Communication in the Business World

Business Communication The success of any business enterprise depends on a multitude of crucial factors, one of them being the ability of its administrators to communicate in a clear and effective manner.

The quality of business communications therefore, having a direct impact on the economic act, is hereby studied at four specific levels, as follows: Interpersonal business communication Negotiation Conflict management, and last Inter-cultural business communication Interpersonal business communication Melinda Knight starts her 2005 article at the premise that efficient business communications at the managerial level are quintessential for the overall success of the enterprise. Yet, despite this generally accepted notion, the managers have little actual training of interpersonal communications during their formation in universities or other non- U.S. MBA programs.

While some programs have some unaligned courses of interpersonal communications in the business settings, other programs do not include the subject in their curricula at all. Knight asserts the importance of managerial communications, but argues that educational programs tend to disregard this as a discipline that could be taught and then evaluated. In such a context then, the recommendation is that of integrating higher levels of interpersonal communication within global managerial training programs. Geraldine E.

Hynes (2012) argues that an essential factor in the success of any enterprise is the commitment and engagement the employees manifest towards the company. In other words, an organization which is able to align the individual goals of its staff members with the organizational goals of the firm is more likely to attain its business objectives comparative to a company which does not completely integrate its staff members.

And Hynes argues that one of the most appropriate means in which such an alignment can be obtained is through the provision of interpersonal communication training programs. In other words, she argues that teaching employees how to relate as individuals, and cherishing this individuality is equally important in attaining business success just as strategic management or planning. Ultimately, the researcher values the role of the human resource above other resources and believes that open and honest communications between the staffs are the gateway to business success. 3.

Negotiation Whenever two parties interact, sooner or later, some sort of conflict will emerge. And, as in any other arena, within the business setting, conflicts are best approached through an open mind and the ability to negotiate and find a mutually beneficial solution. One of the most extensive study on negotiation was conducted by Henrik Agndal at the Stockholm School of Economics, between 1996 and 2005, and it analyzed a total of 263 articles on negotiations.

Among the most important findings of this analysis are the following: Through negotiation, the parties seek to influence each other through various means of communication so that they attain their individual and common purposes Negotiations involve a sense of the individual conducting it, as well as the business stance of the profession he/she represents; the most common negotiations occur in commercial settings and the cultural forces and generally not considered The negotiation model includes the parties (organizational, individual and the relationship), the context (medium, setting, time, context and issues), the process (preparations, steps, offers, strategy, tactics, behaviors, communications and information sharing) and the outcomes (economic terms, perceived outcome and the closing of a deal), all of which are intertwined.

Each negotiation is unique due to the multitude of forces influencing it, and an overall complete image of the negotiation process is impossible to create, especially as experimental research on the topic leads to a decontextualization of the negotiation process and its analysis.

In light with the limitations identified, Agndal made recommendations towards the study of how business people negotiated, rather than students; the use of sales staffs and purchasers as research subjects; the analysis in national contexts; an increase in the areas of study, as well as the research of negotiations in real life situations and interactions. Linda Stamato (2004) takes one step further in the analysis of negotiations and argues that the political climate plays an important role in the development of negotiation skills within the general community, including the business community.

Also, she argues that the enhanced interest of the academia in the topic of negotiation further supports the development of business tactics to communicate more effectively and meet mutually desired objectives in a more efficient manner. 4. Conflict management As it has been mentioned before, conflict is an innate incident in human history, explained by the fact that whenever two people interact, their individual goals will, at some point and in some way, differ. Some of this discrepancies will be resolved rather quickly, whereas others will evolve into outright conflicts.

David B. Lipsky and Ariel C. Avgar (2010) at the Cornell University argue that within the organizational context, conflicts are even more prone to occur and more important to resolve given the diversity of the staffs, as well as the differences and commonalities in the path to attaining the organizational objectives. The two professors believe that the best approach is that of taking a strategic look at means in which conflicts are managed within the workplace.

They then state that the organizations should align the nature of the organization with the goals of the system designed to resolve conflicts. There should be a culture of conflict management to complement the structure and posture of the organization. Ultimately, they urge companies to invest in their conflict resolution systems, since their ability to resolve conflicts is a direct function of how the company will be able to attain its strategic objectives (Lipsky and Avgar, 2010).

In an article for the Harvard Business Review, Gill Corkindale (2007) states that the conflict is usually a function of the individual as well as the environment. And that business conflicts are so difficult to resolve because they involve a multitude of forces, such as unclear conflict reporting lines, competition for resources, general confusion in managerial styles, globalization, cultural diversity and assumptions, poor people skills (including communication) or organizational limits, including the physical and psychological limits of the staffs and managers.

And despite the existence of several methods of dealing with conflict, Corkindale concludes that collaboration is the single best approach. 5. Inter-cultural business communication As it has been mentioned throughout the previous sections, the growingly diverse culture within the business environment represents a source of conflict, meaning as such that business communications must also be conducted from a culturally responsible standpoint.

And this necessity becomes even more obvious as several multinational corporations have failed to adequately run operations in new regions, due to their inability to understand and adjust to the local cultures (Beckers and Bsat, 2014). Daphne Jameson argues.