chapter 7 - dr. nghia trong nguyen · ... robbins and judge, organizational behaviour, ... source:...

7-1

Chapter 7:

Communication

Organizational

Behaviour

5th

Canadian Edition

Langton / Robbins / Judge

Copyright © 2010 Pearson Education

Canada

7-2 Langton, Robbins and Judge, Organizational Behaviour, Fifth Cdn. Ed.

Copyright © 2010 Pearson Education Canada

Chapter Outline

• The Communication Process

• Barriers to Effective Communication

• Organizational Communication

• Other Issues in Communication



Communication

1. How does communication work?

2. What are the barriers to communication?

3. How does communication flow in

organizations?

4. What are other issues in communication?



The Communication Process

• People spend nearly 70 percent of their waking hours communicating—writing, reading, speaking, listening

• Work Canada survey of 2039 Canadians in six industrial and service categories found:

– 61 percent of senior executives believed that they did a good job of communicating with employees.

– Only 33 percent of managers and department heads believed that senior executives were effective communicators.

– Only 22 percent of hourly workers, 27% of clerical employees, and 22% of professional staff reported that senior executives did a good job of communicating with them.

• Canadians reported less favourable perceptions about their company’s communications than did Americans.



Communication Terms

• Communication

– The transfer and understanding of a message between

two or more people.

• Sender

– Establishes a message, encodes the message, and

chooses the channel to send it.

• Receiver

– Decodes the message and provides feedback to the

sender.



Communication Terms

• Encoding

– Converting a message to symbolic form.

• Decoding

– Interpreting a sender’s message.

• Message

– What is communicated.

• Channel

– The medium through which a message travels.



Exhibit 7-1 The Communication

Process Model

Encodes the

message

Chooses the

channel

Chooses

a message

Provides

feedback

Decodes the

message

Sender Receiver

Considers the receiver

Considers the sender



Choosing Channels

• Channels differ in their capacity to convey information.

• Rich channels have the ability to:

– Handle multiple cues simultaneously.

– Facilitate rapid feedback.

– Be very personal.



Exhibit 7-2 – Information Richness

of Communication Channels

Source: Based on R. H. Lengel and R. L. Daft, “The Selection of Communication Media as an Executive Skill,” Academy of Management Executive, August 1988, pp.

225-232; and R. L. Daft and R. H. Lengel, “Organizational Information Requirements, Media Richness, and Structural Design,” Managerial Science, May 1996, pp. 554-

572. Reproduced from R. L. Daft and R. A. Noe, Organizational Behavior (Forth Worth, TX: Harcourt, 2001), p. 311.



Barriers to Effective Communication

• Filtering

– The sender manipulates information so that it will be

seen more favourably by the receiver.

• Selective Perception

– The receivers selectively sees and hears based on their

needs, motivations, experience, background, and other

personal characteristics.



Barriers to Effective Communication

• Defensiveness

– When individuals interpret a message as threatening,

they often respond in ways that retard effective

communication.

• Information Overload

– Occurs when the information we have to work with

exceeds our processing capacity.

• Language

– Words mean different things to different people.



Communicating Under Stress

• Speak clearly.

• Be aware of the nonverbal part of

communicating.

• Think carefully about how you state

things.



Organizational Communication –

Direction of Communication

• Downward

– Communication that flows from one level of a group to a lower level.

• Managers to employees

• Upward

– Communication that flows to a higher level of a group.

• Employees to manager

• Becoming increasingly difficult

• Lateral

– Communication among members of the same work group, or individuals at the same level.



Networks

• Connections by which information flow.

– Formal Networks.

• Task-related communications that follow the

authority chain

– The Grapevine – Informal Networks.

• Communications that flow along social and

relational lines



Exhibit 7-4 Networks and Their

Effectiveness

All-Channel Wheel Chain

Moderate

High

Moderate

Moderate

Speed

Accuracy

Emergence of a leader

Member satisfaction

Fast

High

High

Low

Fast

Moderate

None

High



The Grapevine

• 75 percent of employees hear about matters first

through rumours on the grapevine.

• The grapevine has three main characteristics:

– Not controlled by management.

– Most employees perceive it as being more believable

and reliable than formal communication.

– Largely used to serve the self-interests of those people

within it.



Purpose of Rumours

1. To structure and reduce anxiety

2. To make sense of limited or fragmented

information

3. To serve as a vehicle to organize group

members, and possibly outsiders, into coalitions

4. To signal a sender’s status or power



Exhibit 7-5

Grapevine Patterns

Single Strand Each tells

one another

A

B

C

D

Y

Gossip One tells all

B

C D

E

F

A

K J

H

I

G

Probability

Each randomly tells others

A

J

D B

F

G

K

E C

H

I

X

Cluster Some tell

selected others

A

C

D F

I B

J

Source: K. Davis and J. W. Newstrom, Human Behavior at Work: Organizational Behavior, 7th ed. (New York: McGraw-Hill, 1985), p. 317. Reprinted by permission.



Exhibit 7-6 Emoticons: Showing

Emotions in Emails



Electronic Communications:

Significant Limitations of E-mail

• Misinterpreting the message.

• Communicating negative messages.

• Overuse of e-mail.

• E-mail emotions.

• Privacy concerns



Instant Messaging (IM) and Text

Messaging (TM)

• Instant Messaging (IM) and Text Messaging (TM)

– Rapidly gaining popularity in business.

– Fast and inexpensive way for managers to stay in touch with

employees and peers with each other.

– IM is better for short messages that will be quickly deleted.

• Despite exponential growth in usage, IM and TM are not

likely to replace email.

– Email is better for long messages that need to be saved.

– There are additional security fears in using IM/TM

• More easily intercepted



Nonverbal Communication

• Messages conveyed through body movements, facial expressions, and the physical distance between the sender and the receiver.

– Kinesics

• The study of body motions, such as gestures, facial configurations, and other movements of the body.

– Proxemics

• The study of physical space in interpersonal relationships.



Silence as Communication

• Defined as an absence of speech or noise.

• Not necessarily inaction—can convey:

– Thinking or contemplating a response to a question.

– Anxiety about speaking.

– Agreement, dissent, frustration, or anger.

• Individuals should be aware of what silence

might mean in any communication.



Communication Barriers Between

Women and Men

• Men use talk to emphasize status, women use it to create

connection.

• Women and men tend to approach points of conflict

differently.

• Men and women view directness and indirectness

differently.

– Women interpret male directness as an assertion of status and one-

upmanship.

– Men interpret female indirectness as covert, sneaky, and weak.

• Men criticize women for apologizing, but women say “I’m

sorry” to express empathy.



Cross-Cultural Communication

Difficulties

• Sources of barriers:

– Semantics

– Word connotations

– Tonal differences



Culture Contexts

• Cultures differ in how much the context makes a

difference in communication.

– High-context cultures

• Cultures that rely heavily on nonverbal and subtle situational

cues in communication.

– Low-context cultures

• Cultures that rely heavily on words to convey meaning in

communication.



Exhibit 7-7

High- vs. Low-Context Cultures

Source: Based on the work of E. T. Hall. From R. E. Duleck, J. S. Fielden, and J. S. Hill, “International Communication: An Executive Primer,” Business Horizons, January-February 1991, p.

21.



Cross-Cultural Communications:

Helpful Rules

• Assume differences until similarity is proven.

• Emphasize description rather than interpretation or

evaluation.

• Practise empathy.

• Treat your interpretations as a working hypothesis.



Summary and Implications

1. How does communication work?

• Communication works through choosing the correct channel, being an effective listener, and using feedback.

2. What are the barriers to communication?

• Errors arise from filtering, selective perception, defensiveness, information overload, and language.

3. How does communication flow in organizations?

• Communication can flow vertically and laterally, and by formal and informal channels in organizations.

4. What are the other issues in communication?

• The big topics in communication are the importance of nonverbal communication and silence, gender, and cross-cultural differences in communication.

chapter 7 - dr. nghia trong nguyen · ... robbins and judge, organizational behaviour, ... source:...

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