Reflective Journal: Business Communication Skills and Practices

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Business Communication
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Table of Contents
Introduction......................................................................................................................................3
The importance of reflective practice with reference to relevant theories......................................4
Learning styles and factors that influence your communication and learning – consider how you
learn best..........................................................................................................................................6
Factors influencing the communication and learning......................................................................8
Communication skills in business...................................................................................................9
Any communication successes and challenges that you have encountered and how you have
responded to these..........................................................................................................................10
Conclusion.....................................................................................................................................11
Bibliography..................................................................................................................................12
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Introduction
There is a dire need for the organisation in present generation to communicate necessary pieces
of information both within and outside the premises in order to benefit the trade as well as
commerce of the organisation. The primary focus of this journal is to provide my knowledge as
well as competency in Business Communication. This journal will be depicting my own
strengths, weaknesses on the application of the business communication. This journal has
reflected several communication skills that are applicable in workplaces.
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The importance of reflective practice with reference to relevant theories
An essential component for continuous professional development is reflective practice.
Reflective practice is also referred as self-learning. This procedure often involves our own
thoughts in the development of competencies of skill sets involved in specific areas. There are
several departments of an organisation and the operational procedures depend on an effective
collaboration of various functional departments of the organisation. In addition to this, the
employees are the ones that have to execute the strategies developed by the higher management.
Therefore, managers as well as leaders have to communicate with employees in order to deliver
an in-depth knowledge of the changes that have been made for the betterment of trade and
commerce of the organisation (Petrou 2018: 1766). There are several theories that help in
personal cognisance such as Gibbs reflective model and Kolb’s learning style concept.
Gibb’s reflective model
Description: In this section, I have to depict the background information of the topic or
experience that I will be reflecting so that the reader has a concise idea of the topic or
experience.
Feelings: Here, I have to depict my personal feelings on the experience. I also need to discuss
my emotions of my personal experience.
Evaluation: In this section, I need to evaluate my actions for the betterment of the situation that
I have faced beforehand. Both the positive as well as negative consequences of my experience
have to be included in this section.
Analysis: Here, I have to include the possible ramifications and consider what may be helpful
for the specific experience or would have hindered it. Here I have to ensure that the theory from
the literature my experience is interweaved suitably.
Conclusion: In this section, I have to draw conclusion of my overall experience and what could
have been helpful for further improvement of the situation. A positive experience should include
my personal opinion on whether or not I would be doing the same for similar situation whereas,
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for negative scenarios I have evaluate any further variable that can help me in improving
situation like this in the future (Roberts et al., 2017: 10).
Kolb’s Learning Concept
Concrete experience: Here, I have to ensure that I define my unique experience that shall
provide a basis of the learning procedure.
Reflective observation: Here, I have to reflect my own opinion on the experience that has been
dealt by me in the past. I have to ensure that I reflect on the experience through all viewpoints
and perspective so that the readers have abbreviated comprehension of the experience and my
personal opinions.
Abstract Conceptualisation: This section is in relevance to the observations that have been
dealt during my experience. It is obligatory for me to implement logical ideas in order to
comprehend the situation and the problems related to it.
Active Experimentation: Here, I have to ensure that I experiment by implementing the theories
that are relevant to the situation in order to receive a better outcome. The theories shall help me
to predict the reality and act on that prediction to receive better results for the situation (DeCoux
2016: 203).
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Learning styles and factors that influence your communication and learning – consider
how you learn best
In order to ensure that I receive a detailed comprehension of the subject, I have to ensure that I
receive knowledge from different types of learning procedures. Knowledge can be gathered
through visual learning, auditory learning, reading and writing learning and kinaesthetic learning.
Figure 1: Visual learning
(Source: Prentiss and Walton 2019: 9)
The visual learning shall help me in receiving an abbreviated knowledge of the subject by
visualising pictures, graphs, as well as charts that are related to the specific subject. Here, the
relationships of various points in relevance to the topic can be comprehended. On the other hand,
the auditory learning shall help me to receive an in-depth knowledge through audios. This
learning procedure mainly emphasises on listening and understanding the concept of the subject.
Hearing the pieces of information regarding the topic shall allow me to gain a comprehensive
knowledge of the subject.
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Figure 2: reading and writing form of learning
(Source: Prentiss and Walton 2019: 9)
However, reading and writing shall allow me to read texts that are related to the subject and write
the knowledge gathered regarding the topic. This is regarded to be the most influential among all
sorts of learning there are several theories as well as concepts that needs to be considered while
learning, which can be apprehended through texts and write-ups. On the other hand,
Kinaesthetic-learning procedure involves several activities as well as programmes that develops
the competencies of the learners regarding the subject. This is based on practical demonstrations
and application of various theories that are involved in the subject.
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Factors influencing the communication and learning
Several factors influence communication and as a result affect learning as well. In order to
ensure that I receive an in-depth knowledge regarding the subject, I have to consider different
factors that affect leaning practices. The following factors affect the learning:
Physiological factors: These are related to my physical body that shall affect my own thinking
regarding the subject and influence my learning. Physiological factors have a direct impact on
the way we think regarding the topic. Injuries, physical stress, as well as extended periods of
inactivity can affect learning procedures. Unbalanced nutrition as well as dehydration can affect
neurotransmitters of the brain and hinder learning performance.
Psychological factors: This are related to the personality as well as characteristics of an
individual that affects learning procedures. An individual’s personality can have both positive as
well as negative effects on learning procedures.
Environmental factors: The surroundings around an individual can have direct impact on the
development of the learning procedures of that individual. The working conditions and
organisational set up can highly influence learning procedures of an individual I have to ensure
that the learning procedures has direct impact on the development of the practical life scenarios.
The environmental factors can both distract and engage the individual in the procedures of
gathering information regarding the topic.
Figure 3: Environmental factors affecting learning
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(Source: Prentiss and Walton 2019: 9)
Communication skills in business
Several communicational skills are applicable in business and it is obligatory for the employees
of organisation to communicate with each other in order to have detailed comprehension of the
operational procedures for the betterment of organisations. The leaders of an organisation has to
ensure that alterations regarding the strategies that are applied due to several factors such as
globalisation, external factors as well as internal factors are communicated among the employees
to ensure a successful execution of the strategies. Several forms of communication are effective
in the development of a business. The verbal as well as non-verbal communications are
applicable for development of a business. The verbal form of communication allows employees
to share pieces of information among them through speech whereas the non-verbal
communication avoids speech and elements such as body language, facial expressions are used
in order to provide understanding of the feelings (Prentiss and Walton 2019: 9).
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Figure 4: Business communication
(Source: Lee et al., 2016: 51)
The leaders and managers have to motivate employees as well to ensure that employees are
indulged in their designated roles as well as responsibilities and provide their best for the
development of the organisation (Lee et al., 2017: 51). It came to my knowledge that the
employees of an organisation have to use effective communication to interact with other
employees and gather pieces of information regarding products as well as services and their
expectations from the organisation. This helps the management of the organisation to cater the
customer with commodities that can meet their demands. Moreover, it also helps the organisation
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to promote the growth of innovation, which is regarded to be of prime focus of the organisation
in this present generation due to harsh competition in the market.
Any communication successes and challenges that you have encountered and how you have
responded to these
In my personal experience as the project leader for Coventry University Group, London, I
encountered several forms of communication that are used in the development of business. I had
to ensure that the entire team develops a healthy relationship and therefore, I initiated a
preliminary discussion of each of the team members. This allowed the team to develop suitable
relationship and discuss the problems regarding the project. In order to share several pieces of
information regarding the project, we applied the verbal and non-verbal communication. We also
had to ensure that our assessor receives a concise idea of the project and therefore, we had to
ensure that the content of the project could communicate with the assessor successfully (Weldy
2017: 62). This led to the success of the project despite of the challenges faced at the earlier
stages of the project due to lack of communication. Therefore, communication is regarded to be
of prime importance in growth as well as development of every organisation and a devoid of
communication can result in catastrophic damages in the development of operational procedures.
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Conclusion
The journal has reflected my personal experience and the influence of communication in the
growth as well as development of business organisations. The journal has collated several
learning styles that are regarded to be best along and includes factors that affect learning
procedures. In addition to this, the journal has covered various aspects of communication skills
in the development of a business and has depicted my personal experience as the project leader
of the Coventry University Group, London.
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Bibliography
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.
Roberts, M.J., Fitzgerald, D. and Molineux, M., 2017. Educating occupational therapists in the
use of theory and evidence to enhance supervision practice. The Open Journal of Occupational
Therapy, 5(4), p.10.
Weldy, T.G., 2017. Facilitating Process and Practice for Improving Business Writing
Skills. American Journal of Management, 17(5), pp.60-66.
DeCoux, V.M., 2016. Kolb's learning style inventory: A review of its applications in nursing
research. Journal of Nursing Education, 29(5), pp.202-207.
Prentiss, S. and Walton, J., 2019. Pedagogical Tools in Our Briefcases: Teaching the Business
and Professional Communication Course. Journal of Communication Pedagogy, 2(1), p.9.
Lee, D., Choi, Y., Youn, S. and Chun, J.U., 2017. Ethical leadership and employee moral voice:
The mediating role of moral efficacy and the moderating role of leader–follower value
congruence. Journal of Business Ethics, 141(1), pp.47-57.
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