COM12 Business Communication Short Essay
1500 words
Short Essay
Description: Short Essay
Weighting: 30%
Due: 5.30 pm AEST, Monday, Week 6 (October 5, 2020)
Length: 1500 words
The following video provides background to and description of this
Assessment task.
Video can be watched at https://web.microsoftstream.com/
a94b8d34-f1ac-4ee2-ae3a-c65cae59b666
Identify examples (three at most) of successful and/or unsuccessful
communication exchanges/processes you have experienced in the
workplace (or other situations if you have not worked in an organisation)
and analyse these situations by applying elements of communication
modelling to demonstrate and evaluate these communication attempts.
An example of an appropriate situation might be as simple as failing to
communicate a change of procedures in a staff or team meeting. Some
questions you might consider are:
What message was sent?
What message was received?
What caused noise and interference?
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https://web.microsoftstream.com/a94b8d34-f1ac-4ee2-ae3a-c65cae59b666
Were cultural issues in play?
Was the message sent consistent with the leadership and management
communication in the organisation?
What other communication elements could have been in play?
Why did the communication processes break down?
And very importantly, what application of communication modelling did –
or could – have made a difference?
An opportunity will be provided for you to brainstorm your scenario and
‘what happened’ with your peers in the Discussion Board. This discussion
will be overseen by your tutor.
You must name the organisation you are analysing in your essay. If
you cannot name the organisation, you must contact your tutor to make
alternate arrangements.
You must use at least 8 different scholarly (peer-reviewed) sources
in your short essay and include a reference list.
You must use the Harvard Referencing Guide , which can be found on
the COM12 unit site.
A reference list is required for assignment 2. In text references are
counted as part of the essay word limit. The reference list is not counted
as part of the word limit.
Your essay should comply with academic essay conventions.
We encourage you to use resources such as Smarthinking as you
complete this task.
You can use first person language to describe your experience in each
situation, but use this sparingly. You will be marked down if you use it
excessively throughout the essay.
Include a word count at the end of your essay.
Prepare your assessment for submission
All assessment items are to be submitted with a University Assessment
Coversheet (located under the “Assessment” tab > “Other Assessment
Resources” folder).
Students are responsible for ensuring they complete all sections of the
Cover Sheet and that they have agreed to the Academic Integrity
Declaration. In addition the Cover Sheet asks you to indicate whether you
agree or do not agree to your work, without disclosure of the contributor’s
identity, to be used, and reproduced as an assessment exemplar for
standard setting and moderation activities. You have the right to deny this
request.
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Please Note: Assessment items submitted
without a cover sheet will not be marked by an
examiner until a cover sheet is provided, unless
advised otherwise in the Unit Outline and by
the Unit Tutor.
On receipt of the assessment item, you are advised by the tutor, via your
student email account if their assessment item does not have a cover sheet.
The date of submission for the assessment item is recorded as the date on
which the cover sheet is received and penalties for late submission will
apply.
Submit a draft of your assessment to check referencing
Before submitting your final short essay, you can submit a draft of your
assessment to receive feedback from Turnitin on your use of referencing.
Submit your final short essay
When complete, you can submit your final Short Essay for marking.
The Assessment 2 Short Essay will be assessed using this marking criteria .
Please Note: Assessment items submitted
without a cover sheet will not be marked by an
examiner until a cover sheet is provided, unless
advised otherwise in the Unit Outline and by
the Unit Tutor.
This document makes reference to the online resources.
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/webapps/ip-turnitintool-BB5bb70f08ac35e/control/view.jsp?assign_id=66015&course_batch_id=COM12_2205_OT&course_id=_82017_1&content_id=_5585947_1
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https://griffitheduau.sharepoint.com/:b:/s/HLSSacademic/EdbjLCqe3BRHm4-T5EQfOdIBD5jpFQYF-OBBHkoDPaXhIQ?e=xIODQq
Videos and other embedded content
https://web.microsoftstream.com/a94b8d34-f1ac-4ee2-ae3a-
c65cae59b666
External Links
submit a draft of your assessment
submit your final Short Essay
this marking criteria
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/webapps/ip-turnitintool-BB5bb70f08ac35e/control/view.jsp?assign_id=66015&course_batch_id=COM12_2205_OT&course_id=_82017_1&content_id=_5585947_1
/webapps/ip-turnitintool-BB5bb70f08ac35e/control/view.jsp?assign_id=66012&course_batch_id=COM12_2205_OT&course_id=_82017_1&content_id=_5585946_1
https://griffitheduau.sharepoint.com/:b:/s/HLSSacademic/EdbjLCqe3BRHm4-T5EQfOdIBD5jpFQYF-OBBHkoDPaXhIQ?e=xIODQq
- Assessment 2: Short Essay
What you will do
Prepare your assessment for submission
Submit a draft of your assessment to check referencing
Submit your final short essay
Marking Criteria
Additional information
Online Exclusive Materials
Videos and other embedded content
External Links
1
RUNNING HEAD: COMMUNICATION
Communication
Communication is vital in the day to day running of the business. It is also an essential element in day to day human endeavors. Without proper communication, much of corporate and personal goals would go unachieved. Proper communication helps in giving direction and in creating a cohesive roadmap in the workplace (Bradley, 2013, p.50). Communication problems, on the other hand, are likely to act as setbacks to progress in an organization and eventually affect morale, interdepartmental working relationships, and productivity. When left unchecked, poor communication may lead to low profits, increased turnover, and mistakes that impact on the public image of the company negatively.
Recently I had experiences of what ineffective communication can be. I had been working with Hungry Jack’s Pty Ltd as a crew member. Hungry Jack’s Pty Ltd is an Australian fast-food franchise of the Burger King Corporation. It is owned wholly by Competitive Australia as a subsidiary. Jack Cowin owns the company. Hungry Jack owns and operates all of the Burger King restaurants in Australia. Not so long, during the departmental meeting, which we usually hold on Monday morning that the corporate manager requested some set of data. I responded that I would work on the task and submit the report by Friday of the same week. This timeline seemed substantial and enough for me to have worked on the data sets required. On its surface, this also seemed like an example of proper communication. In my mind, I knew that I had up to Friday 4.pm to deliver the report.
By Friday 10.am, I realized that there was still a large portion of the data to analyze and generate a report, and I scrambled to complete the task. By about 1 pm the supervisor sent me an email requesting for the report so that he could go through it before the departmental directors meeting the same afternoon. I sheepishly had to tell the head of the department that I had not completed. By the time the director’s meeting was starting, I was still not through, and the director had to go with half-prepared reports, which not only made him irritated but also left me doubting my competence.
Another case happened when I failed to send an apology message to the director that I had been stuck in traffic and would not be able to reach the office in time to attend the meeting, which was usually held by 7 am. I had no credit card, and my phone had gone off due to the power shortage, and I had no way I would have communicated with the supervisor. I had to get to the office and get my phone charged as well as put on the credit card. The head of the department saw it as some sort of insubordination and unpreparedness, which made him scold me on that not taking into account that this was the first time to happen for all years I worked and had not even missed any of the meetings.
Other than the two cases of ineffective communication, one example has proved to be some sort of successful communication while I worked in Hungry Jack. As part of recognizing its customers, Jack Hungry started sending the clients birthday cards during their birthdays. In a few cases, particularly for those clients within vicinity Hungry Jack would deliver a birthday cake and then sing the melodious birthday song to the client. This would prompt clients to give positive reviews to Hungry Jack over its respect for its customers. This proved as a type of symbolic communication with significant impacts on their loyalty.
The two cases of ineffective communication and one case of successful communication would, however, help me in understanding what proper and effective communication ought to be, especially for a business. Proper communication should ensure that all parties involved are well informed. It is important to give specific deadlines whenever one is communicating a particular need (Cairney and Kwiatkowski, 2017, p.37). For the directors and supervisors, it is also essential to make a note to schedule a pre-deadline check-in that will help contact the employee or the vendors that all is on track. Communicating without a deadline is an example of not giving important specifics in communication. Any vital communication made should include a review of critical elements that will help avoid miscommunication and delivery of poor work.
Possessing and developing excellent communication skills would help business leaders and departments in an organization in every facet of organization operations. If employees are excellent communicators, they tend to listen and not to overreact. This is vital as it helps in reducing and preventing conflicts within the organization. The head of the department scolded me while becoming accusatory for being late in only one meeting, among many not putting some empathy in my case. Co-workers can work out disagreement and remain respectful and potentially threaten friends (Cairney and Kwiatkowski, 2017, p.37). Employees and even managers who can listen to various issues presented to them by customers or their co-workers without becoming defensive or accusatory help prevent clients. Helping the team members to learn to communicate professionally builds a positive atmosphere in the workplace. Positive morale for the team is good for the productivity of the department.
It is imperative to note that the business world depends on the relationships between the employees, customers, suppliers, creditors, among other parties. Communication is the basis of healthy relationships. Therefore, cultivating excellent communication would help organizations in strengthening these relationships. Sending a birthday card, for instance, to a customer, may help in creating loyalty to the brand (Petrou, Demerouti and Schaufeli, 2018, p.1766). Environments that encourage Positive communication help to provide security for people to share ideas without any fear of judgment. By providing platforms to employees where they can share their thoughts, innovation, and creativity will emerge. In such a scenario, an employee is likely to share what is not working and what is working in a procedure or operations.
Organizations must emphasize confidentiality in the workplace of certain information that must not be let out to other parties. Effective and streamlined communication starts from the top to down. If an organization does not have any practice on conversation, there is the need to create one and then use it for orientation and training of staff (Husain, 2013, p.43). It is also important to note that some problems in an organization will not arise solely from poor communication but may arise from issues such as poor organization, inadequate skills in time management, and other ineffective business practices. In this respect, before blames are made on communication problems, other breakdown causes for the breakdown of operations must be assessed.
Lack of communication may lead to misunderstanding, which in turn would lead to failed deadlines, mistakes, and altered project directions. Lack of clear communication also results in blames as well as frustrations (Reyna, Hanham, and Meier, 2018, p.36). Misunderstandings often arise when instructions are not transparent or not communicate most effectively. It may also happen when status and updates reports are not shared in the right way, or there is no lead person for the project. Other than misunderstandings arising in an organization, miscommunication also tends to frustrate relationships within an organization (Husain, 2013, p.43). Miscommunications happen when employees exchange information without understanding each other clearly. This may lead to misinterpreted details and facts that may make one team member work from a specific set of perceived knowledge and circumstances. At the same time, another is entirely in a different direction. When miscommunication has been identified, the organization must take corrective measures and save the situation.
People tend to communicate differently, and when there are no defined communication strategies, different styles are likely to lead to some clash and conflicts. An example is that one worker may prefer face to face conversations while another may prefer electronic means such as email. Each party may feel that the other party is challenging, and this would eventually lead to communication breakdown (Gilley, Gilley, and McMillan, 2009, p.75). Even when it comes to the right communication style, any technological glitches likely to occur must be considered to ensure that the flow of communication is sufficient. Emails, for instance, maybe routed to the spam box or be lost, and failure to follow up on contact through email may render communication ineffective. Such glitches may be overcome through personal conversations or phone conversations (Kwiatkowski, 2017, p.22)
Companies and organizations that suffer from problems related to communication often have no communication protocols. Improving communication in the workplace involves developing communication protocols that all employees should follow. This may include a policy on sending emails, providing reports on the status, and having a face to face meetings. Creating a communication system of checks and balances will help mitigate the problems. Additionally, unresponsiveness may lead to conflicts within the organization (Frandsen and Johansen, 2011, p 18). When managers or colleagues fail to respond to the request of information or clarification of opinion, the employee or the party waiting for response may feel that the other party is intentionally doing so, and this brings frustration, especially if the expected answer is supposed to come from up to down. This can indeed interfere with the ability of the employee to perform the tasks. It may further create a non-collaborative and toxic environment, even where non-responsiveness is due to some oversight or other benign causes.
Conclusion
Communication is an essential element in the success of the business as well as in personal life. It helps propel firms and organizations in the right direction. Excellent communication help in managing customers and in winning trust from them. Without proper communication in an organization, there is a high likelihood of constant conflicts and frustrations among the employees. Organizations must, therefore, build on the right communication protocols and strategies and help their employees in developing effective communication. Managers must emphasize the importance of the proper connection with their employees. Through excellent communication directed to its clients, an organization is even able to salvage its deteriorating public image.
Word Count – 1675 words
References
Bradley, H., 2013, November. Assessing and developing successful communication. People with Profound & Multiple Learning Disabilities: A Collaborative Approach to Meeting (p. 50). Routledge.
Cairney, P., and Kwiatkowski, R., 2017. How to communicate effectively with policymakers: combine insights from psychology and policy studies. Palgrave Communications, 3(1), p.37.
Gilley, A., Gilley, J.W., and McMillan, H.S., 2009. Organizational change: Motivation, communication, and leadership effectiveness. Performance improvement quarterly, 21(4), pp.75-94.
Frandsen, F., and Johansen, W., 2011. The study of internal crisis communication: towards an integrative framework. Corporate Communications: An International Journal.
Husain, Z., 2013. Effective communication brings a successful organizational change: the Business & Management Review, 3(2), p.43.
Kwiatkowski, C., 2017. Effective communication is a primary key to successful organizational change—Journal of Quality and Environmental Studies, 7(2), pp.22-29.
Petrou, P., Demerouti, E., and Schaufeli, W.B., 2018. Crafting the change: The role of employee job crafting behaviors for successful organizational change—Journal of Management, 44(5), pp.1766-1792.
Reyna, J., Hanham, J., and Meier, P., 2018. The Internet explosion, digital media principles, and implications to communicate effectively in the digital space. E-learning and Digital Media, 15(1), pp.36-52