch of personality and skills required for job fit, employees personality is no aligned to their jobs. Duty managers in stores are not listening to feedback from staff on some critical issues such as shortage of workforce and overwhelming of duties thus unable to attend to customers needs. The organization is also witnessing weak conflict resolution mechanism because of uneven distribution of tasks to which has affected the moral of staff negatively.

Solutions

Mismatch of Personality and Skills

Personality profiling is necessary for efficiency and individual job satisfaction. The adaptability of persons within an organization is revealed through personality. The aspect of personality in not just limited to subordinate but also to managers when dealing with motivation and communication. Understanding yourself enables you to understand people around you particularly those you want to motivate.

The organization need conceptualize personality type theory put forward by Carl Jung. In this theory, Jung characterized people by preferences of general attitude (extrovert vs. introvert). The preferences as aligned to two functions of perception (sensing vs. intuition) and the preference to other two functions of judging (thinking vs. feeling) (DeVito, 2000).

Jung Typology profiling for workplace determines personality type of an individual that goes beyond to evaluate additional factors to adequately assess behavioral preferences of a person at the workplace. This theory dynamically generates personalized description of personality types such as preferences to activities, working style, decision-making problem-solving style, conflict management and communication style.

The company can achieve better results by matching right personality with the right job and helps to avoid pitfalls such as turnover and low morale. Unlocking personality assists in determining human qualities like leadership, motivation, and empathy. By understanding this principle, the organization will minimize work-related stress due to heavy workload and interpersonal conflicts because employees will perform duties they enjoy (DeVito, 2000).

Listening, Feedback and Conflict Resolution

Joseph DeVito divided listening into five Stages that include: receiving, understanding, remembering, evaluating, and responding. This step is critical because the level of interpretation of the message differs from one person to another. Unfortunately, an opinion can lead to a misconception of the message thus eliciting communication-related conflict. Responding also referred to as feedback is the most critical and final stage of the listening process. This step defines the involvement of the recipient. The nature of the conflict in this context is personality clash and role conflicts because of heavy workload and poor communication which the management has to address by adopting listening principles.

Lack of listening has created the misunderstanding between duty managers in stores with other staffs information is flowing from top to the bottom without feedback. Listening will help managers to understand issues surrounding the work environment that include a shortage of workforce and overwhelming of activities that limit the ability to attend to customers.

Managers should receive put in place communication system that involves receiving, understand, remembering evaluating and responding by providing feedback. Feedback will ensure that communication flows from the top to the bottom and vice versa (Harold,1948).

Communication Model and feedback

Communication cycle

Shannons (1949), introduced the first communication model for Bell Laboratories. It consisted of three primary parts: sender, channel, and receiver. This model is a perhaps a genesis of understanding communication flow

The source is the person who shares the informations source generates data that is shared in the message that is transmitted through a channel to a receiver. In this context, the organization should ensure that source of information is well defined. The message is that peace of information that is communicated. In the first place, there is an object that carries inherent meaning, followed by the image that acts as a symbol that represents the meaning of the objects and thirdly is interpretation. Ordination of these all leads to a successive message which the organization should adhere too. Encoding is a process of assembling information, ideas and thoughts into a representative design to ensure that the recipient understands the same message as the source. The message should be clear to recipient from effective communication. Also, the message should be objective but not subjective.Channel is a medium through which the encoded message is conveyed it may be verbal or non-verbal. A channel is a critical element when communicating, so its good to choose a right channel when transmitting the message. Decoding involves listening and reading the message to deduce the meaning. It is the translation of the message to get the sender's meaning which managers should do without prejudice. Receiver: Finally, the message is delivered to the receiver who should take into consideration frames and preconceptions of the message and share the reaction. Feedback is a reaction or response to the message received back to the sender.Feedback stipulates the course of action.

Theories and Methods of Communication

Under principles and methods of effective communication, Lasswell (1948) introduces a five-level model that can help our organizations understand the flow of information. This same pattern was adopted during the Second World War:

The source: Who?

The message Says What.

Through what channel or medium? In Which Channel:

The audience To Whom.

To What Effect: the desired effect??

This model has further been referred to as the Five Ws

Who should be told?

When should they be told?

What should they be told?

Where should

Who should control the communications process? The message be conveyed?( Lasswell (1948)

Understanding this basic model will enable managers to ensure that relevant information reach appropriate audience for effective decision-making

Conflict resolution through Feedback model

The organization can adopt feedback under threes simple steps in a model referred to as Sandwich model. Managers should start off with positive feedback by praising something employees did Impressively. They should also provide constructive criticism, in a precise manner possible in weak points that they feel requires correction and ensure that they confine themselves to the matter at hand. Finally end on a positive note, by simply revisiting the positive feedback at the start and provide a general view of the progress and conclude by complimenting them for their receptiveness to receiving criticism.

Conclusion

Effective communication is a thread that holds various parts of an organization that is interdependent together. Whatever a strategy an organization has, it is inconsequential until it is transmitted and understood by the relevant audience. Effective communication tends to enhance better performance and job satisfaction because people feel involved if they are made to understand their jobs well.Managers can get work done effectively through a structured communication system. Therefore, managers should have excellent communication skills and also embrace feedback, furthermore communication means of motivating employees to achieve companys goals efficiently hence satisfy customers needs. Communication also helps in modifying employees behavior and attitude. Organization should develop and maintain communication systems that will enhance effective communication that includes capacity building for employees. Good communication ensures two-way flow of information thus provide a framework for efficient feedback mechanism

References

DeVito, J. A. 2000. The elements of public speaking (7th ed.). New York, NY: Longman.

Harold L.1948. "The Structure and Function of Communication in Society." In Lyman Bryson (ed.), The Communication of Ideas. Harper and Row

Jung, C. G. 1971. Psychological Types (Collected Works of C. G. Jung, Volume 6, Chapter X)