1.2 What is communication? – Corporate communication for success (2023)

Those

ThatThoseintroduces himself, creates and sends the message. In a public speaking situation, the source is the person making the speech. He or she conveys the message by sharing new information with the audience. The speaker also conveys a message through their tone of voice, body language, and choice of clothing. The speaker begins by first determining the message—what to say and how to say it. The second step is to encode the message, choosing just the right order or perfect words to convey the intended meaning. The third step is to present or broadcast the information to the recipient or audience. Finally, by observing the audience's reaction, the source recognizes how well they received the message and responds with clarifications or supporting information.

news

"Thatmessageis the appeal or meaning created by the source for the recipient or audience.” (McLean, 2005) When you plan to give a speech or write a report, your message shines through only from the words you choose to exist that convey your meaning. But this is just the beginning. The words are brought together with grammar and organization. You can save your main point for last. The message also consists of the way you say it - in a speech with your tone of voice, your body language and your looks - and in a report with your writing style, your punctuation and the headings and formatting you choose. Additionally, part of the message can be the environment or context in which you present it and noise that can make your message difficult to hear or see.

For example, imagine you are addressing a large audience of sales reps and you know there is a World Series game tonight. Your audience might have a hard time settling down, but you might decide to start with, "I understand there's an important game tonight." By verbally expressing something that most of the people in your audience are familiar with and interested in, this is a great way to capture and focus their attention.

Channel

"ThatChannelis the manner in which a message or messages are transmitted between source and recipient.” (McLean, 2005) Think of your television, for example. How many channels do you have on your TV? Each channel, even in a digital world, takes up some space in the cable or signal that brings each channel's message to your home. Television combines an audio signal that you hear with a visual signal that you see. Together they convey the message to the recipient or audience. Turn off the volume on your TV. Can you still understand what is happening? This is often possible because body language conveys part of the message of the show. Now turn up the volume, but turn around so you can't see the TV. You can still hear the dialogue and follow the plot.

Similarly, when you speak or write, you use a channel to convey your message. Spoken channels include face-to-face conversations, speeches, phone calls and voicemail messages, radio, public address systems, and Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP). Written channels include letters, memoranda, purchase orders, invoices, newspaper and magazine articles, blogs, emails, text messages, tweets, and so on.

recipient

"Thatrecipientreceives the message from the source, analyzes and interprets the message in a way that is both intended and unintended by the source.” (McLean, 2005) To better understand this component, imagine a receiver on a soccer team. The quarterback throws the football (message) to a receiver who must see and interpret where he is catching the ball. The quarterback may intend for the recipient to "pick up" their message in one way, but the recipient may see things differently and miss the football (intended meaning) altogether.

As a recipient, you hear, see, touch, smell, and/or taste to receive a message. Your audience "guesses" you, as you might do long before you take the stage or open your mouth. Your audience's nonverbal responses can serve as clues as to how to adjust your opening. By putting yourself in their place, you anticipate what you would be looking for if you were them. Just as a quarterback plans where the receiver will be in order to place the ball correctly, you too can discern the interaction between source and receiver in a business communications context. All of this happens at the same time and illustrates why and how communication is constantly changing.

Feedback

If you respond to the source, intentionally or unintentionally, provide feedback.Feedbackconsists of messages that the recipient sends back to the source. Verbal or non-verbal, all of these feedback signals allow the source to see how well, how accurate (or how poorly and inaccurately) the message was received. Feedback also provides an opportunity for the recipient or audience to ask for clarification, agree or disagree, or suggest that the source could make the message more interesting. As feedback increases, so does communication accuracy (Leavitt & Mueller, 1951).

Let's say you're a sales manager and you're on a conference call with four sales reps. As a source, you want to tell the sales reps to use the fact that it's World Series season to close the sale of baseball-related sports gear. You say your message, but you hear no response from your audience. You might assume that means they understood you and agreed with you, but later in the month you might be disappointed to find that very few sales were made. If you followed your message with a request for feedback (“Does that make sense? Do any of you have questions?”), you may have an opportunity to refine your message and find out if any of the sales reps believed your suggestion would don't work for their customers.

Surroundings

"Thatvicinityis the physical and psychological atmosphere in which you send and receive messages.” (McLean, 2005) The environment can include the tables, chairs, lighting and sound equipment located in the room. The room itself is an example of the surroundings. The environment can also include factors such as formal attire, which can indicate whether a discussion is open and caring or more professional and formal. People are more likely to have an intimate conversation when they are physically close and less likely when they can only see each other from across the room. If so, they may be texting each other, which is itself an intimate form of communication. The choice of text is influenced by the environment. As a speaker, your environment will influence and play a role in your speech. It's always a good idea to check where you'll be speaking before the day of the actual presentation.

context

"Thatcontextof the communication interaction involves the setting, the scene, and the expectations of the people involved.” (McLean, 2005) A professional communication context may include business suits (environmental cues) that directly or indirectly influence participants' expectations of language and behavior.

A presentation or discussion does not take place as an isolated event. When you came to class, you came from somewhere. So is the person sitting next to you, as is the instructor. The degree to which the setting is formal or informal depends on the participants' contextual expectations of the communication. The person sitting next to you may be used to informal communication with faculty, but that particular faculty may be used to verbal and non-verbal displays of respect in the academic setting. You may also be used to formal interactions with teachers and find your classmate asking "Hey teacher, do we have homework today?". as rude and inconsiderate when they take it as normal. The instructor's non-verbal response certainly gives you an indication of how he perceives the interaction, both the choice of words and the way they were said.

Context is about what people expect from each other, and we often create those expectations from environmental cues. Traditional gatherings like weddings or quinceañeras are often formal events. There is a time for quiet social greetings, a time of silence as the bride walks down the aisle, or the father can have the first dance with his daughter as she is being transformed from girl to woman in the eyes of her community. In both celebrations, there can come a time for wild partying and dancing. You may be asked to make a toast, and the context of the wedding or quinceañera will affect your presentation, timing, and effectiveness.

Two communication models

Researchers have observed that in a communication, the source and receiver can send messages simultaneously, and often overlapping. You, as the speaker, often play both roles, as a source and as a receiver. You focus on communicating and receiving your messages to the audience. The audience will respond in the form of feedback that will give you important clues. While there are many communication models, here we focus on two that offer perspectives and lessons for business communicators.

Instead of considering the source sending a message and someone receiving it as two distinct acts, researchers often view communication as onetransaktionalprocess (Figure 1.3 "Transactional communication model"), where actions are often performed simultaneously. The distinction between source and recipient becomes blurred, for example, when the conversation is switched, in which both participants take on both roles at the same time.

Researchers have also explored the idea that we all construct our own interpretations of the message. As the State Department quote at the beginning of this chapter shows, what I said and what you heard may be different. In whichconstructivistmodel (Figure 1.4 "Constructivist communication model"), we focus on negotiated meaning or commonality when attempting to describe communication (Pearce & Cronen, 1980),

Imagine you are visiting Atlanta, Georgia and you go to a restaurant for dinner. When asked if you'd like a "Coke," you can answer "Sure." The waiter can then ask you again, "What kind?" and you can reply, "Coke is fine." The waiter can then ask a third time, "What kind of soft drink would you like?" The misconception in this example is that in Atlanta, home of the Coca-Cola Company, most soft drinks are generically referred to as "cola." When you order a soft drink, you must specify what kind it is, even if you want to order a drink that isn't cola or isn't even made by the Coca-Cola Company. For someone from other regions of the United States, the words "pop," "soda pop," or "soda" may be the familiar term for a soft drink; not necessarily the "Coke" brand. In this example, both you and the waiter understand the word cola, but each has a different meaning. In order to communicate, you both need to recognize what the term means to the other person and create common ground to fully understand the request and provide a response.

Because we carry within ourselves the multiple meanings of words, gestures, and ideas, we can refer to a dictionary, but we still have to negotiate meaning.

references

Cronen, V. & Pearce, W.B. (1982). The coordinated management of meaning: A theory of communication. In F.E. Dance (ed.),theory of human communication(S. 61–89). New York, NY: Harper & Row.

Leavitt, H. & Mueller, R. (1951). Some implications of feedback on communication.human relationships, 4, 401–410.

McLean, S. (2003).The basics of voice communication. Boston, MA: Allyn & Bacon.

McLean, S. (2005).The basics of interpersonal communication(S. 10). Boston, MA: Allyn & Bacon.

Pearce, W.B., & Cronen, V. (1980).Communication, Action and Meaning: The Creation of Social Realities. New York, NY: Praeger.

Pearson, J. & Nelson, P. (2000).An introduction to human communication: understanding and sharing(S. 6). Boston, MA: McGraw-Hill.

Weekley, E. (1967).An Etymological Dictionary of Modern English(Vol. 1, p. 338). New York, NY: Dover Publications.