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CHAPTER TWELVE

COMMUNICATION

12.00 Chapter Outline

12.01: Learning Objectives............................................

12.02: Introduction........................................................
12.03: What is Communication?....................................
12.04: Importance of Communication............................
12.05: Functions of Communication...............................
12.06: The Communication Process...............................
12.07: The Emphasis on Perception...............................
12.08: Barriers to Effective Communication..................
12.09: Overcoming Communication Barriers.................
12.10: Methods of Communication................................
12.11: Making Effective Presentations...........................
12.12: Grapevines..........................................................
12.13: Communicating HRM Programmes…………….
12.14: HRM in Practice………………………………..
12.15: Progress Questions..............................................
12.16: Notes and References..........................................

12.01 Learning Objectives

After studying this chapter, you will be able to:

(1) Understand the place and role of communication in organisational

performance.

(2) Explain the communication process with the aid of a diagram.

(3) Explain the barriers to effective communication and the techniques to

overcome them.

(4) Explain the different methods of communication used in work

organisations today.

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(5) Understand the factors giving rise to the grapevine.

(6) Discuss the ten guidelines for making effective presentations.

(7) Understand how chairpersons should run meetings if they want

them to succeed.

12.0 Introduction

Information is a crucial resource for the effective functioning of work organisations. As

a resource, information is normally about the internal and external environments of the
organisation, i.e. its performance processes, its management approaches, its products, and its
members on the one hand, and outputs emitted by other organisations on the other hand.
Information is equally needed by employees and unions to enable them to understand and trust
various matters in the performance of organisations and thus maintain the desired relations
within the organisation Information is thus a tool to be used by all organisational members to
play their roles smoothly in the organisation.

In order for information to serve the above enumerated purposes, it must be adequately
available i.e. it should be available, in the right quantities, quality, and timely. The means
through which adequate information can be acquired by organisational members is the
organisation’s communication system. Management should note that mere good intentions are
not sufficient; the good intentions embodied in the various human resources programmes must
be well communicated to people if the inherent good intentions are to have the desired effects.

A human resources communication system involves both formal and informal processes
for the acquisition and dissemination of information related to the organisation’s human
resources. All organisations, formal and informal, small and large, have their human resources
communication systems. Some organisations’ human resources communication systems are
formal, some informal, and some both formal and informal. For instance, the human resources
communication system is usually informal and unsophisticated mainly due to the small number
of both people and relationships involved. For this reason, the communication system is
informally managed and does not require a separate organisational unit. But in large work
organisations, human resources communication systems are more formal and sophisticated
because the number of organisational members is larger and the intra- and extra-organisational
relationships involving the people is enormous. In such organisations the communication system
is so complex that a separate organisational unit is designed and communication specialists are
recruited to run it.

In this chapter, we will address the role of the human resources department in managing
effective communication among organisational members for purposes of maintaining and
enhancing high levels of performance in the work organisation. The chapter will conclude with
a discussion of employee counselling - a complex form of communication that requires highly
sophisticated behavioural skills to execute properly.

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12.03 What is Communication?

Communication can be defined as a process involving the transfer of information and

understanding from one person to another, in order to enable the two share what they feel and
know.1

The term "communication" is perceived variously by different people. To some people it

denotes the means of transmitting information, e.g. telephone, radio, television, etc. To others,
communication means the channels of exchanging information e.g. the suggestion box, chain of
command, or even the grapevine. As can be noted in the above definition, to us communication
is the process of exchanging information and making oneself understood by others. This is in
our view the definition which explains how organisational members can get to understand their
performance obligations, and maintain desirable interpersonal relations. Thus communication is
the act of inducing others to get and understand an idea in the sense intended by the speaker or
writer. In this sense, communication is not a reflexive isolated action, but a consistent and
ongoing process that has a determining effect on organisational performance.

The term communication is derived from the Latin word "communis" which means
"common". If we communicate an idea, we establish a common ground for understanding it
among ourselves. Thus if we speak or write, we intend that our listener should receive and
understand our ideas as we intend. If however our ideas are received differently by our listeners
or readers, we have not communicated, because the communicator and the listener or reader,
have not established a common ground of understanding. In such a case we have merely spoken
or written, which a radio or television set can equally do. Communication has the primary
purpose of inducing others to receive and understand an idea in the context intended by the
communicator. Communication is in this sense, a means of influence and an important tool for
managerial effectiveness, because in their efforts to get work done through people, managers
seek to communicate, not merely to speak or write to their subordinates. As a matter of fact,
managers should not merely speak or write, they ought to communicate!

The right to communication is not an exclusive possession of managers. Communication

is an important neutral facility, which everyone needs to be able to play their roles in the
performance of the organisation. It is useful to note that one of the few things, the absence of
which human beings cannot tolerate is information. If management does not provide timely and
accurate information on issues of interest to many people, they will chip something in to stand
for information until accurate information is provided, a situation which gives rise to

1
GREENBERG J. and BARON R.A., "Behaviour in Organisations:
Understanding and Managing the Human Side of Work", Prentice-Hall
International Inc., Englewood Cliffs, New Jersey 1995 p.330.

BITTEL L.R. and NEWSTROM J.W., "What Every Supervisor Should

Know", McGraw-Hill Publishing Company, New York 1990, p.290.

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unnecessary grapevines. Wise managers know that it is easier and more credible to provide
accurate and timely information than to correct misinformation.

12.04 The Importance of Communication

The importance of communication can be explained by the roles it plays in the

management of organisations. These roles are derived from our discussion on communication in
this chapter.2 Communication

(1) provides an informed basis for decision making.

(2) ensures consistency in performance.

(3) ensures consistency in behaviour and interpersonal relations.

(4) increases understanding and trust among organisational members.

(5) enhances task understanding and thus increases quality of performance.

(6) alerts managers to potential operational problems.

(7) enhances job satisfaction and quality of work life.

(8) enables us to maintain record of organisational events,

resources, and performance.

12.05 Functions of Communication

Communication performs five main functions in the management of organisational

performance: motivating, co-operation, controlling, emotional expression, and information. 3
Let us discuss these functions.

(1) Motivation

Communication leads to motivation and job satisfaction. Through

communication, managers can make employees understand what they are expected to do, feed
them back on how well they are doing it, or the problems they are facing, and what they can do
in order to remove them and thus enhance their productivity. An employee who understands
what to do and how to do it, knows his or her employer’s expectations and, granted that he or
she possesses the capabilities to perform, he or she stands good chances of performing highly
and liking their job. We have emphasised in chapter 11 that in order for motivation, and quality
of work life programmes to yield the desired effects, they should be communicated to all
interested parties. It is through communication that employees and unions can understand and
make effective use of motivational and quality of work life programmes.

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(2) Co-operation

Communication fosters co-operation among organisational members. In a work

organisation where managers and other employees have established a culture of speaking to one
another, information is freely shared - a relationship which leads to greater co-operation. Co-
operation among organisational members increases interpersonal trust, reduces grapevines, and
keeps organisational politics at low and manageable levels.

(3) Controlling Behaviour

Communication also plays the role of controlling the behaviour of organisational

members. An organisation’s communication system requires members to abide by a reporting
order by which an employee must communicate any key issue to his or her immediate superior
instead of “looping” or by-passing his or her boss to communicate the issue to his or her boss’s
boss.

Such management principles as unity of command have the advantages of

ensuring that information is restricted to relevant parties, that communication takes the desired
routes only and that the employees’ immediate bosses are made to play their role in controlling
emotional information which encourages a culture of talking things over and thus minimising
grapevines. The Hawthorne experiments, discussed in chapter one, showed that the work group
was able to maintain control by openly communicating the norms that were to be followed.

(4) Emotional Expression

An organisational culture in which people can communicate freely, encourages

organisational members to release their frustration and feelings of either satisfaction or
dissatisfaction. Free release of emotional expressions is useful in minimising stress,
dissatisfaction, and grapevines.4

(5) Information

In a work organisation where the work force exchanges information freely,

organisational members are informed about what is going on and managerial decision making is
based on accurate information. In an organisation where people are able to exchange
information freely, it also becomes easy to manage a system of industrial democracy, and
organisational justice. Also, decision makers in such an organisation have a wider range of
alternatives due to the abundance of information at their disposal, and thus the chosen
alternatives become qualitatively superior decisions.

12.06 The Communication Process

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Communication should be perceived as a process or flow. The communication process

begins from a sender i.e. an individual, group, section, department, or entire organisation which
has an idea or message to transmit to a receiver as follows:

(1) The message is encoded i.e. converted into a form e.g. written or spoken language
that can be sent to and understood by the receiver. An example of encoding a message is when
we select the words to use when we write or speak to someone. Many communicators have
problems here. The main problems are choice of form or forms and choice of the right quality
and quantity of words that effectively convey the desired message.

(2) After the message is encoded, it is transmitted through one or more channels to
reach the receiver. Channels of communication include telephone lines, radio, television, postal
routes or even human beings etc. The form of the encoded message dictates the choice of the
channel of communication to be used. For instance if the form is oral message, the appropriate
channels will be the telephone, radio, television or in person. If the selected form is visual e.g.
pictures or written words, then postal routes, modems, telex, telefax, or satellite dish.

(3) When he or she receives the message, the receiver must decode it i.e. translate the
message into the sender's ideas and assign meaning to it. We will explain this concept in detail
in the next section.. The objective expected to be achieved here is that the receiver should
receive the message and understand it as intended by the sender. A common potential weakness
in the communication process is the limitation of the receiver's ability to decode messages as
expected by the sender. Generally, people's abilities to comprehend information depends on the
language skills of the sender, the receiver's language skills, as well as the situation obtaining
during decoding.

(4) The last step in the communication process involves feedback i.e. The reaction of
the receiver, to transmit a new message back to the sender. Feedback enables the sender to
ascertain whether the message was received and understood as originally intended. In case the
sender realises that the receiver did not understand the message as intended, he or she initiates
another message to correct the deficiency and sends it through the same process. Feedback also
serves to show that the receiver of the message attached importance to the message.

________________________________________________________________

Feedback

Sender Encoding CHANNELS Decoding Receiver

________________________________________________________________

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Fig. 12-01: The communication process

Messages rarely reach the receivers without problems. Very often a message reaches the
receiver in a form significantly different from the sender’s message i.e. in distorted form.
Distortion is caused by many factors as we will note in the following section on barriers to
effective communication.

12.07 The Emphasis on Perception

The objective of any communicator is to convey his or her message to the receiver. The
central concept in the process of transferring messages from the sender to the receiver is
meaning i.e. the perceived thoughts or ideas that are intended to be expressed by the sender. 5 In
order for communication to be effective, the process of transmitting messages should end up
with the creation of the intended meaning. A simpler way of saying this is that the process
should succeed to make the receiver perceive the thoughts or ideas that the sender intended to
express.

If you are following the argument carefully, you will already have recognised the
emergence of two concepts: i.e. dependency, and creation of meaning. Let us explore these two
concepts.

A communication process has an inherent dependency relationship between the sender of

a message and the receiver. Both the sender and the receiver must be present in order for
communication to take place. But where the sender is initiating the communication process as
one of the tasks of his or her work, it is correct to say that the receiver is in a position to
determine if the communication process has been effective or not. Another way of stating this
concept is that the sender is dependent on the receiver to be effective as a communicator.

The import from this concept for human resources management, is that technically there
should be no bossing attitudes in a communication relationship because both the sender and the
receiver are essential for a communication process to take place. In the performance of their
duties, managers are increasingly having to communicate to employees, e.g. when initiating
change in a process, when moulding behaviour, and when delegating work. In order for them to
be effective, they must appreciate the determining role of the receiver i.e. the dependency role of
the sender, and the need for the sender to create a conducive environment to facilitate the
creation of meaning. An interpersonal relationship bossed by the manager as a sender does not
create a conducive environment for the creation of meaning.

Secondly, in a communication process, meaning cannot be transferred from the sender to

the receiver: the receiver creates his or her own meaning from the message received. 6
Technically, the receiver should not be blamed for creating a meaning different from that
intended by the sender. Creation of meaning is a perceptional issue. So, the way a receiver
perceives and interprets a communicated message is the prerogative of the receiver, which at
best should be used to evaluate the effectiveness of the communication process. It is the

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responsibility of the sender to encode the message correctly, select the right communication
channel, and anticipate possible barriers in order to ensure communication effectiveness.

12.08 Barriers of Communication

Very often what people say is understood to mean differently i.e. distortion. To distort a
message means to change it so that its meaning becomes different from that which was originally
intended by the sender. Messages can be distorted due to careless encoding, poor choice of
symbols, and ambiguity in the content of the message. Also, poor choice of channels, high noise
level, as well as the prejudice, knowledge, perceptual skills level of attention, and care of the
receiver can cause communication distortion. 7In between the sender and the receiver there
usually exist barriers which render communication ineffective. Barriers are interferences in the
communication process which filter part of it, or alter it. In all cases, barriers create problems to
the communication process. Let us discuss these barriers.

(1) Emotions

Emotions i.e. the feelings of the receiver at the time of receiving the communication
message influence how he or she interprets it. The same message received when a person is
angry or depressed is interpreted differently when he or she is in a neutral or happy disposition.
In order to avoid the effects on communication caused by the receiver’s emotions, many senders
prefer to time the communication of their messages at times when the receiver is in his or her
neutral or favourable emotions. Emotions are the most common type of barriers in work
organisations. They are characterised by poor listening habits and irrational and subjective
thinking processes.

For instance, imagine an officer in the human resources department explaining the
company’s lending procedure to an employee who urgently needs a cash advance against her
salary. At the time of applying for the loan, the employee was very depressed. Her
concentration was not on the officer’s explanation, but on getting the money she urgently
wanted. In this case, the employee allowed her emotions to block her understanding of the
company’s lending procedure to employees, which she will most probably need in future.

(2) Semantics

Semantic barriers arise from limitations in the words and symbols which we use to
communicate. Words have so many different meanings that they compel the sender to zero in on
a context that he or she wishes to use in the communication process.

For instance, in work environments, people may deliberately use words which to an
outsider have universal meanings, but which may be totally different from the local meanings
which employees attach to them in a specific environment. Such words are common in
harbours, mines, and manufacturing organisations.

(3) Filtering

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Filtering is a deliberate manipulation of information by the sender so that the receiver

may receive it in a form desired by the sender. For instance, imagine employees in a section ask
their supervisor to report to the production manager that the stoppage of preventive maintenance
of machines in their section will soon cause all the machines to come to a stop. The supervisor,
knowing that because he is responsible for arranging for maintenance will be fired by his boss,
tells the production manager, “I intend to call my team to do thorough maintenance on all the
machines this week end. Do you have any objection?” The production manager will of course
say, “of course not. Please go ahead Tom”, though this is not the original message the
employees wanted to convey to the production manager. The production supervisor has filtered
the message and removed the accusational meaning that the employees had built in it.

Filtering is essential in intra-organisational communication though not for purposes of

message manipulation. The structure of information storage has a pyramidal shape. The lower
the level of the job position in the organisation, the greater the information detail it is exposed
to. However, as information passes from lower to higher levels it has to be condensed and
synthesised so that top managers are not overloaded with unnecessary detail.

Top managers should be given only the most important detail to enable them make big
decisions while the information related to routine operations should be left with managers in the
lower echelons. This sounds a perfectly straightforward guideline, but in practice, the managers
in the lower echelons are de facto the deciders of which information is “most important” and
which is not. In the paraphrasing, condensing, and synthesising of information for top
managers, managers at lower levels often end up reducing, blocking, or even changing the
meanings of messages in order to protect their interests.

It appears that the major determinant in the filtering of communication is the number of
levels in the organisational structure. So, whenever necessary, information should not be
allowed to be sent through so many levels because that subjects it to so much filtering, which
increases its chances of being received with reduced, blocked, or altered meanings at its
destination.

(4) Selective Perception

We have already explained that the receiver’s perception of a message is an important

determinant in the creation of the resulting meaning. Sometimes, for no underlying reasons, the
receiver could perceive a message to mean something completely different from the meaning
intended by the sender. There are however, instances when the receiver may selectively
perceive the message differently with intention to protect his needs, biases, motivations, and
interests.

For instance in an employment interview a person who hates recruiting Muslim

fundamentalists in the work organisation due to their extremist behaviours, may see that
behaviour in all candidates with Muslim names though the candidates may actually not have
extremist behaviour at all.

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(5) Physical Barriers

Physical barriers are communication interferences which are caused by the physical
environment. Physical barriers include noise, distractions, long distances, walls, cliffs, etc. For
instance, in arranging a venue for a meeting, an interview or a training workshop, the human
resources department should consider the possible physical barriers that might affect
communication. A venue which is too near the main road may not be suitable because
communication may be interrupted by distractions from passing vehicles, and noise.

(6) The Halloo Error

It is human weakness for many of us to tend to interpret a message purely from the
confidence we have in the sender. Because of our experience in the trustworthiness and
reliability in the sender we attach enhanced importance and positive values to the message even
though it may not deserve such treatment. The halloo error bars us from making correct
interpretations of messages.

(7) Forgetting

Another barrier of communication is the lack of our ability to remember the details of the
message we receive particularly if the message is communicated to us verbally. If we do not
record down the messages we receive, we are very likely to forget them, so that when we are
required to act on them we act on completely different messages from those we received earlier.

(8) Differences in Status

The positions that individuals occupy in the organisation structure, influence the quality
of communication among them. Peers at any level find it relatively easier to share information
among themselves than between them and their superiors or their juniors. The ideal situation is
for all organisational members to regard communication as a necessary tool which should not
have any status limitations at all, because everyone needs accurate and timely information to be
able to co-exist with others amicably, and contribute appropriately to the organisation’s
performance processes.

The ability to maintain the status, different people hold in the organisation should not be
drawn from communication boycotts, blockages, and distortions. The author knows an
unfortunately large number of managers who used to be good persons, but after their
promotions, they no longer spoke to fellow employees, became terrible hoarders of information,
because to them this is the definition of being a leader. Information is a common resource which
all organisational members are entitled to, for the good of organisational performance and
survival.

(9) Stereotype

Stereotype thinking is another common barrier to communication. It is natural for a

receiver to fix some expectations from the sender because of some past conceptions which the

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receiver believes stay the same. This kind of thinking conditions the receiver to receive
messages in form of certain constant values all the time even when the message may in fact carry
a new meaning. Organisations and people are open systems and they live in dynamic
environments, thus stereotyping is an unfortunate but real communication barrier.

12.09 Overcoming Communication Barriers

In the previous section we discussed nine barriers which render communication processes
ineffective by reducing, blocking, and altering meaning in the transmitted messages. What can
organisations do to minimise these barriers in order to enhance communication effectiveness?
The following suggestions should be helpful.

(1) Use simple, straightforward language

The sender should structure his or her messages in simple and straightforward language,
that is compatible with the audience to whom the message is directed. The use of specialised
vocabulary can greatly facilitate understanding when it is used to communicate with experts in
the technical field, but it can cause enormous difficulties with non-experts in the field.

(2) Listen carefully.

Listening refers to a receiver’s positive effort to receive and understand messages that are
transmitted by sound. Good listening is not only good manners, it also helps the receiver to
understand the emotions, feelings and intentions the sender wishes to communicate. Good
listening shows people that “we care and are interested in them and in their ideas”. 8

Trained instructors are often angered when they discover that they are speaking to people
who are only hearing but not listening. Hearing is the passive state of permitting your ears to
receive sounds. Listening however, is an active search for meaning. So listening is more than
hearing. It involves, in addition to receiving sounds an active search of meaning. As a matter of
fact, when you listen, two people are thinking - the sender and the receiver. 9

Many people are poor listeners. Why? Listening is more difficult to do and more tiring
than both talking and hearing. It demands total concentration and intellectual effort. The
average person speaks at a rate of about 150 words per minute, whereas the average person has
the capacity to listen at the rate of over 1,000 words per minute. 10 Listening is thus more tiring
than talking because it underworks the brain and frees our mind to wander about.

How then can we improve listening skills? Generally, we are able to be better listeners if
we can empathise with the sender, i.e. if we can try to place ourselves in the “shoes” of the
sender. Through empathy, we improve our ability to receive the full meaning of a
communicated message. Other suggestions for improving our listening skills are suggested by
Davis as follows:11

(a) Stop talking. You cannot listen if you are talking.

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(b) Put the talker at ease.

(c) Show the talker that you want to listen.

(d) Remove distractions.

(e) Empathise. See the situation from the other person’s point of view.

(f) Be patient.

(g) Hold your temper.

(h) Go easy with argument and criticism. When you argue, even if you
win, you lose.

(i) Ask questions to show interest and encourage response.

(j) Stop talking. This is first and last because all other guidelines depend on it.
Nature gave people two ears but only one tongue, which is a gentle hint that they should listen
more than they talk. Listening requires two ears, one for meaning and one for feeling. Decision
makers who do not listen have less information for making sound decisions.

(3) Use Feedback

We can remove communication barriers if we make good use of feedback. Feedback can
be sent in any channel of communication desired. Feedback can be initiated by the receiver but
more often it is requested by the sender in order to cross-check if the message was perceived and
understood as intended.

(4) Suppress Emotions

We have explained in the previous section how emotions can be a barrier to effective
communication. We wish to suggest here that if a person receives communication at a time
when he or she is for some reasons not in the right composure, he or she should try to suppress
his or her emotions. If , as is very often the case, the receiver is unable to successfully suppress
his or her emotions, he or she should withdraw from further communication until his or her
normal composure is regained.

(5) Sincerity

Communicators should be sincere personalities. Sincerity affects both the sender and the
receiver alike. A sincere person commands the trust and respect of others: he or she is honest,
serious, and straightforward. A message from a sincere person should be interpreted to mean
what it says, it should be trusted, respected and taken seriously. Similarly when you are
communicating to a sincere person, you ought to know that this is a person who will interpret

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your message to mean what it says, who trusts you to mean what you are saying, who will
respect it and act on it seriously. Where sincerity reigns between the sender and the receiver,
communication barriers are significantly reduced, if not completely removed. Sincerity is a
predisposition, and it is reciprocal. Normally when a person acts sincerely to another, they
expect to be interpreted as such by their colleagues, and to be treated with the same sincerity.

If for instance, a manager has a record of saying things that he or she does not really
mean, his subordinates gradually learn not to attach direct meaning to the manager’s messages
but to guess what he or she could be implying. Similar words can be said about insincere
subordinates, but in organisational life it is probably more pathetic to have an insincere manager
than to have insincere subordinates.

(6) Timing

Messages must be communicated at the right time, if they are to create the desired
impact. An announcement of an attractive benefits package on the same day as a labour
agreement is signed requiring a drastic cut in salaries may be perceived as manipulation by most
employees. So, what we are saying here, is that the timing of the message has changed the
perception of the meaning it was intended to convey.

Managers must learn to keep information and release it at the appropriate time in order to
avoid the misunderstanding of the contained messages.

(8) Channel Selection

In order to ensure maximum effectiveness in communication, selection of the channels to

be used in transmitting certain messages is crucial. As we note from section 12.10, there are
various channels of communication that can be used in transmitting messages. It is the
responsibility of the sender to select which channel or combination of channels to use in order to
ensure that the desired meaning is communicated to the receiver at minimum distortion level.

(9) Make notes

In typical organisational life, particularly for incumbents of criticallnoand centrally

placed jobs, an individual is bound to handle an enormous number of messages. Forgetting is
very possible if the individual does not record these messages i.e. simply relies on his or her
memory. Correctly recorded messages can be retrieve. accurately and can be sent to the right
people at the right time.

(10) Be dynamic

Our recommendation that senders and receivers should be dynamic is aimed at

recommending that they avoid stereotype thinking, which we have described as a
communication barrier in the previous section. By their nature, human beings are dynamic
resources, capable of performing poorly some time and performing wonderfully well at other
times. A real dynamic person should be able to criticise an individual for negative behaviour but

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not completely write off the individual’s personality. Such a person’s thinking enables him or
her to evaluate messages on their merit, not on the preconceived opinion of their sources.
Dynamism helps receivers overcome stereotype and halloo errors in communication.

12.10 Methods of Communication

In work organisations both formal and informal communication is in use. Formal

communication refers to the exchange of information among the members of the organisation in
accordance with the organisation’s structure. Formal communication, unlike informal
communication is regulated by management. It must be conducted with extreme care and goes
through channels established by management. Formal communication is used to transmit
information such as letters of appointments, job instructions, policies, procedures, practices, and
performance appraisal, from management to subordinate employees.12

Specific upward channels are also established for employees to communicate their ideas,
attitudes, and feelings about their jobs, organisational policies and practices, and other matters of
concern to them. In addition to downward, and upward communication, management must
encourage lateral communication for the exchange of ideas among employees of the same level
in the different organisational units. In the performance of their duties, employees, in one unit
play roles that are complimentary, dependent, and conflicting with roles in other units. It is
imperative that management facilitates lateral communication among employees for the
facilitation of performance. Formal communication thus takes the following forms.

(1) Spoken Communication

In practice, modern work organisations use spoken communication extensively because it

is fast, easy, and provides instant feedback. Under spoken communication, the receiver has
practical experience of the ruling conditions under which the message is being transferred.
Therefore, under spoken communication, the sender’s mood, gestures, tone, mannerisms,
emphasis, and facial expressions all have an impact of the receiver’s understanding of the
message being transmitted. Normally, no records are kept of spoken communication but where
desired, a tape recorder or video camera may be used. Spoken communication can take the
following main forms:

(a) Face to Face Communication

Face to face communication between managers and subordinates is ordinarily

used to: advise subordinates what is to be done, increase goal aspirations and hence motivations,
communicate the consequences of their performance, and provide for employee feedback to
management, and vice versa.13

(b) Telephone Communication

Telephone calls are used for quick check-ups or for transmitting and receiving
information and instructions. People communicate more effectively on the telephone than they

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do in a face to face conversation, apparently because in a phone conversation the sender

succeeds to speak differently to the receiver there are fewer distracting signals to deal with.

However, on the phone, the personality of the communicators contradicts his or

her real self. It is important for people to find out how they sound when they are talking on the
telephone i.e. how polite, clear and truthful they sound. It is important for organisations to
enable their employees to communicate by telephone. Short-sighted people restrict the use of
telephone services to their employees under excuses of cost reduction. In a survey of ten
Tanzanian public work organisations, managers confessed that cutting telephone services from
low level personnel actually led to increased absenteeism from work and misuse of telephone
services.

(c) Radio communication

Radio communication has one advantage which makes it especially suitable for
developing countries: it canlyeach places where there is no telephone, and since it is used ctly
among employees, it concentrates on business and is not connected to normal telephone lines.
However, it has offsetting dinedvantages. Radio communication must be brief because at least
one receiver operates on batteries, and its reception clarity is limited by distance and physical
barriers. Radio communication is extensively used by the police, army, and other work
organisations with mobile crews.

(d) Video Communication

Video communication encompasses the advantages of the telephone and face to

face communication. In the developed world, it is possible for one management group in one
city to communicate face to face with another group in another city by using the picturephone
meeting service (PMS).14 The PMS is a facility which ..................CLEO COMPLETE HERE.

(e) Meetings

Meetings are a useful communication forum which uses the face-to-face method.
For meetings to be useful, they should only be called for the following reasons: 15

(i) When leaders need information simultaneously from many people, e.g. when the
leader does not have sufficient information to make a good decision, he or she may call a
meeting of those people who possess the information.

(ii) To enable members to own an idea and thus strengthen members’ commitment.
You will remember that on various occasions, in this book we have recommended that the
design of human resources programmes should be done with the participation of employees and
their union so that they can feel that the programme is theirs and thus enhance their commitment
to its implementation. Occasions for collection of ideas and strengthening commitment are
organised in the form of meetings that are led in styles illustrated in Fig. 12-03. At such
meetings, the chairperson takes care to encourage members’ participation and feedback

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exchange, which in practice, demands skilful co-ordinating, supportive, and listening skills from
the chairperson.

(iii) To enable members perform and understand complex decisions. Groups are
superior to individuals in performing complex tasks particularly those requiring division of
labour.16 A task or problem, particularly one whose output only is known, requires several kinds
of expertise, can be performed much better by a well organised group than by isolated
individuals. A well managed group also outperforms individuals, at tasks that require learning
of new ideas, storage and retrieval of information. This is mainly because groups have greater
and faster learning capability than individuals. 17 Not only do groups have a larger pool of
expertise and experience to draw from, but they also learn faster and possess greater ability to
recognise and correct errors than individuals.

In order to succeed to be effective, means of communicating in addition to being

called for necessary and appropriate reasons, meetings must:

(i) consist of the right membership in terms of number of participants as well

as who they are, and how relevant they are to the goals of the meeting.

_________________________________________________________________

C C C

(3) Decision making leader is

(2) Collecting Information ordinary participant, all have
(1) Giving information
equal responsibility in making
decision.

C C

Decision making members contribute

ideas to enable boss make decisions Problem solving approach
which is handed down to all for
implementation.

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_________________________________________________________________

Fig. 12-03: Types of meetings and leadership styles.

(ii) be well planned in terms of physical space, audio and visual equipment,
someone to take minutes, co-ordination with individuals making presentations, arrangement of
meeting’s business, and timing not only of the meeting’s duration, but also a detailed forecast for
duration of time for the individual items of the agenda.

(iii) be well managed. The management of meeting dynamics is very relevant

to our communication discussion. In all democratic organisations, meetings are unavoidable.
The manager’s role involves the successful management of meetings. How well meetings are
managed also has a decisive effect on the use of meetings as an effective communication means.
Let us devote some space and time to discuss the management of meetings.

To start with, the one key person that is ultimately responsible in the management of the
dynamics of a meeting is its chair person. The following are the general guidelines for
managing meeting dynamics.

(1) Ensure that members get to know each other before the meeting moves into
serious business. Introduction of members to one another enables them to get acquainted, feel
comfortable and to establish interpersonal trust - all of which are important attributes for the
effectiveness of the meeting, particularly if it iinlikely to produce emotional confrontations.

At meetings, s. inars, and workshops, participants usually tend to hold back iar. they are
cautiously reticent to get fully involved until they are sure who they are working with i.e. who
the members are, their titles, expertise, experience, and relevance to the items on the agenda. If
a chairperson overlooks the importance of getting members acquainted, members take a long
time to come together and work seriously or depending on the business, the meeting could
degenerate into hostile confrontations.

Here are four tactics of helping the members of a meeting get acquainted: 18

(a) Before the first meeting, send each member a brief biographical outline of the
other members. This information could be part of the papers accompanying the notice of the
meeting.

(b) Before the meeting starts, provide a social opportunity to familiarise e.g. a coffee
or cocktail hour.

(c) At the start of the meeting, the chairperson should introduce each member or get
members to take turns to introduce themselves. Usually, the chair person’s introduction is more
informative because some members may be too modest to say much about themselves.

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(d) If the meeting is long, provide for a break in the form of a dinner or cocktail
during which members can resume the socialisation they had to postpone in order to start
business but which has been enhanced by the members roles in the meeting so far.

(2) Review the overall purpose of the meeting i.e. briefly explain the overall business
of the meeting for everyone to recapitulate, specify the target time length for the meeting, and
highlight its essential tasks.

(3) Structure the discussions to facilitate critical thinking but refrain from biasing the
discussions with strong personal opinions. Huber suggests five steps for systematically
structuring the business of a meeting:19

(a) If the meeting is part of a series, then at the beginning of the meeting, the chair
person should review the progress made to-date and establish the tasks facing the current
meeting. This step, which links the current meeting to the stages accomplished by previous
meetings, has three main benefits. First, it reinforces the group’s previous successes. Secondly,
it ensures that all members have a common understanding of the objectives and starting point of
the current meeting. And thirdly, it motivates the group and sets the stage for to tackling the
new tasks.

(b) Among the first items of the agenda, obtain a report from each member who was
given an assigned task. This action has the following two motivational values: first, it provides
public recognition to the presenter. Secondly, it enhances the principle of accountability among
the members i.e. they learn from observation and experience that when they are assigned tasks,
they will be held accountable for them in a similar manner.

If this item is not skilfully handled, it may have a demoralising effect to the members
with pre-assigned tasks. While the meeting conducts its other business, the members scheduled
to make presentations will be anxiously thinking about what they are going to say, and worrying
whether there is enough time left for them to make useful contributions.

(c) Sustain the flow of the discussions using informational displays. Information
displays sustain members’ interest and help them process information effectively. For example,
in a brainstorming session, suggestions should be listed on the blackboard or flip chart; while in
a technical presentation, handouts and overhead transparencies should be used.

(d) The chair person should manage the discussion in a manner that encourages as
many participants as possible to participate. The meeting achieves high output levels, and the
members achieve high satisfaction, when the rate of participation of individuals corresponds
with their abilities. In order to achieve a high and equitable participation among members, the
chairperson should tactfully prevent a few individuals from dominating the meeting.

The chairperson can achieve this by the use of guiding comments such as, “Now
Mr. Chibuye, I think we fully understand your views on this matter. Let us in the name of
fairness allow other members to express their views as well”. Or, “Dr. Mwasele, we have not
heard from you today. What are your views on this proposal?” And yet another, “Now

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members almost all the arguments that have come up have been in support of the proposal. Can
we now hear from the members who are opposed to the proposal as well?”

The first comment is intended to discourage a long speaker so that others also
have a chance to contribute to the discussion. The second comment is intended to draw quiet
members into the discussion. The third one is intended to maintain an equitable distribution
between points of views and to economise the time spent by members repeating views
contributed by other members.

(e) The chairperson should close the meeting by summarising the accomplishments
of the meeting and reviewing the objects of the next meeting or the assignments of individuals at
the next meeting. It is the duty of the chairperson to make the members feel a sense of
accomplishment at the end of the meeting, because the achievements of the current meeting
provide motivation for participation at the next meeting. Also, it is essential for the chairperson
to review plans for the next meeting in the same spirit just as he or she started the meeting by
reviewing the achievements of the last meeting. This enables members to end the meeting with
a clear view of the tasks of the next meeting.

(2) Written communication

All managers spend much of their time reading and preparing written communication.
Written communication is in the forms of job instructions, procedures policy manuals reports,
audio visual aids, bulletins, letters, memorandums, and organisational newspapers. We wish to
emphasise that written communication should succeed to achieve both clarity and courtesy i.e.
convey the required meaning to the target person as courteously as possible. 20 Skills in effective
written communication can be enhanced, if the human resources department arranges for
appropriate courses in writing skills.

In many organisations, managers will not volunteer to express weaknesses in written

communication or to be identified as weak communicators. It is also an open secret that some
managers can be very poor in written communication. They frown it out with their authority and
force their subordinates to accept that they “are” understood. So, where the human resources
department identifies deficiencies in written communication in managers, it should either use the
office of the chief executive to send such managers for training or ensure that the organisation’s
training programme contains training on written communication and attractive inducements
targeted at attracting the managers.

Sometimes, employees do communicate to management in written form. Examples of

upward written communication include suggestion programmes, and attitude surveys. A
suggestion programme is a system of stimulating employee participation by rewarding them for
suggestions made e.g. improvement in work methods and procedures, equipment design and
safety measures. Attitude surveys, are conducted through questionnaires and are aimed at
providing information to help management in designing and or implementing better quality of
work life programmes. Like we mentioned in the case of downward written communication,
upward communication must also achieve clarity and courtesy.

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(3) Body Language

Non-verbal body movements or facial expressions which convey to people messages of

any kind are called body language. These signals as illustrated in Fig. 12-04 are prone to various
interpretations, depending on the cultural background of the people involved. They should not
be relied upon for effective communication.

________________________________________________________________
Signal Meaning

Frowning I am angry.
Shrugging of shoulders I do not know, I do not like.
Nodding head up and down I agree.
Shaking head side to side I disagree.
Raising eye brows I doubt, am surprised, am sceptical.
Drumming fingers Please hurry up, finish up.
Rolling eyes I do not believe you.
Tight-lipped frowning I am very displeased, disappointed.
_______________________________________________________________

Fig. 12-04: Examples of Tanzanian body language signals

12.11 Making Effective Presentations

Apart from the chairperson’s role, the other critical role in effective meetings is that of a
presenter. Every person plays the role of presenter sometime in life, and when they do, they
want to do a good job. The following are ten useful guidelines to help you improve your
presentation skills.21 These guidelines can equally be used by the chairperson and by all persons
who make oral presentations to an audience.

(1) Use physical space and movement to your advantage.

Prior to the presentation, arrange the room in a way that the participants are evenly
spread out from the presenter. The presenter should not be too close to the participants sitting in
front, and not too distant from the participants sitting at the back of the room. The participants
should also sit as close to one another as possible, in order to increase cohesion.

(2) Use gestures naturally.

The presenter should avoid irrelevant actions and mannerisms e.g. unnecessarily
adjusting spectacles, jingling coins in the pockets, and unnecessary shifting of speech notes.
Imitated gestures are unnatural to the presenter and irritating to the audience. Natural and
skilfully used gestures can be used to illustrate, describe, and emphasise concepts.

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(3) Present your proposals in logically compelling arguments.

There are two basic approaches to making a logical argument: inductive and deductive.
An inductive presentation begins with a set of data or examples. It then uses these data or
examples to construct an argument to support a proposal.

A deductive presentation on the other hand, begins by outlining a set of general

principles, values or beliefs about a programme. It then proceeds to show why they consider the
programme wrongly or correctly designed. For example, the system theory dictates that a well
designed organisation ought to ensure an orderly arrangement of its sub-systems so that each
subsystem plays its specific role in the predetermined relationship with other subsystems. My
proposal is that in the organisation structure, the placement of our university library as an
academic subsystem on the one hand, and as part of the central administration on the other, is
wrong and must inevitably lead our university into avoidable management and performance
problems.

(4) Show concern for the audience as individuals, not as a bunch of participants.

It is useful for the presenter to learn as much as possible about the members that make up
his or her audience. Such details about the members’ status, qualifications, experience, and
attitude about the presenter’s subject and the presenter himself or herself will greatly help the
presenter to structure his or her presentation to achieve optimum effectiveness. Occasional
reference to members in the presentation which specifically touches their background and
interests keeps the presentation not only lively, but honestly on cause.

(5) Maintain your audience’s attention.

The presenter should consistently show that he or she is alert, intense, and enthusiastic,
and use a tone of voice and facial expression that do not send participants to sleep. It is also
suggested that the presenter should speak in standing position assuming an erect but comfortable
posture, but if he or she must speak while seated, the presenter should sit erect and lean slightly
forward towards the audience. Finally the presenter should cleverly use humour in order to
provide variety to the audience.

(6) Be flexible.

The presenter should use his or her knowledge of the subject to avoid being marooned to
his or her notes during the presentation. A good presenter should be able to use his or her notes
as a guide only and use an approach or approaches most appropriate to the composition and
mood of the audience.

(7) Encourage audience participation.

Whenever possible, audience participation gives the presenter an opportunity to check

participant interest and comprehension and to break the possible monotony arising out of one
way communication. Audience participation can also be stimulated by asking questions.

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(8) Do not panic when challenged.

A good presenter should never allow himself or herself to be angry, intimidated or

embarrassed by participants’ feedback. One clue to avoid this situation is not to take any
negative feedback from your audience personally. An experienced presenter will respond to
objections with a smile and as positively as possible; and answer questions as succinctly as
possible in order to avoid further unnecessary questions.

(9) Maintain control of the meeting.

If you come across a questioner who puts you on the defensive position, you should
quickly move out of the situation by either avoiding answering the question or postponing it
politely by saying simply, “that is a brilliant question. We will surely discover the answer in the
next few minutes.” Another technique of postponing answers of this type is to offer, “So that we
may be able to finish the discussion of our subject within the allotted time, I suggest we continue
with the presentation. I will however be available to answer Mr. Kaijage’s question after the
session”. The crucial issue here is the presenter has an objective and that objective must be
achieved, not any other that arise during the course of the meeting.

(10) Respond spontaneously to unanticipated disturbances.

If for instance power, or a mike or overhead projector fails, you should not panic. You
should quickly inform the participants that this has happened, and make the necessary
adjustments to continue with or without the failed equipment. Under no circumstances should
the presenter attempt to conceal the fact that the equipment has failed. This may not be
respectful enough to the participants who see for themselves that the equipment has failed, and it
is obviously inappropriate for the presenter to assume responsibility for a mistake he did not
make.

12.12 Grapevines

A grapevine is an informal method of communication involving peers in the same

organisational unit or in different organisational units. In a grapevine, people exchange pieces
of information mainly as a means of socialising or merely sharing information. The grapevine
provides for a rapid transmission of information and very often misinformation. Grapevines are
common in organisations where the formal communication methods are ineffective. So one way
of discouraging grapevines is to keep channels of communication open and presenting positive
and truthful facts on all organisational matters. This seems to confirm the saying in
Organisational Behaviour that one gap human beings cannot tolerate is an information gap: they
will put something in its place until the grapevine can be filled with the correct information.

Grapevines lead to a political organisational environment. They disturb management

because they distort communication. When employees indulge in grapevines, they sow seeds of
distrust, and consume useful organisational time sending or receiving guessed information.

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They should therefore be discouraged, which is not similar to suggesting that they should be
suppressed. We recommend that managers should discourage grapevines by encouraging
efficient communication, being positive, and truthful to their employees, and providing timely
and accurate information as a habit.

12.13 Communicating HRM Programmes

The position of the HR department in the structure of the work organisation makes the
department dependent on communication as a means to achieving effectiveness and efficiency of
its services. Pasqueletto correctly compared the communication of human resources
programmes to the marketing of a new product. 22 Consider the sad fact, that approximately 90
percent of new consumer products that are introduced to the market fail. What factors contribute
towards this failure? In some cases, failure is due to a poor product that does not fill a current
consumer need. In other cases, product failure may be due to a problem in the marketing system
i.e. the product may have been inadequately researched, the salespeople may not have been
properly trained, the distribution system may have been poorly designed and managed, or the
overall marketing strategy may have been misguided. Similarly, many well-designed human
resources programmes fail because they are not properly communicated or marketed. In the case
of human resources programmes, the customers are the employees, and the price is often
employee commitment, motivation and cooperation.

Each and every one of the human resources functions discussed in this book requires
some degree of effective communication to succeed. For instance, think of the crucial role that
communication plays in career planning, recruiting, training, and performance appraisal. In all
too many instances, human resources managers spend tremendous amounts of time developing
good programmes, only to subsequently do a poor job of communicating them. It is helpful for
human resources manager to develop a marketing approach when implementing their
programmes. The following are six useful communication-related guidelines for human
resources managers.
Cleo Develop each of the following guidelines using Byars pp.15 & 16
(a) Avoid communicating in peer group or “privileged-class” language.

(b) Back up communication with management action.

(c) Don’t ignore the cultural aspects of communication.

(d) Periodically reinforce employee communication.

(e) Transmit information and not just data.

(f) Don’t ignore the perceptual and behavioural aspects of communication.

The above guidelines involve good common sense. We are not implying that human
resources managers in African work organisations are not practical; rather, we are expressing the
view that they often do not take sufficient time to think through a communication. When

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structuring a communication, we think human resources managers should ask themselves, “How
could this message be possibly misinterpreted?”

12.14 HRM in Practice

12.15 Progress Questions

(1) Briefly discuss the role played by communication in the performance

of work organisations.
2
See also TORRINGTON D. And HALL L., “CLEO COMPLETE“ Prentice
Hall p.135.

3
SCOTT W.G. and MITCHELL T.R., “Organisation theory: A Structural
and Behavioural Analysis”, Richard D. Irwin, New York, 1976.

4
Refer to chapter fifteen on stress management.

5
COLLINS Cobuild English Language Dictionary, Collins Publishers 1987.

6
WILKENS P.L. and TIMM P.R., “Perceived Communication Inequity: A
Determinant of Job dissatisfaction” Journal of Management, Spring 1078
pp.107-119.

7
ROBBINS S.P., “Organisational Behaviour: Concepts, Controversies, and
Applications”, Prentice-Hall International (UK) Limited, London, 1986 pp.
140-141.

8
WERTHER W.B. and DAVIS K., “Personnel Management and Human
Resources”. McGraw-Hill Book Co., New York 1987 p. 449.

9
ROBBINS S.P., Op. Cit. p. 215.

10
Ibid.

11
DAVIS K. “Human Behaviour at Work: Organisational Behaviour”,
McGraw Hill Inc. New York 1981.

12
KATZ D. And KAHN R.L., “The Social Psychology of Organisations”,
John Wiley and Sons, Inc., New York 1978 pp.440 - 443.

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(2) With the help of a diagram, explain the organisational communication

process.

(3) What is the place of perception in the effectiveness of organisational

communication?

(4) Discuss the barriers to effective communication in work organisations

in your country.

(5) How can barriers to communication be overcome?

13
See also CUMMINGS L.L. and SCHWAB D.P., “Performance in
Organisations - Determinants and Appraisal”, Scott, Foresman and
Company, Glenview 1973, pp. 51 - 52.

14
The picturephone meeting service is an AT&T invention.

15
WHETTEN D.A. and CAMERON K.A., “Developing Management Skills”,
Scott, Foresman and Company, Glenview 1984, pp.450 - 457.

16
FILLEY A., “A Committee Management: Guidelines from Social Science
Research” California Management Review 1970, No.13 pp. 13-21.

JEWELL L.N. and REITZ H.J., “Group Effectiveness In Organisations”

Glenview III, Scott Foresman, New York, 1981.

17
DAVIS J., “Group Performance”, Addison Wesley Reading, Massachusetts,
1969.

18
HUBER G. “Managerial Decision Making” Scott, Foresman, Glenview,
Illinois 1980 p.180.

19
Ibid, pp.179 - 188.

20
BITTEL L.R. and NEWSTROM J.W., Op. Cit. pp 295-298.

21
WILCOX R.P. “Oral Reporting in Business and Industry”, Prentice Hall
International, Englewood cliffs, New Jersey, 1967.

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(6) Critically discuss the possible methods of communication.

(7) (a) When should meetings be used as a means of communication?

(b) In which ways can a chairman get the members of a meeting

acquainted?

(8) Discuss the management guidelines for managing effective meeting

dynamics.

(9) Mbekomize has been invited to make a presentation at a meeting of

army officers about “Effective Human Resources Planning in the Civil
Service”. Give him ten general guidelines to enable him make a good
presentation.

(10) Write brief notes on:

(a) Written communication.

(b) Grapevines

(c) Body language.

12.15 References

BARRETT H. “Practical Uses of Speech Communication, Holt, Rinehart

and Winston, New York, 1977.

MAMBERT W.A. “Effective Presentations”, John Wiley & Sons, New

York, 1976.
22
Pasqueletto J. “An HRS Marketing Strategy”, Personnel Journal, June 1989
pp. 62 – 71.

396