Question

Communication in Organizations: Skill-Building Exercise

Exercise Overview

Communication skills refer to a manager’s ability to effectively convey ideas and information to others and to effectively receive ideas and information from others. This exercise focuses on communication skills as they involve deciding how to best convey information to others.

Exercise Background

Assume that you are a middle manager for a large electronics firm. People in your organization generally use one of three methods to communicate with one another. One common method is verbal communication, either face-to-face or by telephone. Surprisingly, people also still use a lot of written communication in the form of memos, reports, letters, and other documentation. And, of course, there is also a lot of digital communication such as email and direct messaging.

During a typical day you receive and send a variety of messages and other communication, sometimes using only a single method of communication but often using some combination of methods. The questions that follow ask you to select one or more methods that would be most effective for communicating specific kinds of information.

Use your communication skills to answer the following questions.

1. You need to reprimand a staff assistant who has been coming in to work late for the last several days. Which of these options would most likely be both efficient and effective? Check all that apply.

Send an email

Regardless of what you do first, follow-up with a written reprimand to the individual’s personnel file

Use social media

Reprimand the individual in public so as to deter others from being late

Schedule a meeting to discuss the problem

2. You need to schedule a meeting with your boss. Which of these options would most likely be both efficient and effective? Check all that apply.

Call the boss’s assistant and request a meeting

Email the boss’s assistant and request a meeting

Write a formal letter to your boss asking for a meeting

3. You need to inform a supplier that your company will soon be cutting back on its purchases because you plan to shift more of your business to a supplier offering lower prices. Which of these options would most likely be both efficient and effective? Check all that apply.

A telephone call to the supplier to explain the situation

An email to the supplier to explain the situation

A letter to the supplier to explain the situation

A personal meeting with the supplier to explain the situation

Answer 1

1. The first effective and efficient option to reprimand a staff assistant who is coming late for work is to schedule a meeting to discuss the problem.  A meeting with the staff could help to understand the reason for late coming, to council the staff about the expected behavior, rule and regulations to be followed as well as it could help to give a warning. Coming late to work shows the laziness of the employee and lack of seriousness to the committed work. It is effective and efficient because it helps the staff assistant to realise the seriousness of his laziness. If the staff assistant continue to be late even after the first warning , regardless what has done first , follow up with a written reprimand to the individual personnel file or send an email, both these written warnings appears to be  effective as it gives a idea about the further consequences . Reprimanding the individual in public so as to deter others may not be effective as it questions self respect of an individual and could seriously affect the morale of employees. Use of social media is also appears to be less effective and efficient, because public platform maynot be suitable for professional issues. It is not an effective way to handle the issue.

2. For scheduling a meeting with boss the first option is to send an email to the boss' assistant and request for a meeting. It appears to be effective and efficient as it is a cornor stone of business communication. Sending email to the assistant is convenient as he or she is the one who schedules and make arrangements for the meetings.The effectiveness of email depends on the style and structure such as it has to be direct, clear and easy to read.It appears to be effective since, Emails are most used means of communication nowadays. Another likely way to schedule a meeting with boss is to call the boss' assistant and request a meeting , this also appears to be effective and efficient. The assistant could convey the message to the boss and schedule the meeting as per convenience of boss. Writing a formal letter to the boss directly asking for a meeting may not be effective .The speed of communication is low , and it is an older style of requesting for meeting. As all the professional matters such as meetings, conferences of a boss is managed and scheduled by the assistant it appears to inconvenient.

3. To inform the supplier that the company will be cutting back the future purchases because the company plan to shift more of business to a supplier offering lower prices , In this situation the company could send an email to the supplier to explain the situation. It is effective and efficient because it faster means of communication as well as gives a platform to explain the reason for such a shift. Making a telephone call to the supplier to explain the situation also appears to be effective and efficient as it also easier and faster means of communication, and does not involve much cost. Sending a letter to the supplier to explain the situation may not be effective and efficient as it consumes a lot of time to pass the information. Arranging a personal meeting with supplier to explain the situation is most ineffective and inefficient way especially when the supplier cannot be conveniently approached. It consumes a lot of time and involves cost too.

NOTE :"If you liked this answer, please give an UP VOTE , it will be quite encouraging , THANK YOU!"