Text Summary, Lecture Outline
The Role of Communication in Business
Slides 1-1, 1-2, 1-3
This chapter puts business communicaon in context. It explains the importance of business
communicaon skills, describes large and small factors that aect business communicaon, idenes the
main types of communicaon, and describes the problem-solving approach that is essenal to eecve
business communicaon.
Slides 1-4, 1-5
Communicaon is important to you and to the business you will work for.
For you, good communicaon skills can lead to advancement.
Your performance will be judged largely by your ability to communicate.
The higher you advance, the greater your need for communicaon skills will be.
For the business for which you will work, communicang is important because it is a major part of the
work of the business.
Communicaon is essenal for organized acvity.
Much of the work done involves the processing of informaon.
Unfortunately, many businesspeople do not communicate well. You might share highly publicized
communicaon blunders that companies have made, or ask students to share stories they may have
about how good or poor communicaon in a company had a signicant result, either for a parcular
communicator or for a company in general.
Slides 1-6, 1-7
The nature of work today presents special communicaon challenges.
Media literacy: Since the arrival of email in the late 1980s, business communicaon has been
experiencing a revoluon. Now more than ever, there’s a need for expanded media literacy in the
workplace.
Increased globalism and diversity: According to a panelist for a recent webinar on workplace trends, we
are seeing “the emergence of the truly globally integrated enterprise,” which means that the likelihood
of working on a global team is increasing, as is the importance of “global social networks.”
Strong analycal skills: Adapng to a quickly changing business landscape requires being able to assess
informaon quickly, focus on what’s relevant, and interpret informaon reliably and usefully.
Ethics and social responsibility: Meanwhile, since ethical scandals have hurt many businesses,
generang trust through ethical behavior has increased in importance, and social responsibility has
become a buzzword and markeng strategy for many companies.
You can have good conversaons with your class about technological innovaons that your students
have seen in their own lifemes, about the internaonal nature of business these days, about diversity in
places where students have worked, and about the growing presence of ethics and
corporate-responsibility-related issues in the news. During the discussion of each trend, ask how it might
in4uence business communicaon pracces.
Some of the richest conversaons you can have with students involve technology and social media. Here
are some ideas for discussion.
Much has been wri6en about the dierences between the Millennial, Gen-X, and Baby Boomer
generaons in the workplace, and these o:en include their uses and understandings of technology. You
may ask students: Have you personally experienced these dierences? Do you think “growing up” with
technology gives Millennials an advantage in the workplace? How might you use this experience to your
advantage during an interview?
Here are some related quesons:
1. How are apps, Skype, tweets, social networking, and virtual meengs changing business? How might
apps and Skype be employed for internal and external communicaon?
2. How are telecommung situaons, where your rst meeng takes place over email, and you never
meet in person, changing business interacon? How does this change “the stakes” of your rst email and
subsequent emails? Is it really possible to form a professional relaonship over email? Have you ever
experienced a business relaonship like this? Was it successful?
3. Also, some companies that hire out of state are hiring people strictly over Skype, without ever
meeng in person. Is this wise? Do you believe it’s possible to really know a person or a company
through one Skype interview? How would you prepare for such an interview?
Slide 1-8
Despite all the changes we’ve seen in the last 25 years or so, most communicaons in business sll fall
into one of three basic categories.
Internal-operaonal communicaon is all the communicaon that occurs in conducng work within the
business. It is the work done to carry out the operang plan (the business’s plan for doing whatever it
was formed to do).
It takes many forms—orders and instrucons from superiors; oral exchanges between workers; wri6en
reports, emails, memorandums, proposals . . . and the list goes on.
Much of it is conducted through the business’s computer network. (Here you can call a6enon to the
Intranet example provided and discuss other contemporary communicaon media that businesses are
using internally.)
External-operaonal communicaon is all the communicang businesses do with people and groups
outside the business. Because businesses are dependent on outside people and groups,
external-operaonal communicaon is necessary for success.
This category includes direct selling (sales presentaons, adversing, public relaons acvies, mailings),
correspondence with other businesses, and communicaon with such external pares as community
representaves, non-prot and/or government organizaons, and more.
Nowadays, much of this communicang is technology assisted. Ask students what types of
computer-assisted messages businesses are sending out these days in addion to email and faxes.
Personal communicaon is the exchange of informaon and feelings among the workers.
People will talk when they come together. Much of this talk is personal. But this communicang can
aect the workers’ aGtudes—and thus their job performance.
Too much or too li6le personal communicaon, or the wrong type, can adversely aect producvity. Ask
students to discuss the types of personal communicaon that went/go on in a workplace they are
familiar with. Bring out the benets and drawbacks and see if you can draw some conclusions about how
much and what kind of personal communicaon is appropriate in a workplace or develop rules of thumb
for personal communicaon in business.
Slides 1-9, 1-10
The formal network consists of communicaon along established channels in the business.
Every business has a formal network. It may be completely hierarchical, meaning li6le can be
communicated to the company unless it goes through the CEO and internal communicaons team rst.
Or it may be less hierarchical and “4at,” meaning that every employee can call a team meeng or has
access to “company wide” email and can send any noce out as required. In larger companies, the
former is generally true, while in smaller companies the la6er is o:en true.
In general, communicaon 4ow can be downward, upward, or lateral (with this la6er type growing in
importance as hierarchies in organizaons become 4a6er).
Each business develops its own forms (or genres) of communicaon to get its work done. Whether it’s
formal work requests and progress reports, weekly/monthly sta meengs, or an internal project
management/communicaons system, such as Basecamp, every organizaon has its own formal,
traceable way of disseminang work informaon internally.
The informal network consists of all the personal communicang that goes on in the business.
The informal network includes those employees you have professional and personal relaonships with
within your company. It’s also the external network you interact with outside of work and within your
social media networks, when talking about your company.
It follows no set pa6ern and may link any of the workers in the business. Its structure is ever changing
and may be extremely complex.
Known as the grapevine, it carries rumors and gossip but can also spread informaon and insights that
enhance an organizaon’s culture, cohesion, and performance.
It cannot be outlawed or controlled—so wise execuves work with it rather than against it.
The informal network also includes the social media networks you interact with outside of work, through
Facebook and other venues. Many companies, such as Procter & Gamble, have extremely detailed social
media policies and lengthy internal courses on how to use social media eecvely. For instance, as of
2010, P&G employees could not promote a P&G product on their own Facebook pages without
disclosing rst that they were employees of the company. Many companies will also re employees for
sharing proprietary informaon or speaking negavely about their companies and other employees on
their Facebook pages.
Here, you can invite students to share their experiences with formal and informal networks in places
where they or those they know have worked. Ask them who the “talk leaders” were in their examples of
grapevines, and point out that even those without a great deal of formal power can have considerable
informal power.
You can also invite students to share the diLcules they’ve encountered with Facebook and work
situaons. Have they seen a coworker write something negave on a page or share proprietary
informaon? Did they feel the need to react? How did they deal with the situaon ethically?
Or you can discuss a news arcle on a well-known social media case covering a workplace issue.
If you have me for a brief, in-class wring assignment you may want to invite students to remember a
me when they found out condenal company informaon from an informal communicaon. How did
they deal with it? Did they share it? You may also ask them to write about the most powerful
professional relaonship they’ve experienced, and how the relaonship contributed posively or
negavely to their careers. Helping them understand the in4uence relaonships have on their careers is
crical to helping them understand the in4uence of communicaon.
Slide 1-11
How much and what kind of communicang a business does depends on the type of business, its
environment, and the nature of the people involved.
Nature of the business: Some industries have more communicaon needs than others.
Size and complexity: Relavely simple businesses, such as repair services, require far less
communicaon than complex businesses, such as automobile manufacturers.
Industry environment (relaon to environment): Some industry environments are more stable than
others, leading to more strategic and less impromptu communicaon processes.
Geographic dispersion: Obviously, internal communicaon in a business with mulple locaons diers
from that of a one-locaon business.
Organizaonal culture: Some organizaons have stronger cultures than others. Are the employees
supporng the culture’s values and mission with their internal and external communicaons or
undermining it?
For discussion, you can draw on students’ own experiences as employees and consumers to help them
understand the signicance of these factors. Compare students’ experiences working for large and small
companies and companies in dierent industries. Get them to volunteer stories about the organizaonal
culture of places where they’ve worked or shopped and to discuss how the culture probably in4uenced,
and was in4uenced by, the company’s communicaon pracces.
You can relay that if the company culture is formal—for example, you need to set up an appointment to
see the CEO, rather than dropping by his or her oLce—you can probably assume that the
communicaon will be formal as well (perhaps having strict communicaon channels you must follow
and not as much access to informaon).
If the CEO is wearing jeans when you meet him or her—now common in many industries, especially if
the company is a start-up—you’ll probably nd an informal and conversaonal wring style, parcularly
internally and possibly externally.
Companies with the strongest cultures—shared values/mission, company-sponsored team-building
events/retreats, etc.—are o:en the most successful. You may ask students why they think this is true.
However, the “unoLcial culture”—what the employees really believe and what they’re really
doing/saying behind closed doors—is o:en considered the true culture. When the company-sanconed
culture and the unoLcial culture are aligned, you o:en have success. When they aren’t, the company
struggles more. You may ask students if they’ve ever worked for an organizaon where the oLcial
culture was dierent from the unoLcial culture.
You may also want to ask students what they feel are “p-os” to a company’s culture. You can also
share these signs of an organizaon’s culture recognized by researchers and ask them to contribute
others:
What kind of stories does the company tell about its past—the living history? What a culture chooses to
share says a lot about its values.
Do they have certain “heroes” that they elevate (or even make fun of in a friendly way) because they’ve
had such an impact on the success of the company? This says a lot about the professional contribuons
the company values.
Do they have rituals? Burgers or happy hours on Friday? Ba6le of the bands every year? Community
clean-up day? When the company gives employees ckets to events are they ckets to NASCAR or ckets
to the ATP? This says a lot about the type of culture it is.
Does the team seem like a cohesive group with shared values or are they “doing their own thing” and
confused about where the company is going?
Ask students how important an organizaon’s culture is to them. Should they ask quesons about it
during an interview? For instance, if a company has “ba6le of the bands” every year and employees are
supposed to parcipate and expected to perform, would this be an issue for them? Or would they enjoy
this type of culture?
The Business Communication Process
Slide 1-12
To understand the business-communicaon process, it’s important rst to understand the nature of
business communicaon. Business communicaon is best understood as complex problem solving. This
means that, for most situaons, the business communicator will need to take a unique set of
circumstances into account and generate a unique soluon that will achieve the desired business goals.
That is why being a successful business communicator requires:
Research (interview the players and understand the history of the communicaons situaon)
Careful analysis (to gather and interpret the relevant informaon)
Creavity (to think of possible soluons)
Judgment (to pick the soluon that will t this situaon best)
You might ask your class how it’s possible that, when there’s no single “correct” answer to any
business-communicaon problem, it’s sll possible to say that some soluons are be6er than others. If
you’re not lucky enough to have a savvy student who “gets” this, you can make the point by showing
them dierent handlings of a simple business situaon and discussing what makes some be6er than
others.
You might also share examples of how analysis, creavity, and judgment work during the
business-communicaon process. For instance, in addion to gathering and interpreng the relevant
informaon, analysis o:en involves analyzing the culture’s expectaons for communicaon (formal vs.
informal), considering the current climate (are there sensive/hot bu6on issues, such as limited
resources, that shouldn’t be brought up?), and looking at the individual audience’s needs and fears. For
example, if you’re asking your boss for a vacaon day via email, and you know that he or she is already
afraid a project isn’t going to be completed on me, at some point in the email you need to menon
this, reassuring your boss that you’ll sll meet the project deadline. Many factors go into analysis.
Creavity o:en means looking at a communicaons issue from mulple angles. At its most basic level,
the following quesons need to be asked: What is the correct medium for this communicaon? What is
the correct venue? For instance, if you’re in internal communicaons for a major company and rolling
out a new company brand internally, a memo is probably not the most creave execuon. But having the
IT department turn every employee’s computer background into the company’s new logo and look, so
they’re greeted with it in the morning when they come to work, is a surprising and fresh way to make
the announcement. To make the communicaon even more eecve, the communicaons department
might hold a company-wide meeng that a:ernoon, revealing the new brand on the big screen,
explaining strategy, and handing out T–shirts.
Good judgment is making sure you always pick the soluon that will t the situaon and the long-term
goals and values of the culture. It also means always sending a message at the right me, in the right
tone, to the right audience, and never sharing inappropriate or proprietary informaon. You may let
students know that, believe it or not, this can be tricky in a business environment. It’s common to
inadvertently slip up or step on someone’s toes, but they’ll learn strategies for exercising excellent
judgment in this course.
Slide 1-13
Because the communicang that goes on in business is done by people, it is helpful for us to know how
communicaon between businesspeople occurs. This model shows both process and contexts. Refer to
Exhibit 1-4 in Chapter 1 for a complete illustraon and explanaon of the process.
A fun exercise for illustrang this process in acon is to divide the class up into two opposing teams.
Team 1 must recommend a surprising change to the syllabus to Team 2. Team 2 then has to follow the
process of responding to this recommendaon as laid out in Exhibit 1-4. Do they agree? Will they
propose a dierent recommendaon and argue their case? Will they respond at all? If the class is large,
you may break it up into smaller compeng groups.
Slide 1-14
With this slide you can take a closer look at the contexts in which business communicaon takes place:
The larger business-economic, sociocultural, historical context
The communicators’ relaonship
The communicators’ individual contexts (organizaonal, professional, personal)
As the text says, communicaon is not simply about moving informaon from point A to point B. Anyone
who neglects the specic contexts in which communicaon takes place is likely doomed to be an
unsuccessful communicator. Factoring these mulple contexts into communicaon decisions is a large
part of treang business communicaon as a problem-solving process.
Slide 1-15
Here are the steps that usually occur when people are solving business problems and communicang
about them.
1. Senses a communicaon need. You can emphasize that a “need” can be either a problem to
solve or an opportunity to take advantage of.
2. De/nes the problem. Here, the writer/speaker gathers informaon about the situaon—about
what has happened or what might be achieved, about possible audiences, about prior similar
situaons, about organizaonal goals and possible means for achieving them.
3. Searches for possible soluons. Given the situaon, in what dierent ways might the
communicaon challenge be tackled? What strategies could best further the interests of the
pares involved?
4. Selects a course of acon. Here the writer/speaker decides not only what to say but also how to
say it. He or she makes basic decisions about the type of message that will be sent—which also
involves choosing the communicaon channel (phone? email? texng?) that will best support
the goals of the message.
5. Composes the message. You can preview the advice in Chapter 2 about the wring process. Help
students realize that whatever wring style works best for them is the one they should use, but
emphasize the importance of all three main composing stages (planning, dra:ing, and revising).
6. Delivers the message. Students o:en do not realize how important message ming is, or how
important it is to imagine the hecc work context in which the recipient will receive the
message. This step deserves some careful thought.
7. Receives the message. Now we’re over on the recipient’s side of the process. If the sender has
made wise decisions (about ming, channel, format, and framing of the message), the odds of
the recipient’s actually reading and/or hearing the message are promising. (Otherwise, as you
can remind your students, the message might get thrown away, buried under other messages, or
deleted.)
8. Interprets the message. As the recipient processes the message, he or she will be forming all
sorts of impressions—about the writer/speaker, about the writer/speaker’s company, about the
goal of the message, about the message’s specic contents, about why the message is signicant
(or not).
9. Decides on a response. If the recipient a6ends to the message, he/she will have a response,
whether it’s the one the sender intends or not. If the message has been tailored carefully to the
recipient’s interests, the recipient’s response—whether a return message, an acon, or simply a
change in aGtude—will have a good chance of being the desired one.
10. Replies to the message. Here the recipient becomes the sender, and the communicaon cycle
begins again. And it may lead to another cycle—and another. The cycles may connue as long as
the parcipants wish to communicate. In oral communicaon, you can point out, the cycles tend
to happen quickly as the communicators work to create a mutual understanding, whereas the
communicaon cycles in wri6en communicaon tend to occur more slowly.
There are no guarantees that any message will be successful—but the analycal process presented in the
communicaon model will make the odds of success as high as possible.
Slide 1-16
The last slide suggests the three key features of business communicaon: it’s about sharing informaon,
it’s about building relaonships, and it’s about solving workplace problems.