Communication Reflection Assignment - University Name

This assignment is a reflection on the importance of communication in leadership, focusing on intercultural communication challenges. The student analyzes the communication model, highlighting the roles of encoding, decoding, and the impact of cultural dimensions like high and low context communication. The reflection emphasizes the importance of adapting communication styles to build trust, especially when interacting with individuals from different linguistic backgrounds. The student provides a personal anecdote illustrating communication barriers and the importance of simplifying messages for better understanding. The assignment concludes by emphasizing the relevance of intercultural communication in the workplace and the need to be aware of communication pitfalls to avoid misunderstandings and build trust within diverse teams. The student also includes a bibliography with a relevant research article.

Running head: COMMUNICATION
COMMUNICATION
Name of the Student:
Name of the University:
Author Note:

1COMMUNICATION
(A) Reflection on learning materials
The main learning outcome from the materials in the article is that communication
plays an important part in the development of trust within the workforce of an organization.
The communication model in the article suggests that communication is like a cycle, and
therefore, encoding and decoding of messages play an important part in the process of the
communication. Stress has been given on the medium of the messages as well, which is
indicative of a high quality and comprehensive model. Cultural dimensions have also been
considered, such as high context and low context cultures, in which communications take
place with high entropy such as giving importance to non verbal aspects of communication,
as well as formality in communication in high context, while in low context, communication
processes takes place through casual forms, not giving much stress on the non verbal cues.
Edward Hall (1990) says in the article that the sender of the message should never assume
that the message is fully comprehensible to the receiver, since focusing more on encoding the
messages without being complacent would ensure that the message is well framed for the
better interpretation by the receiver. This is a highly important factor in communication, since
often times, we do face the consequences of speaking without thinking.
(B) Reflection on contents
The way in which communication barriers play a part in the trust formation and trust
worthiness within a group of workforce, indicates the fact that some aspects of
communication must be manipulated in favour of the facilitation of the communication
process, to ensure that trust is established in the group, which is vital for performance. What
it implies to me is that whenever I am communicating with a person who is from a different
linguistic background, I must be able to shape messages with the least entropy, so that the
messages are simple to comprehend for the other entity. I have been faced with similar
situations. In one instance, I spotted a Japanese man trying to get the directions to the airport,

2COMMUNICATION
from an American. Quite evidently, the communication process had serious flaws, due to
which the man could not decipher the directions being conveyed by the American. This led to
a loss of trust, which prompted the man to approach me for the purpose of getting the
directions. I tried to keep my language and messages as simple as possible, which eventually
led him to understand the directions.
(C) Reflection on topic
The given topic in the article, is of critical importance in my life. The place where I
work, has several immigrant customers who influx on a daily basis. This topic should be well
familiar to me, so that I know the fundamentals of how I should communicate to them, to
gain their trust. In my work life, this would be of critical importance, since communication
plays a big role in conveying important work related messages, and failing to do so because
of language barriers, would only mean that not only would I lose the trust of the other person,
but would also do no good to the organization. It is relevant to me as well, since on many
occasions, I have faced the consequences of speaking without enough thought processes, such
as identifying a Japanese person as an Asian since I did not know his country of origin, which
made the Japanese person think that I was being racist towards him.

3COMMUNICATION
Bibliography
Tenzer, H., Pudelko, M. and Harzing, A.W., 2014. The impact of language barriers on trust
formation in multinational teams. Journal of International Business Studies, 45(5), pp.508-
535.