ITC105 Communication and Information Management : Innovative Ideas

This is an individual task and the topics are selected to assess your understanding and ability to explain fundamental communication process, verbal and non-verbal communication, and ethical communication. It will demonstrate your progress towards meeting the learning outcomes:

Be able to identify the components of the communication model;
Be able to explain the fundamental concepts of the communication process;
Be able to discuss the impact of non-verbal communication.
Be able to critically assess the main issues associated with ethical communication.

1. Your boss has asked you to call a meeting of the members of the sales group to discuss the launch of new product in the service list of the company. What kind of meeting would be required?

Two way meetings are best suited to share brainstorming ideas prior to a product launch in the company. The meeting will additionally give the workers an opportunity to deliver strategic ideas regarding the advancement of the product in the market. One of the most prevalent ways of establishing of an effective two way meetings can be via video conference. These meetings provide a thorough interaction amongst the members of the sales group related with the product launch. These meetings provide a perfect synchronization where people with different ideas and opinions come together and exchange the same. This can be extremely beneficial for the product to make it more interesting and relevant for the consumers in the market. It gives a platform where the members can share and exchange innovative ideas and suggestions regarding the product.

Some of the main purposes of a company meeting are developing new and inventive ideas, making creative decisions, develop an in-depth understanding and disperse a sense of encouragement amongst the employees that will instigate them to deliver improved performance (Ostendorf, Mouzas & Chakrabarti, 2014). These things are fundamental prior to a product launch in order to come up with innovative ideas to attract prospective customers and develop a loyal customer base. Therefore, with a single idea, one can plan to change the complete appearance of the product in front of the attendees (Anitha, 2014). With an open spaced innovative meeting, the speaker can sketch different ways that will insinuate passion within the listeners for the product that will be launched. Ensure that the meeting is simply not turning into a venue to passively convey the ideas among the employees. Instead it should be crucial in making the product reachable to a wider section of the society (Clark, Pipkin & Farmer, 2014).

2. Lateral or horizontal communication is more important today than vertical communication. Do you agree or disagree? Justify your answer.

I beg to differ with the concept that in an organization lateral or horizontal communication is of greater significance in a company than vertical one. Vertical communication is mandatory for every organization, whether small scale or large scale. There can be two types of vertical communication, upward communication and downward communication. When the information flows from the superior to the sub-ordinates, it is known as downward communication and vice versa.  This is simply because organization should be driven to achieve its goal by forming unity with the various departments and hierarchies which are intrinsic part of the same. Therefore, one of the main advantages of vertical communication in an organizational structure is clearly demarcate the management structure (Keyton et al., 2013). With vertical communication, one can also eliminate the possibilities of ambiguities that can be a result of horizontal communication. As it is, vertical communication is delivered directly from the top level of management it will clear any misunderstanding that can arise out of nuances or body language of any middle person involved with conveying the information. Vertical communication is essentially feedback oriented and gives the subordinates a chance of instantly voicing their doubts or issues.

In case of horizontal communication, is the flow of information between the different departments amongst the people of same level of hierarchy. One thing that is hugely rampant with this system is the delay and distortion of facts. This naturally cripples the feedback process as the whole system tends to get massively time-consuming and at times lapse. Furthermore, with vertical communication, there arise a number of interpretative problems among the various departments, making room for de-motivation which impact adversely on the productivity of the company. Moreover, since it is more informal in nature and may give birth to unnecessary confusions, many companies strive to steer clear of it.

3. Critically assess the following scenario and answer the questions: [10 marks] Josh in the Accounting Department tells you that he heard from a reliable source that 15 percent of the staff will be fired within 120 days. You would love to share this juicy news with other department members, for their own defense and planning. Should you? Why or why not? Rationale

As far as my opinions are concerned, I would definitely not communicate the news to the other members of the department. This may give rise to unnecessary cause of panic and de-motivation amongst the employees by spreading the news that 15 percent of the employees are at risk of getting terminated by the company. I do not have authority at all to spread news that needs to be officially confirmed in the strictest terms by higher authorities. De-motivation can hamper the work environment and as a result the productivity of the employees (Delmas & Pekovic, 2013). It is the responsibility of every employee to ensure that they are maintaining the workplace ambience which influences the quality of work that other co-workers are doing.

 With the help of communication one must address and protect the rights of the employees and ensure that none of the parties are violating the rights of the other. (Shockley-Zalabak, 2014).

The same can be conveyed verbally or non-verbally, the later includes body language that also includes gestures and posture of the informer who conveys the particular information without depending on words. However, in case of non-verbal communication, it can give rise to hostile environment and can convey a sense of dominance and submission. It can also affect the workplace atmosphere by bullying, intimidation or other such unwelcomed invasion of personal space.  Therefore, the need for ethical communication which involves honesty and candidness is fundamental to ensure commitment and trust among the employees. The same can also foster a feeling of responsiveness, truthfulness and accuracy within the organization and eradicate possibilities of coercion.

Reference List:

Alvesson, M. (Ed.). (2016). Organizational culture. Sage.

Anitha, J. (2014). Determinants of employee engagement and their impact on employee performance. International journal of productivity and performance management.

Clark, R., Pipkin, E., & Farmer, A. (2014). Planning Innovative and Engaging Public Meetings.

Delmas, M. A., & Pekovic, S. (2013). Environmental standards and labor productivity: Understanding the mechanisms that sustain sustainability. Journal of Organizational Behavior, 34(2), 230-252.

Keyton, J., Caputo, J. M., Ford, E. A., Fu, R., Leibowitz, S. A., Liu, T., ... & Wu, C. (2013). Investigating verbal workplace communication behaviors. The Journal of Business Communication (1973), 50(2), 152-169.

Ostendorf, J., Mouzas, S., & Chakrabarti, R. (2014). Innovation in business networks: The role of leveraging resources. Industrial Marketing Management, 43(3), 504-511.

Shockley-Zalabak, P. (2014). Fundamentals of organizational communication. Pearson.