Communication in a Workplace for Openly and Professionally

Question: Discuss about theCommunication in a Workplace for Openly and Professionally. Answer: Introduction. An ideal workplace is characterized by great communication among workmates. In such an environment, employees communicate freely, openly and professionally. Interpersonal communication explains how well a person communicates with his/her colleagues (Eisenberg et al 2009). However poor communication exists in many organizations and is one of the major reasons for conflicts in these organisations and even in our relationships with others. Case study. I have witnessed this a lot of times in my relationships with friends and family. I have also seen it in one of the biggest Non-governmental organizations in the country. For example, there is an incident where my sister, an employee in this NGO found herself in a lot of trouble due to poor communication. She is a program manager in this organization which works with refugees and focuses on the girl child refugees. She has a boss, who is the regional manager called Jane. One day, a lady called Linda (a foreigner) went to Jane and informed her of her interest in helping to educate two orphaned girls between the age of ten and twelve. These girls should be refugees and if possible siblings. Jane informed my sister and asked her to make arrangements and identify the two girls. She quickly did so and started working on the papers to legalize the process. After two months everything was ready and the two girls, who live with their aunt were to move to the capital and start living with Lin da. Earlier on, she had asked the aunt for her consent and she had quickly agreed. She had used an interpreter who could speak the aunts native language since she did not understand English. However, when the time to travel came, the aunt was disappointed because she had agreed thinking that she would move too with the girls which was not the case. She went ahead and said that she was forced in to it and tricked by my sister. This case was quickly forwarded to the relevant authorities and my sister was being accused of child trafficking. To make thinks worse, Jane had not informed her boss of these developments all along hence there was a lot of confusion, friction, frustration and worry. If the aunt had understood what my sister meant when she was asking for her consent then maybe there would have been no such problem. If Jane had informed her boss, the country director, about the arrangement then such a problem would have been easily resolved. This is a very big organisation that was undergoing a lot of challenges due to poor communication. Being an observer, the incident did not affect me directly, however I was sad and really felt bad that my sister had to go through all that. I think the incident would have been avoided if the organisation had paid more attention to communication. I felt angry and disappointed that such a respectable organisation would face such mere challenges. My sister on the other hand was left so scared and even thought of resigning. However, the case was resolved but she was left demoralized and she has been seeking employment elsewhere since then. The lady was not able to help the two girls which was so unfortunate. Everyone was left disappointed. What were the reasons for the poor communication? Unclear objectives. One of the major causes of poor communication in most organisations is undefined objectives (Dixon 1998). The organisations objectives must be defined for there to be no conflicts. For example, the duty Jane asked my sister to carry out, this is, to identify the two girls does not fall under my sisters responsibilities as the program manager but due to undefined objectives, she went ahead and did it which was later used against her. Language barrier. My sister and the aunt could not speak the same language. If they had been able to communicate without the interpreter then maybe the aunt would have known what she was giving consent to. Poor leadership. There is a chain of poor leadership in the organisation. There is no communication among the managers and it is evident the managers hardly know their responsibilities and roles. Personal issues. Personal issues have an effect on communication between employees in organization. For this reason an organization should have a policy against romantic relationships in the workplace (Dwyer 2012). In case of fights and arguments, the employees should take it upon themselves to solve them(Tourish and Hargie 2004). Personal issues between Jane and the regional director has been witnessed by many. Maybe that was the reason she did not inform him of the on goings which led to more harm. How to improve communication Defining the organisations objectives. Objectives and goals should be defined. Everyone should know their roles (Gerard and Ellinor 2001). Sorting out personal issues. Jane and the regional director should sit down an sort their issues to avoid such cases in the future. Train on better leadership. The leaders should be trained as often as possible so as to make them better leaders (Walker 2011). If this does not work then it would make more sense to have them replaced with new better leaders. Insights gained for the development of interpersonal communication in work-based settings For there to be effective communication in a work place, every employee should work on his/her own communication skills (Gergen et al 2004). Team communication should be everyones priority. There are ways of developing interpersonal communications in this setting. They include: Having an open-door policy. This is where you let your office door be open to everyone at all times. Closing your office door creates a barrier ( Fairhurst 2007). It is hard for other people to interact with you. When you have an open door, it shows that you are open to interactions, discussion and sharing of ideas hence more communication. This shows that other employees can trust you. Work on your emotional intelligence. For there to be effective communication in a work place, you as an employer should work on how you relate with others. You should work on your self-awareness, self-management, social awareness and relationship management (Mazutis and Slawinski 2008). Research and plan. As an employee, you should make it a point of importance to collect relevant information and use this during important conversations to avoid confusion and inaccuracy (Isaacs 1999). Monitor expectations. Do not assume. Your assumptions may not always be write. When interacting with a co-worker monitor how he/she expresses himself/herself. Get to know what one expects from you. Understand him/her. Take note of your audience. Understand who you are talking to. Different employees have different personalities, character, weakness and strengths (Eunson,2012). Communicate with everyone with this in mind as per their personality. Self-evaluate yourself. Get to understand who you are. Know your strengths and weaknesses. You can ask for honest opinion and feedback from your fellow colleagues and even managers to help you learn more about yourself (Downs 2004). How can these insights inform the way you communicate with people in the future? Taking into considerations the insights mentioned above, I think in the future I will be able to communicate even better with my workmates. I have realized I hardly take time to understand my audience and this might have led to communication breakdown in the past. For this reason, I plan to learn on how to pay more attention to my audience to ensure the message is passed on correctly and with no misinterpretations. Working on my emotional intelligence is an insight I found the most important. This is not only good for communication with my colleagues but it is also important for me to grow as a person (Miller, 2012). Applying this in the future would lead to even better relationships in the workplace. Conclusion. I have learnt a lot about communication and I have come to realize it is one of the most important aspect in the workplace. Every individual in the workforce should pay more attention to it so as to ensure maximum productivity in the work place. Reference List: Dixon, N.M. 1998, Dialogue at Work. Making Talk Developmental for People and Organizations, Center for Creative Leadership, London. Downs, C.W. Adrian, A.D. 2004aa, Assessing Organizational Communication. Strategic Communication Audits, Guilford Press, New York. Dwyer, J. 2012, The Business Communication Handbook, 9th edn, Pearson Australia, Frenchs Forest. (Available via UTS Library Open Reserve) Eisenberg, E.M., Goodall, H.L. 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