Name-Mohammed Tawheed Mollah Id-00159286T Critically Analyse the Importance of Communication Skills in the Workplace Importance of effective communication in the workplace Effective communication in the workplace has benefits that are considered with organisation’s growth and development. Organisations spend a lot of money for employees training to effectively communicate with them. It is important to know that employees should understand the significance of communication. Effective communication helps in diversity, global business, employee morale and team building specifically. These are the core benefits that an organisation gets in which employee communication is made an important element to be considered (Afsar & Badir, 2017). As an example, at Amazon, the communication process was clear, due to which the relationships between employees and employers helped to build strongly while increasing the level of trust. Effective working relationships are the key to business productivity (Hills & Argyle, 2001). It helped in avoiding misunderstanding, improved the morale, reduced stress, helped in team building, minimised conflicts, ensured transparency and improved efficiency at work. The communication process was effective because there was coordination in the work and a team building approach was considered effectively while building relationships in the organisation. Effective communication helped in increasing the moral standards of employees and ethical values are observed in an organisation (Zagenczyk et al. 2010). Stages in the communication cycle The communication cycle has six stages that are described below with an example to effectively apply in an organisation. The communication process is a two-way process where it is important that the sender should communicate with the receiver while the receiver should ensure that a feedback is passed onto the original sender for information that had been transmitted. The steps in the communication cycle consist of send, encode, transmit, receive, decode and feedback. The ‘send’ is the first stage when the ideas are generated and are ready to be transmitted to the encoder. A sender is a person who sends the information in the communication process. The second stage of encoding takes place when a sender sends the message, which needs to be transparent and clearly understood and communicates to the receiver (Conrad & Poole, 2005). Encoding means ideas that are communicated should be clear, organised and thoughtful. This states that a language and a style is used while communicating it to the recipient. Transmitting messages includes choosing the appropriate media and communicating it through a method or some media appropriate to the content and context of the message. How the message is being communicated should be clarified. As such, meetings are used to communicate certain messages that are important and require instant feedback, as a result, face to face communication is advisable (Gil & Mataveli, 2017).. Phone calls can be used as another option when face-to-face communication is not possible. A face-to-face communication ensures instantaneous feedback and the ability to derive information from the body language of the participants in the process. Decoding is accepting the message that has been communicating and feedback provides an assurance that the message has been understood completely. Barriers to communication in the workplace Barriers of communication are a hindrance that is faced in the communication process. This sound like a potential barrier that impacts the overall communication cycle. The barriers to communication are experience, background, mood, perceptions, nonverbal messages to be misunderstood, language, attitude and culture barriers (Manuti et al. 2015). Perception is a potential barrier that is felt in the communication process because as such when the message is transmitted to the receiver, a specific set of ideas are been communicated. While the other party misunderstands the message with his own perception and there occurs the hindrance in the communication process. Language is an extreme barrier because not every individual would be comfortable if the local language is used. This occurs due to the difference in culture. Culture is again a barrier for communication process because of the set of beliefs and the traditional difference (Allen, 2006). Lack of experience leads to improper communication which has to be considered in the communication process. Overcome potential barriers to communication With the barriers to communication such as perception, language, culture and experience it is important to consider the steps to overcome these barriers. Overcoming these barriers would help the communication cycle to improve effectively and efficiency is considered with the actionable steps. There are certainly recommended solutions that are felt along with the barriers of communication. Perception being a barrier to communication should be understood and crystal clear information should be communicated with employees that would help employees to understand the information and help to achieve the organisation's goals and objectives. While communicating the information, verbal communication can be adopted as a method to majorly solve the issues regarding communication. Language barriers can be solved while using the national or majorly spoken languages and communicating in a language which is easy for the employees to understand and respond (Smith, 2017). Whereas culture plays an important role because cultural differences are felt and training and induction programs are given to employees to know a new culture and accept the culture where they are working. Experience can be gained while giving training to employees at a certain time period and development programs should be initiated to feel the difference (Walker & Gorsuch, 2002). Main methods of written and oral communication in the workplace and their uses The main methods for communication at the workplace are an oral method and written method that can be used in an organisation for effective communication. Whereas an oral method is used for the communication wherein the message is short and has little importance and emergency. The oral method includes communicating face to face or may be over a phone. Face to face communication is oral communication and due to its importance, the message is directly being communicated to the receiver while giving the brief information regarding agendas to be discussed, for example, in the meeting. The written communication includes letters, email or social media. This states that a written format is prepared and given to employees for a particular message. For example, team leader sends a text or an email to employees while stating that the meeting has been held at a particular time. This is important whereas social media communication is for the general public or selected individuals to gain some importance that is felt to increase the effectiveness at work (Kalish & Robins, 2006). Advantages and disadvantages of written method of communication The benefits and disadvantages of written communication are described while the importance is being discussed. The main advantages of written communication include written proof, saves the time of both the parties, no personal contact is needed, etc. the written proof is a later process when the receiver or a sender have a misunderstanding about the message that has been communicated. This helps to give a proof that the message was communicated well or may be understood well by the receiver. It saves the time for both the parties while no face to face communication is needed so waiting for a person is no more an issue for both the parties. The message has to be just written and sent via email or text to the other party. The disadvantages that are felt towards written communication method includes costliness, misunderstood or wrongly interpreted, potential delay with a feedback and lack of security. The message can be misunderstood because generally the written method is short and sweet but it may create a delay in the communication so a feedback is awaited. Lack of security is an issue that has been observed because the message is been transmitted through a text or email which may be a disclosure at the other end (Hough & Furnham, 2003). Main advantages and disadvantages of oral communication The main advantages of oral communication include personal contact, less formal, the best way to deal with disagreement, nonverbal can be accessed and allows the opportunity to clear the information if it is not clear at a particular time of discussion or communication. These are the advantages that are felt while using the oral method of communication. With the impact that is considered towards the oral communication, there are clear goals to be achieved and communicated to the employees at the time of meetings. The disadvantages felt for oral communication method include no formal documentation, no record of information or evidence, time-consuming process and costly in nature. These are felt towards and the most important which is considered is a lack of proof that is felt at the time of conflicts and disagreements. Non-verbal communication can influence the effectiveness of oral communication With the non-verbal techniques to be used, there is a supportiveness that is felt which ensures the successful outcome of communication. Facial expressions are the great way to communicate at times of non-verbal communication because facial expressions give an indication of what the sender wants to communicate. Eye contact is importantly maintained at the time of communication as it is a non-verbal communication and things are majorly been understood when words do not specifically indicate the real meaning. Symbols and signs are made to communicate non-verbally in an organisation whereas this is a casual communication that is maintained. References Afsar, B. & Badir, Y. 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