Chapter 17 Workplace Communication
Chapter Objectives
Define “vocation,” and explain its relation to a job.
Define small group communication.
List the types of roles for small groups.
Lecture Outline
I. Speaking for Your Vocation
A. Learning Objective
1. Define “vocation,” and explain its relation to a job.
B. The primary purpose of speaking in professional contexts is to establish and maintain
relationships with colleagues.
C. A vocation refers to a feeling of dedication, if not a sense of duty, to a chosen career.
II. Speaking at Work
A. Learning Objectives
2. List the types of roles for small groups.
4. List five types of workplace presentations.
B. The appropriate norms of professional speaking will differ widely depending on the
culture of the specific organization or business, since most are limited to audiences of small
groups.
1. By observing before you speak up, you can begin to identify the norms of your
organizational culture, including what is appropriate to say and, more importantly, how to
say it.
C. Speaking in Small Groups
1. Small group communication concerns the interaction among three or more
people who self-identify as a group.
a) Small group communication is a speaking situation in which a group
comes together to deliberate about a task or to analyze information.
2. Roles
a) Small group discussion is similar to public speaking in that we learn the
norms of small group discussion from experience and often without formal study.
b) In small group communication, a leader is someone who is designated or
who emerges to guide and moderate discussion.
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c)
Task-oriented roles are adopted by members to help meet the goals of
the group. These tasks directly contribute toward the goal of the discussion, such
as taking notes or procuring needed supplies.
d)
Social-oriented roles are adopted by members of a group to help
moderate the mood and feelings of participants.
3. Group Tendencies
a)
Researchers point out two psychological tendencies that can lead a small
group discussion astray: groupthink and conflict.
b)
Groupthink is a common, often unconscious, tendency to avoid conflict
in a group, usually by failing to challenge ideas or decisions. The consequence is
often the silencing of the thoughts or feelings of those who disagree.
c)
Conflict refers to the inevitable disagreement groups encounter when
working on a task together; conflict is positive when it is depersonalized and
focused on problem solving.
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To ensure that conflict is productive, care should be taken to
always define and discuss conflict in terms of issues or structures, not
people.
D. Making Presentations in the Workplace
1. If you are asked to create and deliver a presentation as a team, care should be
taken among your group to establish roles for the speaking parts as well as assign
different tasks.
2. Most of the information about speaking to inform and persuade in previous
chapters is easily applied to professional presentations.
3. Workplace presentations are different from public speaking presentations
because they are constrained by the norms of a workplace culture.
4. A virtual group is a collection of people brought together to work on a common
task through long-distance technologies such as teleconferencing or Skype.
5. Types of workplace and professional presentations
a)
Keynote speeches are common when businesses or professional
organizations hold annual or semiannual meetings. Keynote speakers at these
events are often workplace leaders or invited guests.
b)
Training sessions are used to train a number of colleagues to assume new
roles and responsibilities, or to facilitate discussion among them.
c)
Proposals are plans for change that are presented to others for discussion
and deliberation. Proposals are usually written first, and then introduced to others
in the form of an oral presentation. As a result, these types of presentations tend
to veer from informative to persuasive.
d)
Sales pitches are fundamentally
persuasive speeches designed to
convince an audience to purchase a product or service, or perhaps adopt an
approach, address a problem, or embrace an opportunity that your organization is
recommending.
e)
Reports are researched presentations that inform clients or colleagues as
to the status of specific aspects of the business or organization.
III. Interviewing for a Job
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A. Learning Objectives
2. List and define two types of workplace interviews.
B. The techniques and skills of public speaking have a direct application to interview
contexts: you should research your audience, and you should strive to establish goodwill and
common values.
C. Screening Interviews
1. A screening interview is one in which an employer attempts to reduce a large
number of job applicants to a smaller and more manageable number. These interviews
usually involve questions about basic qualifications and fit.
2. Since applicants have the least amount of power during screening interviews,
they should be very well prepared and follow these tips:
D. Selection Interviews
1. A selection interview is one in which an employer seeks personal contact, either
through videoconferencing or in person, with a potential employee. Questions are usually
designed to further assess a worker’s qualifications and predict his or her work-related
behavior.
2. The behavioral interview is a popular form of interviewing that asks candidates
questions about past behavior to predict future work-related outcomes.
3. When you are asked behavioral questions, job interview experts recommend the
following:
a) Explain the situation and task thoroughly.
b) Describe what action you took in response to the situation.
c) Describe the result in detail.
Key Terms
Vocation: a feeling of dedication toward one’s occupation.
Small group communication: the interaction among three or more people who self-identify as a group.
Leader (in small group communication): someone who is designated or who emerges to guide and
moderate discussion.
Task-oriented roles (in small group discussions): adopted by members to help meet the goals of the
group.
Social-oriented roles: adopted by members of a group to help moderate the mood and feelings of
participants.
Groupthink: a common, often unconscious tendency to avoid conflict in a group, usually by failing to
challenge ideas or decisions.
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Conflict: the inevitable disagreement groups encounter when working on a task together; conflict is
positive when it is depersonalized and focused on problem solving.
Virtual group: a collection of people brought together to work on a common task through long-distance
technologies (teleconferencing, Skype, and so on); today, such groups are as common in the workplace as
they are in video gaming.
Behavioral interview: a popular form of interviewing that asks candidates questions about past behavior
to predict future work-related outcomes.
Chapter Summary
Discussion Questions
1. The chapter explains that avoiding conflict is impossible, so the best approach to productive conflict is
managing it with effective communication. Think of a recent time when you experienced a task-related
conflict either at work or in a group. What strategies did you use to resolve the conflict? Were you
satisfied with the resolution? What could you have done differently?
2. A profession or career comes from the Latin term vocare, or a calling, which includes an ethical
orientation. Today, much research suggests that millennials show little commitment to a career or an
employer. Instead, they tend to job hop or career hop more than previous generations. Do you think that
there is a generational difference in how people define vocation or career? If you agree, what is the
impact of this divide? Defend your answer using ideas from the chapter and provide examples for
support.
A: Although some research finds that that millennials job hop due to the “gig economy” and
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3. The chapter says that the guiding principle for workplace ethics is communicating honest and true
information. From a different angle, employees sometimes withhold information about sexual harassment,
falsified data, or inside information about a company’s unethical practices for fear of backlash. Would
you blow the whistle on a company’s unethical practices? Explain your position using ideas from the
chapter or anywhere else in the textbook and provide examples to support.
4. Even though you’ve only been working at your new job for about a month, your team members asked
you to present the status report on your team’s project to the department heads. You know very little
about the culture of your company. What would you do to prepare for your presentation?
5. Advice about job hunting and interviewing is often mixed. Some people recommend trying to stand out
from the crowd, others recommend showing that you fit in. Thinking about the principles of workplace
communication, how do you know the right thing to do when you go to an interview?
Activities for in-class work or homework
1. Analysis of interdependence in leader and member roles
Students will connect leader and member roles to relational concepts from previous Speech Craft
chapters.
Derek Sivers’s TED Talk on “How to Start a Movement” is based on his viral video, “First Follower,
Leadership Lessons from The Dancing Guy.” Sivers argues that leaders are made by followers, and that
the first follower is the most important figure in any movement. He gives advice to movement leaders.
Although this presentation is about movements and not groups, the information helps differentiate
leadership and membership roles.
This activity can apply to most class formats and activity structures.
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Search “derek sivers how to start a movement” for access to the video.
Prompt:
Sivers’s TED Talk provides a list of specific lessons from the dancing guy. What advice does he give to
leaders? How does this advice describe the relationship between the leader and followers? What are the
parallels or connections between leaders/followers and speakers/listeners?
Debriefing:
Students occasionally need help unpacking Sivers’s point, which is that leaders don’t exist without
followers and that we overvalue the function of leadership in group success. This parallels the
foundational point about the listener/speaker relationship explained in Chapter 2. This video is frequently
used in social movement trainings to encourage people who think they lack leadership abilities to take on
leadership roles.
2. Design a group contract.
Group members will construct a contract that specifies tasks, norms, and evaluation criteria to help the
group successfully complete their project.
If group projects are part of course grades or formal assessments, then the group contract is a good
activity to initiate the group project. It begins the group dynamic and helps students verbalize their
expectations for group members. Instructors can formalize this activity with a worksheet or document,
and require students to submit the contract as part of the group project.
This activity works in all class formats and should be completed in groups.
Scenario:
Pretend that your group is the planning committee for the annual awards dinner hosted by the “Awesome
Students Club.” The dinner is scheduled for two months from now. Create a contract that sets the
guidelines for how your group should interact while planning.
Your contract should include:
2. Task roles, responsibilities, and dates. These can be amended as the work progresses. (E.g., the
secretary records minutes at every meeting and distributes them within x days.) Indicate who signs up for
each task.
3. A process for handling any problems or unmet expectations before they disrupt the project.
Debriefing:
3. Behavioral interview practice
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Students will practice for behavioral interviews with STAR answers.
This activity can be approached in many ways. If an interview is part of the final grade, practicing in class
is a good warm-up, and using the assignment rubric can make the assignment and expectations concrete
for the students. The activity can be treated in several ways:
1. Warmup for a graded interview
4. Peer evaluations as part of an interview process. If peer evaluations occur, then providing a rubric or
guidance for feedback will help give the activity structure.
Directions:
1. Students should write answers to the behavioral questions following the STAR format in the
chapter.
3. Place students in groups of three. One student will ask questions, one student will answer, and
one student will evaluate. Round robin until all students have performed all roles.
Interview Questions:
Questions taken from Monster.Com’s list of 100 most-asked questions:
1. Give me an example of a time that you felt you went above and beyond the call of duty at
work.
2. Can you describe a time when your work was criticized?
3. Have you ever been on a team where someone was not pulling their own weight? How did you
handle it?
it?
5. What is your greatest failure, and what did you learn from it?
4. Evaluate 60-second pitch speeches.
Students will evaluate a series of one-minute competitive pitch speeches from a Startup Weekend
competition. Search “startup weekend” to access site.
Startup Weekend is an international competition where people build startup companies to launch new
Questions:
1. If you were competing at Startup Weekend, who would you vote for and why? What criteria would you
use to decide? Did the speakers follow the stated guidelines for the Pitchfire speeches? How do your
personal criteria for voting match what you learned in the chapter about workplace communication? How
do your criteria for voting match what you learned about good speeches from the class?
2. The Pitchfire speakers do not represent a business. Startup Weekend is a competition or game and no
companies are real. Would you consider this type of speech a workplace or professional presentation?
Why or why not? Explain your answer using ideas from the chapter and provide examples to illustrate.
Teaching Tips
1. If instructors are looking for something new or a different perspective on how to teach workplace
2. Some career services offer practice interviews for students.
4. According to an article in Forbes (January 2017), the four most desired job skills that managers want
from millennials are attention, experience outside of college, agility or grit, and humility. Using different
recent college graduates’ confidence in their workplace readiness exceeds their actual skill level.
Instructors might be interested in citing this information when teaching the interviewing section of
Chapter 17.
5. Startup Weekend uses an interesting strategy for dealing with speakers who exceed time limits. When a
Content Presentation Ideas/Assignments
1. Shark Tank 1-Minute Pitches
For this assi gnment, assi gn students to work in pairs. Each pair will then co me up with an idea for a
2. Training Session
This assignment gives students experience with business-type presentations.
Preparing for the Assignment
3. Job Interviews: The Dos and Don’ts
This assignment gives students experience with interviewing for a job. It covers both what to do and what
not to do.
Preparing for the Assignment
Have each student find a partner for the assignment, or assign partners.
Each partner will have a chance to play both t he in terviewer and the intervie wee. One scenario shoul d
present the interviewee in a positive light, givi ng thoughtful responses that dem onstrate his or her skills
and experience. These responses can be based on actual sk ills and experiences, or t hey can be fabricated.
In the second scenario, the interviewee should have weak answers to the questions, appear nervous, or be
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inappropriately dressed. Students shoul d have fun wit h this assignment; the use of hum or is fine, as long
as students follow the instructions.
More Resources
1. Video to illustrate a good job pitch; good for flipped and online classes: search “pwc perfecting your
elevator pitch video.”
2. Price Waterhouse Cooper developed a career education program to assist college seniors in the
3. Lego Corporation is well known for its training and professional development activities, and many
4. A conflict management course from MIT Open Courseware has some excellent resources, including a
negotiation activity called the “Two Dollar Game.” This is a complex but engaging activity: search “mit