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Chapter 1Communication in the Workplace Md. Mustafizur Rahman, Faculty,
CBA IUBAT
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Business Communication

Communication is important to business.

Business needs good communicators but most people do not
communicate well.

By improving your communication ability, you can improve your chances
for success.

Communication is vital to every part of business.

Communication takes many forms oral, written, and computer.
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Major Communication Activities

Speaking

Reading

Listening

Writing
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Why Communication Skills Needed in Business

Speaking well

Writing well

Displaying proper etiquette (manners)

Listening attentively
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Why Business Needs to Communicate

Communication is vital to every part of business.

For example, employees process information with
computers, write messages, fill out forms, give
and receive orders, and talk over the telephone.

Executives use written and oral messages to
initiate business with customers and other
companies and respond to incoming messages.

Oral communication is a major part of this
information flow. written communication are letters, email messages, reports, and internet
documents.

Communication enables human beings to work
together.
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Main Forms of Communication in Business

Internal-Operational Communication

External-Operational Communication

Personal Communication
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Internal-Operational Communication

All the communication that occurs in conducting work within a business is
classified as internal operational.

This is the communication among the businesss workers that is done to
implement the businesss operating plan (e.g. provide a service,
manufacture a product, sell goods, etc.)
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Cont.

Internal-operational communication takes many
forms. It includes

the orders and instructions that supervisors
give workers

reports that workers prepare concerning sales,
productions, inventories, etc.

the email messages that workers write in
carrying out their assignments.
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External-Operational Communication

This is the work-related communicating that a
business does with people and groups outside the
business.

Example when business executives communicate
with suppliers, service companies, customers, and
the general public.
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Cont.

External-operational communication includes all
of the businesss efforts at direct selling
descriptive brochures, telephone callbacks,
follow-up service calls, etc.

It also includes the advertising the business
does, example radio and television messages,
newspaper and magazine advertising, website
advertising, etc.

Also in this category is all that a business does
to improve its public relations, including its
planned publicity, the community service of its
employees, the courtesy of its employees, and the
environmental friendliness of its products and
facilities.
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Personal Communication

Personal communication is the exchange of
information and feelings in which we human beings
engage whenever we come together.

We will communicate even when we have little or
nothing to say.

The employees attitudes toward the business,
each other, and their assignments directly affect
their productivity. And the nature of
conversation in a work situation affects
attitudes.
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Cont.

In a work situation where heated words and
flaming tempers are often present, the employees
are not likely to make their usual productive
efforts.

However, a cheerful work situation is likely to
have an equally bad effect on productivity.

Somewhere between these extremes lies the ideal
productive attitude.
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Communication Network of the Organization

In a workday we see an organization feeding on a
continuous supply of information.

Most of the information flow of operational
communication is downward and follows the formal
lines of organization (from the top executives
down to the workers).

This is so because most of the information,
instructions, orders, and such needed to achieve
the businesss objectives originate at the top
and must be communicated downward.
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Cont.

However, most good companies recognize the value
of open upward communication.

Their executives use open channels of
communication to be better informed of the status
of things on the front line.

They also have found that information from the
lower levels can be important in achieving
company work goals.
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Communication Network of the Organization

Two forms of network in an organization

The Formal Network

The Informal Network
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Formal and Informal Communication
Straight lines Formal Network Curved lines
Informal Network Fig 1 Formal and Informal
communication Networks in a Division of a Small
Business.
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Formal Network

The business has major, well-established channels
of information flow. These are the formal
channels the main lines of operational
communication (both internal and external).

Specifically, the flow includes the upward,
lateral, and downward movements of information by
report, email, records, and such within the
organization.
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Cont.

It also includes orders, instructions, and
messages down the authority structure of working
information through the organizations email or
intranet and of extremely directed messages,
sales presentations, advertising, and publicity.

These main channels should not just happen they
should be carefully thought out and changed as
the needs of the business change.
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Informal Network

The informal network is a secondary network
consisting primarily of personal communication.

It comprises the thousands upon thousands of
personal communications that support the formal
communication network of a business.

Such communications follow no set pattern they
form an ever-changing and infinitely complex
structure liking all the members of the
organization.

Informal network is not a single network but a
complex relationship of smaller networks
consisting of groups of people.
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Cont.

The relationship is made even more complex by the
fact that these people may belong to more than
one group and that group memberships and the
links between and among groups are continually
changing.

Known as the grapevine in management literature,
this communication network is extremely
effective.
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Cont.

Certainly, it carries much gossip and rumor, for
this is the nature of human conversation. And it
is as fickle (inconsistent) and inaccurate as the
human beings who are a part of it.

Even so, the grapevine usually carries far more
information than the formal communication system
and on many matters it is more effective in
determining the course of an organization.

Wise managers recognize the presence of the
grapevine. That is, they keep in touch with the
grapevine and turn it into a constructive tool.
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Variation in Communication Activity by Business

Just how much communicating a business does
depend on several factors

The Nature of the Business e.g. insurance
companies have a great need to communicate with
their customers, especially through letters and
mailing pieces, whereas housecleaning service
companies have little such need.

Geographic dispersion of the operations of a
business Obviously, internal communication in a
business with multiple locations differs from
that of a one-location business.

People who make up a business Every human being
is unique. Each has unique communication needs
and abilities. Thus, varying combination of
people will produce varying needs for
communication.
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The Process of Human Communication
A Model of the Communication Process.
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The Process of Human Communication

Kelly sends a message to Justin through a
carefully selected medium or channel.

Justins senses pick up the message, but also
pick up competing information from his sensory
world.

Kellys message is filtered through Justins
unique mind and is given meaning.

The meaning given may trigger a response
(feedback), which Justins unique mind forms.

5 -8. Justin sends the message to Kelly. It
enters her sensory world, and a second cycle
begins that is the same as the first cycle.
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Cont.

The Beginning A Message Sent

Although the steps described may suggest that
Justin and Kelly are communicating in separate
actions, the actions occur simultaneously. As one
is sending, the other is receiving.

Our description begins with Kelly, the sender,
communicating (or encoding) a message through a
carefully selected medium to Justin, the
receiver.

Her message could be in any of a number of forms
--- gestures, facial expressions, drawings, or,
more likely, written or spoken words. Whatever
the medium, Kelly sends the message to Justin.
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Cont.

The Filtering Process

When Kellys message gets to Justins brain, it
goes through a sort of filtering (or decoding)
process. Through that process Justins brain
gives meaning to Kellys message.

Those contents are made up of all Justin knows
and all he thinks. It includes his entire
emotional makeup and all his opinions, attitudes,
and beliefs. It includes al the cultural
influences of his family, his organization
memberships, his social groups, and such.
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Cont.

Obviously, no two people have precisely identical
filters, for no two people have minds with
precisely the same contents.

Thus, the meaning Justin gives Kellys message
may not be precisely the same as the one that
someone else would give it. And it may not be the
meaning Kelly intended.

For example, assume that Kelly used the word
liberal in her message. Now assume that Kelly and
Justin have had sharply differing experiences
with the word. To Kelly the word is negative, for
her experience has made her dislike things
liberal. To Justin the word is positive.
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Cont.

Formation and Sending of the Response

After his mind has given meaning to Kellys
message, Justin may react to the message. If the
meaning he received is sufficiently strong, he
may react by communicating some form of response
(called feedback). This response may be through
words, gestures, physical actions, or some other
means.

Justin ends this stage of the communication
process by forming a message and sends to Kelly.
He may send them in a number of ways as spoken
words, written words, gestures, movements, facial
expressions, diagrams on paper, and so on.
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Cont.

The Cycle Repeated

When Justin sends his message to Kelly, one cycle
of the communication process ends. Now a second
cycle begins.

This one involves Kelly rather than Justin, but
the process is the same.

The process may continue, cycle after cycle, as
long as Kelly and Justin want to communicate.
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Written Vs Oral Communication

Written communication is more likely to involve
creative effort. It is more likely to be thought
out.

Written communication involves a limited number
of cycles, and oral communication usually
involves many. In fact, some written
communication is one-cycle communication. That
is, a message is sent and received, but none is
returned.
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Cont.

The time between cycles In face-to-face
communication, cycles occur fast, often in rapid
succession. In written communication, some delay
occurs. While instant and text messaging may be
read within a few seconds of sending, fax or
email messages may be read a few minutes after
they are transmitted, letters in a few days,
reports perhaps in days, weeks, or months.
Because they provide a record, written messages
may communicate over extremely long time periods.
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Some Basic Truths about Communication (Errors in
Communication)

Meanings Sent are Not Always Received No two
minds have identical filters. No two minds have
identical storehouses of words, gestures, facial
expressions, or any of the other symbol forms.
Because of these differences in mind, errors in
communication are bound to occur. Skilled
communicators work hard to minimize these errors.
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Cont.

Meaning is in the Mind Meaning is in the mind not in the words or other symbols used. How
accurately a sender conveys meaning in symbols
depends on how skillful one is in choosing
symbols with the receiver in mind and on how
skillful the receiver is in interpreting the
meaning intended.

The Symbols of Communication Are Imperfect One
reason for this is that the symbols we use,
especially words, are at best crude substitutes
for the real thing. For example, the word man can
refer to billions of human beings of whom no two
are precisely alike. The verb run conveys only
the most general part of an action it ignores
the countless variations in speed, grace and
style.
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Cont.
Communication across cultures is especially
imperfect, for often there are no equivalent
words in the cultures. For example, usually there
is no precise translation for our jargon in other
cultures. Words such as computer virus, and geek
(nerd, bore) are not likely to have equivalents
in every culture. Similarly, other cultures have
specialized words unique and necessary to them
that we do not have. For instance, the Eskimo
have many words for snow, each describing a
unique type. Obviously, such distinctions are
vital o their existence. We can get along very
well with the one word.
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Cont.

Communication is also imperfect because
communicators vary in their ability to convey
thoughts. Some find it very difficult to select
symbols that express their simplest thoughts.