MNG81001: Analyzing Interpersonal Communication at Southern Cross

This report provides an in-depth analysis of interpersonal communication (IC) and its importance in management, particularly within the context of ABC Company. It defines IC, explains its effects on the workplace, and details the significance of persuasion as a tool for managers. The report assesses communication gaps within the organization, evaluates leadership styles, and recommends strategies to improve communication effectiveness. Key areas covered include conflict resolution, team building, crisis management, and the impact of cultural differences on communication. Furthermore, the report explores various communication channels, such as formal, informal, downward, upward, and horizontal communication, highlighting the challenges and advantages of each. The analysis culminates in practical recommendations aimed at enhancing workplace communication and fostering a more transparent and productive organizational environment.

Running head: INTERPERSONAL ASPECTS OF COMMUNICATION
SOUTHERN CROSS UNIVERSITY
Signed Signed : T. Ritesh
Date: Date : 09/06/18
Student Name: Ritesh Raj Tagarampudi Student ID NO:
22921727 Unit Name : Management
Communication Unit Code : MNG81001
Tutor’s name:Stuart Danvers Assignment
No. 4Assignment Due date:09/06/18
Date submitted:09/06/18
Interpersonal aspects of communication
Declaration: I have read and understand the Rules Relating to Awards (Rule 3
Section 18 – Academic Misconduct Including Plagiarism) as contained in the SCU
Policy Library. I understand the penalties that apply for plagiarism and agree to
be bound by these rules. The work I am submitting electronically is entirely my
own work.

INTERPERSONAL ASPECTS OF COMMUNICATION
Executive summary
The main purpose of the report was to provide an understanding of interpersonal
communication and its importance. The report chiefly aimed at answering as to why managers
should give priority to effective communication. In doing so, the report gave a thorough
definition of interpersonal communication (IC) and explained its effects in the workplace.
Further, the report also explained the impact of persuasion, which is also a part of IC and
detailed its importance as well.
Also, in this report the communication gap of the managers was measured in accordance
with the importance of effective communication of the managers of ABC Company and the
reason for of making communication active and effective was recommended. The
communication gap within the organization and the leadership style was assessed and addressed.
The strategies were recommended and assigned accordingly with the needs of the organization.
The recommendations were done accordingly with the respective with the current
communication issues within the organization. The report concluded with an overall summary of
the paper and suggested the need for having IC and persuasion as important tools for managers.
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Table of Contents
Executive summary.........................................................................................................................1
Introduction......................................................................................................................................3
Defining Interpersonal communication...........................................................................................3
Importance of interpersonal communication...............................................................................5
Effects in the workplace..................................................................................................................5
Defining persuasion.........................................................................................................................6
Importance of persuasion.............................................................................................................6
Practicing the art of persuasion....................................................................................................7
Findings...........................................................................................................................................8
Effective communication.............................................................................................................8
Communication problems............................................................................................................8
Barrier in effective communication process................................................................................8
Communication channels.............................................................................................................9
Analysis...........................................................................................................................................9
Importance of interpersonal communication and aspects............................................................9
Recommendations..........................................................................................................................11
Advantages of workplace communication.....................................................................................11
Communication problems as formal and whole as organization communication channels..........12
a.) Formal channel of communication:................................................................................12
Informal channel of communication/ grapevine........................................................................13
Downward communication........................................................................................................14
Upward communication.............................................................................................................15
Horizontal communication.........................................................................................................16
The challenge of effective business communication.....................................................................16
Conclusion.....................................................................................................................................21
References......................................................................................................................................22
Bibliography..................................................................................................................................26
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Introduction
Communication holds the key towards attaining success in any organization and thus
receives the most attention from managers especially in today’s global business environment
(Park, Reber and Chon 2016). The failure to communicate effectively leads to poor performance
and undesirable outcomes. Managers therefore, must realize the correct way to communicate and
train their employees properly as well. Even governments of most countries have realized the
importance of communication to flourish business and ultimately the country’s economy (Park
and Ghauri 2015). The businesses that fail to communicate their business goals and policies to
the customers clearly often fall behind in the race to dominate the market.
In this report, the importance of interpersonal communication (IC) and its role in
persuading others shall be discussed. The report will begin with a clear explanation of
interpersonal communication followed by its importance. Then, a discussion on the effects of
interpersonal communication will be done, which will precede the description and importance of
persuasion.
It has been seen that Effective communication in any workplace is essential to establish
the organizational structure in order to avoid communicational problem. Continue establishments
of good communication can be effective for the organizational problem to investigate the priority
of the effective communication. Good communication in workplace to turn to the office for
workplace communication to realize the inclusion can be included as bunch of advantages after
the transmission of various ways such as emails, voicemails, text, messages et cetera. In this
report, ABC Company is suffering from some communicational errors in order to achieve the
communication channel to develop the formal networking channel in the organization. I have
asked to prepare the report including the communication priority to expect the issues.
Defining Interpersonal communication
Communication is categorized into different types that include intrapersonal,
interpersonal, group and mass communication (Overall and McNulty 2017). This paper will
focus on interpersonal communication as it has a significant role to play in modern
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organizations. In order to answer the query as to the reason why managers should prioritize
effective communication, it is important to explain interpersonal communication clearly.
Interpersonal communication refers to the two-way communication involving two
individuals. The sender and the receiver in interpersonal communication communicate via face-
to-face communication (Carr and Hayes 2015). It could be either verbal that is spoken or non-
verbal that is through gestures and signs. Messages conveyed through interpersonal
communication do not possess the same meaning as the words spoken. In cases where the
individuals involved in interpersonal communication hail from different linguistic or cultural
backgrounds, the messages conveyed sometimes become blurred or confusing.
This happens because of the noise, the linguistic and cultural barrier. People from
separate cultures might interpret different meanings of the messages conveyed. One good
example of this noise in interpersonal communication could be of an individual from Asian and a
Western nationality. To the Western individual, kissing on the hand to greet someone is a part of
his or her culture but the same is considered unwelcomed for the Asian.
It has been seen that Employee welfare is a term including various services, benefits and
facilities offered. This study is to investigate the importance of communication and addressing its
barriers among managers. The quality of work life of employees and employers depend upon
various factors. One of the most important factors of that is effective communication. The
effective communication leads to transparency and the attitude of employees towards work or
towards a job.
Communication means transmitting and interpreting information within organization.
The managerial behaviour can greatly hamper the communication and information clarity. The
effective and transparency of communication of employees and managers are highly required for
better productivity and less conflicting situations in the organization. The purpose of present
study is to find out the effective communication in higher management of any organization and
the need of that. Also how aspects of communication can be related to sustainability, how
communication of sustainability can affect the achievements.
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Importance of interpersonal communication
It is of no doubt that, interpersonal communication, however vague or chaotic it could be,
has undeniable importance in all spheres of life. In business particularly, interpersonal
communication is at use in every stage and thus holds utmost importance. Interpersonal
communication is used to resolve conflicts, manage crisis, build strong teams, and become a
great leader amongst other things. Thus, one can see the level of importance interpersonal
communication has in the field of management or business. Conflicts in organizations occur due
to the lack of proper and effective communication, which then leads to poor performance and
outcome. In order to resolve the conflict, managers have to listen to and provide suggestions or
instructions to both conflicting parties.
As Sarapaivanich and Patterson (2015) opine, budding managers or entrepreneurs often
show a deficiency of interpersonal skills when they enter the real world of business. This restricts
them from acquiring the skills to manage conflicts. The manager, the author further states, has
the most important role in an organization because she or he has to communicate interpersonally
with subordinates, clients, guests, peers and superiors to prevent and manage conflicts. Effective
management of conflict demonstrates strong leadership along with the ability to motivate. An
able leader is thus the one who has refined interpersonal skills that he or she utilizes to manage
crisis.
Effects in the workplace
In the workplace, interpersonal communication is the most dominant form of
communication because it is inevitable that two individuals would communicate with each other
at any point of time for any reason. When two people communicate in a workplace whether for
work purpose or just causally, it is bound to produce some result wither positive or negative.
Fluker and Murray (2017) highlight the effects of IC in the workplace by referring to the
productive interchange of ideas. The author stresses on the positive effects of IC and states that
transformational leadership is a result of effective interpersonal communication. Goby,
Nickerson and David (2015) on the other hand focuses on the ways that colleagues from
multicultural backgrounds interact with each other and the effect it has on the organization. At
the workplace, it is inevitable that people from different cultural and social backgrounds would
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work together and they would most certainly engage in interpersonal communication. These
interactions often lead to increased understanding between colleagues and team. However, IC
might also have the negative impact of conflicts as well. When workers representing the
dominant class start harassing or bullying workers hailing from minority background, it produces
severe consequences. It is thus evident that IC has significant effect in the workplace.
Defining persuasion
Persuasion, in its simplest terms refers to the process of convincing someone successfully
to achieve a particular result. It is an umbrella term used in place of influence. Persuasion can
endeavor to manipulate the belief, attitudes, behaviors and motivations of an individual. In the
field of business, persuasion is used as a tool to mold or change the attitudes of the consumers
towards any service or product. Eilu, Baguma and Pettersson (2014) define persuasion as the tool
that people use intentionally or intentionally in their everyday life to turn things into their
advantage.
Every individual is involved in the process of persuasion even without knowing; for
example, parents persuade their children to study by comparing them with other children and
saying that if they do not study they will not get what others will. (Steinfatt and Janbek 2016)
traces the development of the concept of persuasion back to the 1940s and 1950s, when both
politicians and advertising campaigners used it as propaganda. The concept has evolved
remarkably since then and is now the most powerful tool for managers.
Managers and leaders across organizations and across countries have recognized
the impact of persuasion. It has the power to take a business to peak by making people buy the
particular service or product even if it is not significant.
Importance of persuasion
Those who do not have much idea regarding its effectiveness at times perceive
persuasion in a negative way. In order to make people understand the positive role of persuasion
in business, it is important to bring forth its importance (Jacks and Lancaster 2015). In today’s
global business environment, businesses face stiff competition each day. Persuasion helps
managers to attract and keep their customers attached to the organization. Those who work in the
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field of marketing and sales are more aware of the importance of persuasion. They need this tool
to lure and confirm customers in order to earn profit for the company and for themselves as well.
Most ad campaigns or solo ads are forms of persuasion. Persuasion is important for political
leaders because it decides their fate during elections. If they succeed in persuading the voters,
they win elections and consequently attain power. Persuasion is done not only through physical
means but also happens at the psychological level as well. During the 19th century when the
world was divided into two blocs, the leaders realized the importance of persuasion. In the
modern world however, its importance is realized in areas of business and politics only (Jowett
and O'donnell 2014).
Practicing the art of persuasion
The Hypodermic Needle theory, the magic bullet theory, Persuasion theory and the
Stimulus-response model – all constitute the different theories that may explain the art of using
persuasion. These theories help in understanding the influence of persuasion and then practicing
it. According to the Hypodermic Needle theory, mss media or for that fact, anyone having some
control over things has immediate and powerful effect on the subjects. The magic bullet theory is
formed on the same premise. The Persuasion theory on the other hand, states that people could
be influenced to act in a certain way by changing their attitudes through use of powerful words
or actions.
An understanding of these theories could help in practicing the art of persuasion. Apart
from that, managers could also follow certain steps to persuade the receiver (Jarding, Bouchard
and Hartley 2017).
 Repeating a message
 Being specific with the message, that is postulating the message as per
individuals
 Using contradicting story scenarios to induce an impact
 Giving personal touch to the message to match receiver setting
 Taking help from friends to produce warm effect on receivers
 Provide evidences of interests
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Findings
Effective communication
Four major loop wholes of communication are faced by the organization and the
management which is related with interpersonal aspects of communication. One of the important
problem that is faced by the company is that the interpersonal aspects of communication. The
employees use to communicate in order to persuade and influencing others with their decisions
within the organization.
According to (Lähtinen et.al. 2017) another problem that is faced by the organization is
the organization as a whole has formal communication structure but there is no informal channel
within the organization and thus the interpersonal relationship and communication of the
employees are hardly smooth. The aspects of communication should be equivalent with the
graph of achievement and activities with the organization. The problems that are also faced by
the company is the rigid behavior of managers that is leading to lesser well being of employees
as well as of the organization, which hinders in the corporate social responsibility of the business
affecting in customer and employee loyalty and resulting in decreased positive reputation.
Communication problems
Effective leadership is dependent upon effective communication of the employees (Boluk
et.al. 2017). Communication plays a critical role in the advancement of work culture and in
success of business. The communication problem which is faced there is absence of informal
channel of communication within the organization. Employee performance is largely dependent
upon the effective communication of the organization (Massey et.al.2017). When the
communication system is favorable the employees are encouraged and motivated to achieve the
personal as well as able to meet the organizational goals. But the lack of effective
communication leads to the communication gap and dissatisfaction and distress in the work
environment.
Barrier in effective communication process
There are different kind of barriers in the process of communication within the company,
two of the most prominent barriers of communication faced that are environmental
communication barrier and personal communication barrier. The inadequacy to listen and pay
attention to information between sender and receiver and the understanding of the information
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creates a gap of understanding leading to ineffective communication. The important
communication barrier is personal barrier. Personal barrier can be depicted as frame of reference
of an individual or an attitude of manager. The beliefs, values and ideas, prejudice that are
followed by managers which act as personal communication barrier in an organization (Longest
et.al. 2000). The other barriers of communication are selective perception which is basically a
cognitive distortion of an individual which can be described as biased thinking process of an
individual.
Communication channels
The communication channel can be of two basic types, one is formal communication and
another is informal communication. Strategic communication should be followed by the
managers in effective and persuasive, clear and concisely for decision making. The intra
organizational communication flow can be upward, downward, horizontal and diagonal. Upward
communication occurs with the higher level of management and subordinates (Sit et.al. 2017).
Downward communication flow occurs when managers need to provide information to the
subordinates. Horizontal communication occurs when the information is communicated between
co-workers. Diagonal communication occurs between different levels and departments of the
organization. The lack of intra organizational communication channel might lead to the lack of
communication network. It hinders the ability to optimize performance and produces a culture of
distrust uncertainty between the employees which affects in business ineffectiveness and lower
employee engagement (Omilion et.al. 2017).
Analysis
Importance of interpersonal communication and aspects
Interpersonal communication gap can be depicted as the gap of information between
receiver and sender. The gap might be created because of various reasons that might be of lack of
communication skills or the clarity of the information or might be related with some
psychological of personal barriers of the managers. There are certain strategies that can be taken
for more transparency of communication and clear network connection.
According to Fayol’s classical theory (1949), the various informal groups should be
encouraged and strengthened for providing autonomy and play an influential part within the
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company. For making better communication network within the organization the horizontal
organizational structure and communication should be encouraged and followed. The interest
and new ideas should be taken into consideration for generating vast solution of any crysis. The
communication sometimes varies with individual and personality difference (Neill et.al. 2017).
The rigidity and obsessive thoughts of any higher management can make an impact on the
organizational climate and work culture as well as in the job satisfaction of the employees.
Persuasive communication of the managers has great impact on the decision making process of
any hired as the message tend to shape concept, motivate individual or carry effective change
process.
Based on research by Miller (1980), it can be analyzed that, persuasive communication
can affect an individual’s behaviour inadvertently as it is a subset of communication process and
intended to affect others response. Communication means transmitting and interpreting
information in the organization. Feedback plays an important role in the process of
organizational communication, but the managerial behavior can greatly hamper the
communication and information clarity. There are some strategies that can be taken for making a
change in the communication smooth, for making less communication gap the barriers should be
removed and should be taken action for any ineffectiveness or gap (Ackerman et.al. 2017).
Sustainable development is embedded with the organizational culture of the organization.
Sustainable development is thus a process of mutual understanding which can be dealt with
future improvements and developments.
The critical analysis of the problem and the solution that can be drawn is not noticed.
Thus the problem with the communication has aroused within the management. CSR (corporate
social responsibility) is important for economic and organisational growth as this deals with
analyzing the customers’ needs and can be used in brand quality and brand loyalty of
consumes(Tian, D., 2017). An ineffective communication or communication gap may lead to
the environment of distrust which affect greatly in the position of the company in the global
market. Also the rigid managerial behaviour and the lack of open door communication channel
raised the questions of communication gap of managers.
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Recommendations
The employees of the organization should be motivated and empowered and should be
provided by autonomy to feel like they are part of the organization and capable of making
decisions in the team. The effective communication of managers should be non-judgmental and
bias free for making information more transparent and less vague as that increase the chance of
distrust and disregard of information within the work environment. Free flow and constructive
communication of the employees should be encouraged. Any prejudice or frame of reference of
managers should be highly avoided and eradicated.
The use of grapevine communication process should be encouraged within the higher
management. The attitude and prejudice of the managers should be counselled and should bring
change by the process of self-analysis and exercise. Multiple channels should be introduced for
better communication process. The shared view of empathy and knowledge management skills
should be introduced for management. The time frame and training and skill improvement
strategies should be taken for the improvement of communication and action plans should be
introduced. For decision making a participative decision making should be implemented and
required. Counselling, questionnaire and interview questions should be assessed and
recommended as tools.
Advantages of workplace communication
To improve workers more productive: Effective lateral communicational forces can be
developed to discover the employees to produce the effective communication from the superiors
in this sector. Designing for the effective prototyping for the addition to life as the specific
guidance with the real life indication is to develop the effective case to introduce in real life
guidance (Carroll, 2015). It can be said that the effective communicational effects can be
designed to increase the satisfaction and allowing designing the quick and efficient growth to
flow the upward in ABC Company.
To increase job satisfaction: Employees are able to face the upward communication and
the information will be able to respond the leading position of the employees. This
communicational type exists with the managing the employee’s leading role and increasing the
satisfaction level in work culture. Communication will help to receive the specific guidance to
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