Communication Strategies

Internal Communication

• Definition: Information transmission within an organization.
• Examples: Vertical, horizontal, formal, and informal communication.

Vertical Communication

• Hierarchical information sharing (top-down or bottom-up).
• Advantages:
  • Conveys subordinate messages.
  • Maintains labor-management relations and organizational discipline.
  • Explains policies and plans.
  • Supports effective decision-making and decentralization.
  • Avoids bypassing and maintains chain of command.
  • Facilitates job assignment and evaluation, increasing efficiency.
• Disadvantages:
  • Delay process.
  • Disturbs discipline if superiors' roles are questioned.
  • Reduces efficiency due to commanding nature.
  • Can lead to loss or distortion of information.
  • Reduces relationships and can be slow, leading to ineffectiveness.
  • Superiors may neglect to send messages.

Horizontal Communication

• Information sharing among people at the same organizational level.
• Effective for inter-divisional collaboration.
• Advantages:
  • Informal relationships and coordination of activities.
  • Facilitates departmental communication and ends misunderstanding.
  • Hinders bureaucracy and promotes dynamism at work.
  • Supports group activities and quick problem-solving.
  • Links areas of expertise and guards against message distortion.
• Disadvantages:
  • Overload of unfiltered information, wasting time.
  • Positional problems and lack of understanding.
  • Over-specialization, rivalry, and low motivation.
  • Can lead to low productivity.

Formal Communication

• Uses formally recognized channels.
• Examples: Meetings, presentations, memos, reports.
• Characteristics:
  • Well-defined rules and regulations.
  • Bindings with chain of command.
  • Delegation of authority.
  • Used as a reference with recognition.

Informal Communication

• Casual, unofficial information exchange without formal rules.
• Examples: Conversations with friends, family, or colleagues.
• Features:
  • Unofficial channel, not controlled by management.
  • Perceived as more reliable but can contain false information.
  • Flexible and oral.
  • Rapid but may distort meaning.
  • Influential but free from accountability.
  • Multidirectional and may serve personal interests.
• Advantages:
  • Presents grievances and acts as an alternate system.
  • Improves relationships and increases efficiency.
  • Rapid communication and improves interpersonal relationships.
• Disadvantages:
  • Distorts meaning and spreads rumors.
  • Causes misunderstanding and makes maintaining secrecy impossible.
  • Difficult to control, leads to non-cooperation, and provides partial/unreliable information.
  • Can damage discipline and contradict formal information.

Effective Communication Factors

• Clarity: Accurate message meaning.
• Simplicity and economy: Simple methods and language.
• Integrity: Following proper channels.
• Attention: Receiver's focus on information.
• Avoidance of unnecessary information: Concise messages.

External Communication

• Information exchange between an organization and external entities.
• Objectives:
  • Maintain community relations.
  • Collection of information.
  • Contracts with customers.
  • Relations with suppliers, financial institutions, and government.
  • Shareholder relation, regulatory bodies, company images, and international relations.

Specific Communication Needs

• Adapt communication to diverse clients, considering:
  • Disability, Literacy, Language, Gender, age, experiences and emotional well-being.
  • Critical situations.
  • Culture and remote locations.
• Strategies:
  • Use facial expressions, gestures, objects, pictures, and written words.
  • Provide videos, demonstrations, translations, and interpreters.
  • Utilize augmentative communication systems.

Promote Communication Strategies

• Encourage open environment.
• Appreciate others' efforts.
• Ensure clear rules and expectations.
• Be friendly and recognize team membership.
• Improve presentation skills.

Barriers to Listening

• Focusing on agenda, information overload, criticizing speaker, emotional/external noise, physical difficulty.

Strategies for Effective Listening

• Stop, look, listen for essence, be empathetic, and ask questions.

Barriers to Accurate Perception

• Stereotyping, generalizing, not investing time, distorted focus, assuming similar interpretations, incongruent cues.

Strategies for Accurate Perception

• Analyze perceptions, improve perception, and focus on others.

Barriers to Effective Verbal Communication

• Lacking clarity, using stereotypes, jumping to conclusions, dysfunctional responses, lacking confidence.

Strategies for Effective Verbal Communication

• Focus on the issue, be genuine, empathetic, flexible, value yourself, present as an equal, and use affirming responses.

Communication Pathways

• Definition: System through which messages flow.

Types of Organizational Pathways

1. Formal Communication Structure:
   • Definition: Communication through officially designated channels.
     • Types:
       • Downward Communication
         • Communication flows from upper to lower
       • Upward Communication
         • Transmission of messages from lower to higher levels of the organization
       • Horizontal Communication
         • Flow of messages across functional areas at a given level of an organization
2. Informal Communication
   • Definition: Episodes of interaction that do not reflect officially designated channels of communication.

Ways to Improve Your Communication Skills

1. Listen
2. Be aware of body language
3. Ask questions
4. Be brief and to the point
5. Take notes