Communication

Chapter 8
 LEARNING OBJECTIVES
When you have finished studying this chapter, you
should be able to:
1. Describe the communication process.
2. Identify the types of communication.
3. Differentiate between formal and informal
communication.
4. Explain the barriers to communication and how to
overcome it.
5. Identify how effective communication can be achieved.
6. Discuss the categories of interpersonal communication.

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Definition of Communication
 Lewis, Goodman and Fandt: a process in which one
person or group evokes an identical or common meaning
in another person or group.
 Bateman and Snell: the transmission of information and
meaning from one party to another party through the used
of shared symbol.
 Bovee and Thill: the process of sending and receiving
messages.
 Stoner: the process by which people seek to share
meaning through the transmission of symbolic messages.

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THE COMMUNICATION PROCESS

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Components of the Communication Process
 Social Context
 The setting in which the communication takes place.
 Sender
 The sender initiates the communication process by encoding his
or her meaning and sending the message through a channel.
 Encoding translates the sender’s ideas into a systematic set of
symbols or a language expressing the communicator’s purpose.

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Components of the Communication
Process (cont’d)
 Messages
 The tangible forms of coded symbols that are intended to give
a particular meaning to the information or data.
 Channel
 The carrier of the message or the means by which the message
is sent.

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Components of the Communication
Process (cont’d)
 Receiver
 The receiving person or group must make sense of the
information received.
 Decoding the translation of received messages into interpreted
meanings.
 Feedback
 The process of verifying messages and the receiver’s attempts
to ensure that the message he or she decoded is what the
sender really meant to convey.

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Components of the Communication
Process (cont’d)
 Noise
 Any internal or external interference or distraction with the
intended message that can cause distortion in the sending and
receiving of messages.
 It can occur during any stage of the communication process.
 It reduces the probability of achieving common meaning between
sender and receiver.

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Types of Communication
1) Verbal communication
• Is a way of transmitting message by means of spoken words,
writing letters, memo, newsletter, bulletin board, etc.
• In organization, verbal communication is the normal and formal
form of communicating.
• Managers send information either by letters, memo, newsletter,
phone calls, fax or email.
• They do this to make sure the message is received and understood
by the receiver, by setting feedback from the receiver.
2) Non-verbal communication
• It is the exchange of information or transmission of message by
means of gestures and to express feeling and emotion of individual.
• All messages that are non-language responses.

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Communication Channels

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Formal Organizational Communication
 Formal communication is an official communication
network that follows the chain of command and used by
organizations to transmit information within and outside
organization.
 2 types of formal communication are vertical and
horizontal (lateral) communication.

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2 Types of Formal Communication
1) Vertical communication
 Vertical communication is a communication system in which
messages move both up and down the chain of command.
 Can be divided into:
 Downward: messages flow from individuals at higher level to the
lower level.
 Upward: information flow from lower to higher level in the
organization’s hierarchy.
2) Horizontal communication (lateral communication)
 Enables the information to be shared among people on the same
level
 Ex: production manager may require information regarding
sales of company and he obtains from marketing manager.
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Informal Organizational Communication
 Also known as grapevines
 The messages passed among the members are likely to be
inaccurate & also distorted.
 There are 4 types of informal communication:
 Single strand
 Gossip
 Probability
 Cluster

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 Single strand
• Represents how one person passes a message to another
who passes it to another, to another and so on in one long
series of communication.
• This grapevine, Mr. (A) tells Mr. (B) something about the
organization. Mr. (B) then tells it to (C), (D), (E) and
everyone else in the line.
• As the information reaches (J), the news is already
inaccurate/incorrect.
• In fact, this chain of command is the least accurate in
channeling information because information that move
from one another, are added, filtered and passed in the
way the sender would find it interesting and ‘juicy’ to
convey. A B C D
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Gossip
 One person search for information and informs everyone
the information he or she gets.
 The information in non-related job and interesting to hear.
 Ex: when Ani knows that her boss is having an affair with
his secretary, she tells everyone that she met in the
organization.

D
E
C

B A F

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Probability
 Use to tell information at random and those people inturn
tell others at random.
 Information may not be interesting but useful to some
people.
 Ex: news on increment for clerical staffs is only conveyed
to the clerks
D
C
E

B F
A

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Cluster
 A person may convey information to a few chosen
individuals.
 These individual then pass on the information to a few more
selected individuals whom they trust or from specially
chosen individual who they are trying to obtain some favor.
 The information that is conveyed is usually interesting, job-
related and most up to date.
C J
F G K

I L
B A E

H M
D D

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Barriers of Effective Communication

1) Cross-Cultural Diversity
 Individuals from different cultures may encode and decode
their messages differently.
 They may have different behaviors, styles, and ways of looking
at things.
 Ethnocentrism
 The tendency to consider one’s own culture and its values as being
superior to others; a common problem in cross-cultural
communication.

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Barriers of Effective Communication (cont’d)
2) Trust and Credibility
 A very important barrier to effective communication is a lack of
trust between the sender and the receiver.
 This lack of trust can cause the receiver to look for hidden
meanings in the sender’s message.
 It can also cause the sender to try and manipulate the message.

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Barriers of Effective Communication (cont’d)
3) Information Overload
 Managers and organizations can experience information
overload when the amount of data that can be processed is
exceeded.
◦ Information overload can lead to:
 Failing to process or ignoring some information.
 Processing information incorrectly.
 Delaying the processing of information until the information overload
abates.
 Searching for people to help process some of the information.
 Lowering the quality of information processing.
 Withdrawing from the information flow.

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Barriers of Effective Communication (cont’d)
4) Language Characteristics
 Many words and phrases in our language are imprecise.
 Individuals often use different meanings or interpretations of
the same word and do not realize it.
 Jargon is terminology or language specific to a particular
profession or group.
 The imprecision and multiple meanings of words are one reason why
jargon develops.

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Barriers of Effective Communication (cont’d)
5) Gender Differences
 Gender differences can result in breakdowns and lead to
distorted communication and misunderstandings between men
and women.
6) Other Factors
 Time pressures may cause us to focus on information that helps
us make a choice quickly. Feedback may be impaired or
absent.

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How to overcome barriers
 Emphatize
 Create trust atmosphere
 Use simple language
 Develop information system
 Minimize distraction and noise
 Obtain feedback

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Categories of Interpersonal Communication
1. Oral communication
 Includes all forms of spoken information
 Ex: face-to-face, telephone
2. Written communication
 Written documents used to share information in an organization
 Ex: letters, memos, policy, reports, manuals, forms.

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Categories of Interpersonal Communication
(cont’d)
3. Nonverbal communication
 Involves all messages that are non language responses. The 6
basic types of nonverbal communication.
 Kinesic behavior, or body motion: gestures, facial expressions, and
eye behavior.
 Physical characteristics: body shape, physique, posture, height, and
weight.
 Paralanguage: voice quality, speech rate, pitch, and laughing.
 Proxemics: the way people perceive space, seating arrangements, and
conversational distance.
 Environment: building and room design, furniture, light, noise, and
cleanliness.
 Time: being late or early, keeping others waiting.

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Categories of Interpersonal Communication
(cont’d)
4. Technological communication
 Telecommuting or “Telework”
◦ Working at a remote site through a computer linked to a
central office or other employment location.
 Electronic Mail (E-mail)
◦ Sending messages through computerized text-processing and
communication networks.
 Video Conferencing
◦ An umbrella term for technologies that use live video to unite
widely dispersed company operations.
 The Internet
◦ Essentially, “everything” can be done on the internet.

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