Reflective Journal: Communication, Learning, and Management Impact

This reflective journal delves into the significance of business communication, various learning styles, and the impact of communication methods within a business and managerial context. It explores different learning styles such as visual, aural, physical, logical, social, and solitary, referencing Kolb’s learning style theory. The journal also identifies factors influencing communication, including body language, content effectiveness, cultural diversity, social background, and educational differences. Furthermore, it discusses communication theories and models, emphasizing the importance of effective communication in management for planning, organizing, leading, and controlling business activities. The study concludes that clear and reliable communication is essential for building healthy employee relationships and establishing successful business strategies. The document includes a reference list of relevant academic sources.

Reflective Journal

Introduction:
Business Communication process of exchanging information between individuals in an
organisation. This plays an important role in defining and managing the role of people within
an industry. Another form of business communication is to communicate with customers to
promote and sell product and services. It helps an organisation in decision making process. In
addition to this individuals can shape their ideology by sharing values and beliefs with each
other. The study is all about understanding the range of learning styles, factors affecting
communication, theories of communication and its role within management.

A range of learning styles
Every person follow a particular way of learning things for example, sometimes it’s been
seen some people learn through visually that is through video and some like reading books.
Irrespective the way people like learning things for their own good. Learning helps bringing
enlightenment it does not matter is a person is 2 year old, 20 year old or 80 year old there is
always scope of learning and improving. We human being always wanted to have our way of
perfection and we put our life’s work on getting such goal on our way we always learn things.
There are few different ways of learning a thing for example, visual, verbal, physical, logical,
social, and solitary and many more (Motoyama et al., 2015).
Visual mode of learning is one of the best modes of learning. Some people prefer using
picture, videos and images as a mode of learning something. This mode of learning process
can be traced back to ancient Egypt. This process has always been popular among most of the
population of this planet perhaps I am being one of them.
Aural has been popular for a long time and this is one of my favourite mode of learning.
Aural mode of learning can be traced back to the early days of human history. As man
developed they managed to come up with different and newer models such as social and
visual and many more. Aural mode of learning has been around since millennium. It helped
in creation of schools, colleges, almost every business origination. Man’s dependency in
verbal mode of learning process has made them come up with invention like telephone.
Physical mode of learning is the world’s oldest mode of learning. This mode of
communication and learning process has been around since the very beginning of human
civilization. This mode of learning process is very much famous for deaf people in all around
the world. Most of the Indian people can be seen using this style of communication
sometimes defence forces can also be seen making gestural approach while communicating
with each other. Although this is very much important way of learning something this style is
deciphering day by day. Only hand full of people uses this mode of communication and
learning methods (McAleese et al., 2014).
Logical some people require this approach of learning. These people are impossible to handle
and they come up with different questions while answering them one. They always think that
whatever they are doing is always correct and right, they cannot be wrong. Only a counter
question to these people can make them feel better and satisfied. The answers to some

questions are already known to those people but they strive to make conflict even after proper
reasoning. A proper and logical approach to these people is always good for these people.
They understand the logical approach to everything.
Solitary is one of the most effective modes of learning. Some people prefer learning a
particular thing alone through self study. It has been noticed self thought things are very hard
to forget and very effective. Most of the self thought people are very efficient in nature.
Kolb’s learning style has some stages of learning more particularly four stages. Mr Kobel has
done a fantastic job on studding the stages of learning. Although I feel it these stages of
learning can be subjective in nature, which is it may vary from person to person. Here are the
four stages of learning concrete experience, reflective observation of the new experience,
abstract conceptualization and active experimentation.
The first stage states that a new experience or situation is encountered, that is to experience
something. The second stage is based on reflection that is the impact after the experience.
The third stage states about the conceptualisation that is what new idea one is having after the
impact. The last stage is about the test, which is all about being guided by the experiences.
Factors influences communication and learning
The communication becomes worth, when the actual intention of sender is reflected in the
understandings of the receiver. When we are conveying certain messages to an individual,
each aspects of an effective communication must be taken into considerartion.There are
several factors, which influences communication process.
 Body language: Body language plays an important role during the communication
process. This indicates types of expression, gesture or body movements. The
communication, we want to deliver, must be reflected in our body language. The
receiver will get confused, if our body language has no match with our information.
People may consider a negative body language as offence, which can create a bad
impression about the sender (Breakenridg, 2017). For example, as a sales worker
when I talk in a soft and convenient manner, keeping a smiling face and maintaining
effective eye contact, the customers take active participation in the conversation
willingly. On the other hand, when I do not do them, the customers felt dis-
encouraged.

 Effectiveness of the content: The content, which we are trying to deliver, must have
a significant meaning. Without an effective content, messages cannot be understood
by the individuals. A useless content makes our effort worthless.
 Cultural Diversity or background: According to Hooker (2018), cultural diversity
may prevent the communication process. Individuals, having different cultural
background may interpret the wrong meaning of a conversation. This leads to the
creation of conflict among the employees.
 Social background: Individuals in an organisation, have different social background.
The information which is against the customs of their society may the reason of their
dissatisfaction with organisation. If a person has a good background, then the
individual would communicate in a more humble and ethical manner.
 Educational Differences: The communication can be effective, if both sender and
receiver belong to the same educational background. The thought process of
individuals may be different for different educational background and it may reflect in
their understanding.
 Being attentive: During the communication process, both sender and receiver of the
information must be attentive. Without attention, we cannot understand the purpose of
communication.
 Communication Channel: To make the communication process more effective, we
should choose an appropriate channel without having any barriers. For example, I
have found face-to-face communication more convenient that written one as here I get
direct opportunity to communicate effectively.
Theories of communication
Every organization needs to have a proper mode of communication. A proper mode of
communication helps bring efficiency into the organization. There are various models for
communication for example, interpersonal, interpretive and presentational. Every
communication modes has its own advantage and flaws. The formal and informal mode of
communication is no exception to the flaws. For example, in formal mode of communication
a personal relationship is being avoided and in the informal mode of communication the
recording is not kept. An organization should always try to bring efficiency through the
combination of both the formal and the informal mode. If the advantage of formal and
informal is been mixed together there can be a lot better result for the organization. A proper

model of communication should be taken in order to have every employee on the same page.
The communication channel should be chosen in such a way so that conflict, corral and
miscommunication can be avoided (Stüber, 2017)
Impact of different methods of communication within a business and managerial
context
Managers and employees use different methods of communication to run the business in an
effective manner. The methods and its impacts are as follows.
Interpersonal communication is the simple way of exchanging the ideas. It can be both
verbal and non-verbal communication. This helps to build relationship among the employees
and managers. In my company, I have observed that, this method has helped in increasing the
operational efficiency of managerial functions.
According to Mehrabian (2017), the facial expressions, body movements and signals by using
hand are part of Non-Verbal communication. This enhances the relationship among the
employees. It has a significant impact while praising an employee and giving feedbacks.
Apart from this, non-verbal communication enhances the cultural interaction and enables to
negotiate with suppliers and vendors in my company.
The written communication can be done by means of writing memo, sending mails, and
typing messages. Through this, mangers transfer the information to their subordinates in a
formal way. I have observed that each one gets the proof of the activity, which they are going
to perform. In my organisation, managers face problem in getting immediate feedback.
The Oral communication is the exchange of information by spoken words. The tools used by
my company are sales pitches, presentations, meeting and interviews. By the help of oral
communication, mangers can share the concept effectively (Young and Travis, 2017).They
can get immediate feedback. In my view the conflicts and disputes are easily resolved with
the help of effective oral communication. Business meetings serve as an important part of this
communication, which help the business planners to circulate new business ideas.

Role of effective communication within management
It provides the management team to do paining, organizing, leading, controlling and many
more. The management needs to have a proper channel and proper mode so that these task
can get completed efficiently. During organizing if the management team could not co-
operate properly than there will be a big issue. Management always need a way to
communicate with each other and a record for such communication is also very much
necessary. A personal relation among the subordinates needs to be kept before making any
decision. The flow of information from both ways that is from a management team to the
lower level worker and the other way around should be clear and efficient. Sometimes a new
idea may come from outside the management team so the manager should keep their mode of
communication open to all. It also helps the management team to understand the situation of
the company

Conclusion:
As per the study it can be concluded that, business communication is an integral part of the
organization. The communication must be clear and reflected in a reliable manner. Business
cannot get success without a proper communication. The communication in each level of
managerial process is highly necessary. Right information must be passed to right people in
order to get a transparent concept of business strategies. The modes of communication also
play a vital role in building a healthy relationship among employees. A successful business
can be established based upon the effective communication process.

Reference Lists:
Barnlund, D.C., 2017. A transactional model of communication. In Communication
theory (pp. 47-57). Routledge.
Breakenridge, D., 2017. Answers for Modern Communicators: A Guide to Effective Business
Communication. Routledge.
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.
Hooker, J., 2018. Cultural differences in business communication. The handbook of
intercultural discourse and communication, pp.389-407.
Illeris, K., 2018. A comprehensive understanding of human learning. In Contemporary
theories of learning (pp. 1-14). Routledge.
McAleese, M., Bladh, A., Bode, C., Muehlfeit, J., Berger, V. and Petrin, T., 2014. Report to
the European Commission on new modes of learning and teaching in Higher Education.
Mehrabian, A., 2017. Nonverbal communication. Routledge.
Motoyama, T. and Niro, M., Ricoh Co Ltd, 2015. Method and system for remote diagnostic,
control and information collection based on various communication modes for sending
messages to users. U.S. Patent 9,015,261.
Stüber, G.L., 2017. Principles of mobile communication (Vol. 3). Springer.
Young, K.S. and Travis, H.P., 2017. Oral communication: Skills, choices, and consequences.
Waveland Press.