A Crucial Aspect in Business
IntroductionCommunication is the mutual exchange of understanding, originating with the receiver. It’s required that communication be effective in business due to its importance in the management. It also presents the basic function of management for instance in planning, organizing, staffing, directing, and controlling.
Business cannot function well without effective and proper communication, which includes the continuous flow of information (Ellen, 2009). The response or feedback is integral part of business communication. Currently, organizations and companies have expanded and thus involve many people, who need to continuously communicate over various issues.There are various and different departments and levels of hierarchy in the organizations. The bigger the number of levels and departments, the harder is the task of managing the organization. Therefore, communication here plays vital tasks in process of directing and controlling the individuals in the organization.
Urgent feedback can be received and misunderstandings if any can be eliminated. Effective communication is required between the managers and the subordinates in an organization, between organization and the entire society, and the community for instance between the management and trade unions. It is important for the success and growth of an organization or a company. Communication gaps, hence needs to be avoided in any organization if it needs to prosper to higher levels (Ellen, 2009).Business communication is viewed to be a goal oriented. The regulations, policies of the organization and its rules need to be communicated effectively to the people working within and even those outside the company.
It is regulated by particular rules and beliefs. In previous years, business communication was limited to only paper work, telephone calls among other means but currently, with the advancement in technology there is cell phone, video conferencing, emails, satellite communication to support business communication. Efficient business communication helps in creating the good will of an organization.People with different backgrounds bring i different views when it comes to decision making, therefore improving important processes like decision making and communication is what will lead the organization to succeed in the knowledge f economy of the future. Business relies strongly on the workers ability to work with highly diverse groups of individuals who are located across international borders. The highly effective workers perform their duties, the more successful their organization is.
In today’s age of information, career success is directly connected to good communication, a skill that is made more challenging by tremendous changes in technology, the workforce, work environments and the globalization of business.Carrying out business in international countries means dealing with people who are totally different from us. The reason is that they have different religions, participate in different customs, live different lifestyles, and depend on different approaches in business. Moreover, there are difficulties of multiple time zones, vast distances between offices, and different languages thus importance of being knowledgeable or understanding the diversity for effective communication. Successful communication in these new markets needs developing new skills and attitudes.
These involve cultural knowledge and sensitivity, flexibility, patience, and tolerance. These are skills and attitudes that most of us require to polish and special communication training assists to deal with intercultural business transactions.Businesses have for years been cutting costs and flattening their managerial hierarchies in response to intense global competition and other pressures. The flattening meant that only fewer portion of managers isolated decision makers from line workers. In traditional companies, informnation moved or flowed through many levels of leaders.
In organizations where the lines of communication are shorter, decision makers respond more quickly to market changes.Many progressive organization have been forced to change from command and control to coordination and cultivation management methods. This therefore that, work is organized to let people use their own skills and talents more wiseely. But flattened organizations also do pose greater challenges to communication.Previously, authoritarian and hierarchical management structures did not require that every worker be a skilled communicator. The leaders simply could pass along message to the next level.
However today, front line workers as well as managers participate in decision making. Their contribution and commitment are important and very necessary for their company to be successful in global markets. In addition, everyone has become a writer and a good communicator.Business communication is very different and also unique from other types of communication because the main purpose of business is to obtain profit. And thus, in order to create the good way for making profits, the communicator needs to develop good communication skills. Having trends and knowledge without proper and effective communication may not be profitable to the business organization.
An important part of communication process is listening; research shows that many people listen at only twenty five percent efficiency. Therefore, such poor listening behaviors are very costly in businesses. For better and effective communication in business, there is need to recognize the barrier that hinder effective communication and focus more on specific techniques that are good in improving listening skills. Examples of these barriers include physical barriers, personal barriers such as cultural, ethical, and personal values, language barriers, non-verbal distractions, and faking attention.ConclusionCapitalizing on business diversity is a challenge for most companies and individuals. Harmony and acceptance do not occur automatically when people who are different work together.
Therefore, effective communication in business can be improved through understanding the values of the differences, practicing focused, thoughtful and open minded listening, inviting, using and giving feedback because feedback is a very critical element in any successful business communications. Communication does not take place unless the sender encodes meaningful messages that can be decoded by receivers.
