The Effect of Communication Theories in Business Introduction

The effect of communication theories in business Introduction Communication has existed since the beginning of human beings, but people didn’t pay attention to it until the 20th century, especially into the 21st century along with the communication technologies development. Nowadays, there have many communication theories. Among of these theories, interpersonal communication (IC) and organizational communication (OC) are the most commonly-used theories applied in business to help us resolve problems. IC, as a kind of device that organizers usually use to communicate with their employees, more emphasizes individuals interacting face-to-face than OC. It can help us understand how and why people think and behave. However, IC is hardly defined in its own area of study, yet often occurs within other environment like organizations (â€Å"Interpersonal communication,† In Wikipedia, The Free Encyclopedia, 2011). OC, as a subfield of communication, mainly looks at human communication within or among organizations, which is the most basic and central part in business management (Simon, 1998). It relates to the achievement of organizational goals and the formation of organizational culture. Meanwhile, OC is also the most common management behavior which is carried out under certain circumstance and is influenced by organizational culture. The behavior culture of enterprises determines the behavior characteristics and communication ways and styles of employees; the material culture determines the condition of communication technology, communication mediums and channels of companies (â€Å"Organizational Communication†, In Baidu, The Free Encyclopedia, 2011 ). Interpersonal Communication and Organizational Communication in Business In the process of actual application in business, OC is often considered as one field of IC and IC as one means of OC on the contrary. These two communication theories seemingly serve different objects, people versus organizations. Actually, individuals are the common objects of communication. Communication scholars define OC different from IC, only because it always exists in an organization, and sometimes represents one department or one class. So we could see both of them usually work together in one organization. For example, the enterprise culture of General Electric (GE) Company highlights the â€Å"people-oriented† business philosophy. In GE Company, employees are given enough concern and respect, and are encouraged to express their opinions and display their creativity directly. This kind of outspoken communication style of GE makes managers gain more new ideas and opinions to impel company developing. Moreover, for the management coordination, the ex-CEO of GE, Jack Welch, came up with â€Å"boundaryless concept† in the field of organizational communication. GE Company would clear obstacles among all departments like engineering, production and marketing departments and make information totally transparent and free accessible. Under the guidance of such communication theories, GE could use internal information with the most efficiency and achieve the resources sharing on the largest extent (In Scientology Volunteer Minister, 2009). In this case, we hardly tell which communication theory is applied in certain part, yet we easily find the two theories complement and serve each other. The application of communication theories in organization Use to cope with internal problems Communication, as one kind of enterprises culture, has attracted more attention of companies and is treated as the key point of strategic management by leadership. The â€Å"Three Withouts† phenomenon Mr. Yu (2008) came up with in one speech, as the following, is the most direct and understandable explanation of the problems existed in organizations. Lack of Communication with Superiors. Generally speaking, there are many things managers have to think about so that they cannot communicate with employees efficiently in time (Shiwei Yu, 2008). At this time employees are supposed to report actively to superiors, yet most of them have no courage to talk with superiors. There have two performances in this situation. The one performance is that people dare not or are not willing to communicate with superiors when they have good ideas, because either they are overconfident and have no interest any more after several negations by leaders, or they lack of confidence and are afraid of criticism. The other one is that individuals do not report to managers when they find potential problems existed in work. The reason can be concluded that people who are over-dependent on leadership always follow their leaders and have no question to them. Actually, whichever kind of employees is irresponsible for work. In fact, even though we are just the employees, we should consider issues in the sight of the enterprise rather than individuals and adjust our attitude from â€Å"responsible for leadership† to â€Å"responsible for enterprise†. Lack of Communication between Departments. In the most companies, it has been the main problem that different departments hardly communicate sincerely with each other and have no sense of mutual support and positive cooperation (Shiwei Yu, 2008). To resolve the problem, enterprise should firstly review whether the department position of it is reasonable, and then establish the relation mode of â€Å"suppliers and customers† among the all departments, consequently foster the sense of service for different department, so that employees can communicate with sincerity and make efforts together to achieve the goal of enterprise. Virtually, the whole process of resolution is the process of OP applying. Lack of Communication with Subordinates Superiors involved in other business seldom talk with employees, let alone instruct and advice their work, which is responsible for the phenomenon that increasing companies spend over one month in recruiting and training new staff, yet don’t have one day to communicate with their employees(Shiwei Yu). The reason could be conclude as the following two sides: Managers prefer enjoy the feel at high stand to communicate with employees personally. We have to acknowledge that there exist such managers who are arbitrary and hardly accept opinions from the inferiors. If they invariably ignore the subordinate advice and views, it would only discourage the enthusiasm and responsibility of staff. Certainly, there have a latent yet inevitable reason that managers are afraid of being transcended by the subordinate. In addition, it is also an important problem that superiors communicate with inferiors without skills. For the leadership, effective communication not only promotes work smoothly, but also helps to establish their image. Furthermore, as the managers, they have rights and obligations to communicate with inferiors actively as well as know and develop capability and responsibility of employees, just like Toyota Motor Corporation CEO spends two thirds time in chatting with engineers and dealers, while the Boeing Company CEO invites the senior managers to share their exciting stories, and the leadership of Ericsson helps employees make personal development plans every year (Communication Case Study, 2009). Use to cope with external problems Nowadays many companies have the experiences using communications theories to help themselves alleviate crisis and maintain their stable development. Facing crises from exterior factors, companies should first think about how to coordinate each department and communicate with consumers (â€Å"Communication Theories†, In MBAlib, The MBA Encyclopedia, 2010)? What we need to know is that consumers are inclined to the attitude companies express to event rather than the fact itself that is happened. Clients could forgive your mistakes, yet not accept your ignorance. So when the problems occurred, enterprises should first respond and express the determination to deal with them. That is to say, communication is the principal method to resolve problems. The â€Å"Sudan I† event KFC suffered is a wonderful example to support the statement. On March 15th 2005, all KFC outlets in China were found using banned dye Sudan I, the cancer-causing colorant in the sauce of New Orleans roast chicken wings and chicken hamburgers. And then many consumers sued KFC and asked it for their injury compensation. As we know, KFC has been successful in China since it first stepped in the Chinese market in 1987; however this event made KFC loss a large number of customers in a short time. According to a survey, the loss rate of clients of KFC raised to unprecedented 50% in over half stores. Facing a series of emergencies, KFC responded in first time, at that night of event exposure. All KFC outlets stopped selling New Orleans roast chicken wings and chicken hamburgers at the next day, destroyed all rest sauce and posted bulletins in all stores for apology. Each department was connected. Meanwhile, the managers of KFC actively contacted with the victims and accounted for the event as well as the results of survey to eliminate doubts of the public. From the example, we could find the application of communication theories is used in every details of the process of event resolving. First of all, just because of the effective organizational communication taken, all departments and outlets could act in concert to calm the storm immediately. Furthermore, the manager even communicated with customers in person in order to express their apology and sincerity. So IC could be applied more among individuals to achieve what we want. How to ameliorate business communication As we all know, the effective communication between managers and employees depends on the negotiability and share of information in internal organization and is responsible for improving the work efficiency and enhancing decision scientificity and rationality. So how to ameliorate business communication ? The aspect of interpersonal communication 1. Adjust the attitude of communication Along with the information network and communication technology advancement in modern society, the ways of communication between individuals become more various and richer than ever before. On the surface, the connection is indeed increasingly frequent and intimate, yet what is the fact? Most communication has been driven by material benefits. So communicators in business should make much account of not only the process of systematized information communication, but the spiritual communication (HRoot, 2010). 2. Learn to listen Tracey once suggested that the managers of human resource should spend 65% in listening, 25% in speaking and 10% in reading and writing (2006). Thus we could see the significance of listening for communication. More important, only by listening can we detect the others’ heart and logical thinking, communicate with them better and finally attain the objective. 3. Put emphases on nonverbal expression Nonverbal information includes expression, pronunciation and intonation, gesture and so on. Actually this kind of communication more easily touches people than language performance. So weather you send or receive messages, you should notice the power and effect of nonverbal expression. The aspect of organizational organization 1. Speech with confidence Speech is a quite fundamental and common part of OC. For most people, talking is considered as a normal activity, yet speech often make individuals nervous and overwhelmed. However, we often could be asked for speech in formal occasions, even though just several sentences. When we make a speech in a formal occasion, we should keep our speech tempo slow enough and volume loud enough to make ourselves heard by everyone. Meanwhile, we should realize that appropriate words, image and posture are helpful for people understanding (HRoot, 2010). 2. Organize effective conference Conference as one kind of formal communication is indispensable part of OC. The elaborate plan and explicit theme are the primary guarantee to accomplish the goal of meeting. Moreover, when you chair a meeting, you should notice weather the atmosphere is accustomed to listening or communicating, thereby mastering initiative in the activity of communication. Conclusion American famous futurist (1999), John Naisbitt, said â€Å"The competition of future is the competition of management. The focus of management competition lies in the effective communication among the staff of each social organization and the organizations themselves. This sentence simply and accurately points out the essentials and significance of IC and OC for enterprise management. From the above discussion about communication theories, we could see that communication has been an effective tool for modern management. Only through effective IC, the ideas and suggestion from employees could be taken seriously; only by effective OC could the performance of organizational members be appraised a nd recognized. 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