Organisation Behaviour - Communication - Coursework Example

Organisation Behaviour: Communication Name Date Everyday people have to exchange details and be able to transfer messages from one person to another. This scenario may be defined as communication in that it ensures the sender is able to send a message to a receiver in an understandable manner. Effective communication is paramount in the world of personal life and business requirements. For example, from a business perspective, effective communication is necessary in that it can define or different between success and failure or between loss and profit. Thus, this means that communication and especially effective business communication is crucial to the successful management and operation of modern business. Therefore, a businessperson should understand the fundamentals of effective communication to ensure that operations are successful. This is also true for human resource management, an important entity within an organisation, to ensure that the employees accomplish effectively their requirements and ensure that employee turnover is decreased or eliminated. Thus, the aim of this paper is to discuss the communication stages and evaluate on the effectiveness of communication channel. Different authors analyse communication stages through different stages. For example, Wright and Noe (1995) state that there are six stages in communication process, which are idea ‘occurs’, encoding, message transmission, message reception, decoding, and idea ‘understood’. Other authors such as Bovee and Thill (1992) view that that there are four stages within communication process, which are encoding, message transmission, decoding and feedback. Through appropriate analysis, these two views concur in terms of communication process. Generally, communication process forms the foundation in achieving effective communication. Communication process ensures that common meaning between the sender and receiver takes place. This means that those individuals that follow communication process usually have the opportunity to become more productive because effective communication results into superior accomplishment of responsibilities. The entire communication process starts with the sender. Usually, the sender is a group, individual or institution who initiates communication; they are the entities that make ideas to ‘occur’ (Chambers 2000). This stage usually contributes to extend for the success of the message that is being transmitted. Some of the major aspects that play major role especially in the case of the sender are knowledge, perceptions, skill, sender’s experience, cultural influence and attitudes. After occurrence of an idea, the sender then encodes the message. This means that in order for the message to be conveyed, it is important for the sender to encode the message; encoding is the process in which the message is translated into form of symbols that represent concepts and ideas. Thus, at this stage, the process translates concepts and ideas into coded message that will easily be communicated. In this case, the symbols can be in terms of words, languages or gestures. This results into messages that can easily be understood. Encoding a message is controlled by numerous factors and all starts with the sender determining what she/he wants to transmit (Edelman and Mandle, 2005). This decision is based on believes about the receiver in terms of assumptions and knowledge, and other factors that are within the reach of the receiver. Hence, it is important for the sender to utilise those symbols that are familiar to the intended receiver. Usually, the sender should in the ‘shoe’ of the receiver so that the sender can be able to frame and conceptualise the message. After encoding the message, the sender has to use a medium or channel to ensure that the message is conveyed effectively. Common channels that are used are either written or oral but of late, there is increase of visual channels that are associated with technology (Gibson and Hodgetts, 1990). Some common oral channels are telephone and radio while the written channel is in terms of letters, memos and reports. The effectiveness of channel is determined by the characteristics that shape the communication. For instance, when speedy feedback is required, the appropriate channel is oral while for messages that contains numerous details such as numbers, the appropriate channel is written. However, in certain circumstances it is important to complement these two channels (oral and written) in ensuring effective communication strategy. The next stage of communication process is the decoding stage and usually is conducted by the receiver. When the receiver receives the message, a stimulus is sent to the brain of the receiver for interpreting, in order for the message to be assigned some meaning. All this is also called decoding. This means that the receiver interprets the symbols that were sent by the sender, translates the messages into a form that is appropriate to receiver’s experiences in order to ensure that the symbols are useful or meaningful. Hence, successful communication is possible only if the receiver correct interprets the message and the process is governed by receiver’s skills, experiences, culture, knowledge, perceptions and attitudes, which are usually or to some extend the message has the senders encoding environment. When the idea is understood, the receiver is able to send a feedback. The feedback component within communication process defines extend in which the receiver evaluated the message or the effectiveness of communication. This means that this is the opportunity for the sender to clarify the message in case it was misunderstood. Bovee and Thill (1992) states that feedback is paramount in terms it explores chances of communication barriers that may include different interpretation of words, differences in background and differing emotional reactions. It is important to state that the richness of communication channel determines whether the entire communication process was effective. For example, if the sender sends a message with a channel that is not appropriate, it is likely that the message will not reach intended receivers. Thus, this means that is crucial for the sender to choose the appropriate channel since it will effectively aid effectiveness of understanding of the message by the receiver. The decision that the sender decides to use either oral or written channel is governed by many factors (Guffey, 2005). The sender should answer numerous questions before choosing specific channel. Some of these questions include urgency of the message, whether immediate feedback is needed, is permanent record required, is the receiver of the message within the organisation or outside, is the content of the message controversial, complex or private, what are the capabilities of the receiver e.g. what capabilities such as oral and written does the receiver posses. If the sender is able to answer all these questions, the sender will have a platform to choose the appropriate communication channel. Additionally, numerous factors may determine the success of a communication process and are usually referred to as communication barriers. Communication barriers are directly linked with the medium that the sender decides to send the message. One of the channels may distort the message and may be received inappropriately by the receiver. In the case of oral channel, noise may occur during conveying of the message and may distort the actual meaning of the message. Noise can be seen in numerous views, which include playing music or radio in the background, another person trying to enter the conversation and other distractions that distracts the entire communication process. In the case of written channel, some factors that may inhibit effective communication include words that conflict with body language, inflammatory words, incorrect grammar and technical jargon. Generally, this means that the entire communication process is defined by communication channel that is been used. Communication channel play a major role in the communication process and thus it requires specific analyses before choosing the channel to be used (Kroehnert, 2000). Generally, communication is an important aspect in day-to-day activities and appropriate understanding or use of communication process defines its success. In any institution or person-to-person communication, communication process follows definite stages. Even though the stages are different depending on numerous authors but analysis of these perspectives provides four stages that are crucial in communication process. These stages are the encoding, message transmission, decoding and feedback. The encoding stages ensures that the ideas are translated into symbols that can be understood by receiver, message transmission is the means in which the message can be transferred from the sender to the receiver, decoding is ability of the receiver to understand the content of the message while feedback determines whether communication process was successful. Moreover, the channel plays a major role in the communication process and usually determines whether the message was communicated appropriately. Effective channel is that channel that is able to transmit the message without its distortion and usually defines extend of success of the message. References Bovee, C. and Thill, J., 1992. Business Communication Today. New York: McGraw-Hill Publishers. Chambers, H., 2000. Effective Communication Skills for Scientific and Technical Professionals. New York: Perseus Publishers. Edelman, C. and Mandle, C., 2005. Health Promotion throughout the Lifespan 6th Ed. New York: Elsevier Health Sciences. Gibson, J. and Hodgetts, R., 1990. Business Communication: Skills and Strategies. New York: Harper and Row Publishers. Guffey, M., 2005. Business Communication 5th Ed. New York: Thomson/ South-Western Publishers. Kroehnert, G., 2000. Basic Training for Trainers 3rd Ed. New York: McGraw-Hill Professional. Wight, P. and Noe, R., 1995. Management of Organisations. Chicago: Irwin Publishers. Read More