Communications

Poor communication can generate problems which in the work place can lead to:

• Loss of income
• Loss of time - production
• Loss of respect
• Accidents
• Loss of customers
• Loss of employees

When you are communicating effectively you are making your message understood without confusion.  Communication is a two-way process i.e. a person is sending a message and another is receiving it.  Communication is not effective if it is one-way i.e. the information is sent but not understood by the person receiving it: or the receiver does not indicate that they do not understand the message.

Lesson Structure

There are 8 lessons in this course:

1. Introduction
   • Problems with Poor Communication
   • Barriers to Effective Communication
   • Giving Instructions
   • Evaluating Instructions or Orders
2. Types of Communication
   • What is Appropriate Communication
   • Passive, aggressive and assertive Communication
   • Listening
   • Obstacles to Listening
   • Empathic Listening
   • Ways to Indicate You are Listening
   • Informative Language
   • Persuasive Language
   • Imaginative Language
   • Literal Language
   • Figurative Language
   • Formal Language
   • Colloquial Language
   • Communication Channels
3. Language Skills
   • Reviewing your Writing
   • Evaluating your Writing
   • Concise Wording
   • Condensing your Writing
   • Common Problems contributing to Lack of Conciseness
   • Clear Wording
   • Making Meanings Clear
   • Causes of Confusion; homophones, malopropisms, colloquial meanings, ambiguity
   • Simplicity
4. Writing Skills
   • Where Writing Skills are Used
   • Writing for a Purpose
   • Determining the Purpose
   • Knowing Your Reader
   • Guidelines for Effective Writing
   • Language
   • Planning What You Write
   • Business Letters
   • Writing a Business Letter
   • Other Types of Business Documents
   • Writing Themes
   • Types of Themes: analogy, chronological theme
   • Common Gramatical Errors to Avoid
   • Punctuation
5. Developing Writing Skills
   • Writing Fundamentals
   • Improving a Piece of Writing
   • Newspaper Writing
   • Concise Wording
   • Magazine Articles
6. Visual Communications
   • Hand outs
   • Visual Materials; illustration, charts
   • Digital Technology
   • Digital Applications; Graphics, CAD, Multi media, Internet, etc.
7. Public Speaking
   • Audio Aids
   • Recorded Presentations
   • Speaking in Public
   • Principles of Public Speaking
   • Selling
8. Committee Meetings
   • Functions of a Meeting
   • Conducting a Committee Meeting
   • Role of Office Bearers
   • Taking Minutes in a Meeting

Each lesson culminates in an assignment which is submitted to the school, marked by the school's tutors and returned to you with any relevant suggestions, comments, and if necessary, extra reading.

Aims

• Explain the communication process
• Explain the types of communication approaches used.
• Demonstrate language skills that are concise and precise.
• Explain the importance of writing as an effective form of communication.
• Demonstrate writing skills as an effective form of communication.
• Describe various forms of visual communication and how they are generally used to impart
  • messages.
• Prepare for effective verbal communication.
• Conduct committee meetings.

Clarity is a Good Starting Point for Better Communication

You must always consider:
• How well is an idea translated into words?
• How well are words perceived by someone who hears them?

These two points have the potential for error in accurately translating the idea from one person to the other.

When putting an idea into words follow these rules:
1. Use words which are most familiar to the receiver
2. If you want the receiver to give an unfamiliar meaning to a familiar word, use it in the context of your communication, making it clear what it is about. If necessary use a footnote.
3. If you want to use an unfamiliar word, make its meaning clear.

MAKING MEANINGS CLEAR

This can be done in three ways:

1. Illustrative Contexts
A word is stated, and followed by a paragraph or sentence to give "one" fixed meaning to that word. For example, for the word hot:
   "He was hot in the desert" means little unless you illustrate how hot!
   "He was hot in the desert; so hot that he collapsed, shrivelled up and died."
The illustration in this sentence has put the word hot into a context which removes other possible interpretations of the heat being mildly uncomfortable but not life threatening.

2. Glossing
A gloss was originally a note in the margin to explain a word. Today we either use footnotes or put the note in brackets straight after the word being explained.

3. Defining
Defining involves classifying something, telling what it is in a way which separates it from everything else in existence. Example: A ball is a round three-dimensional object.

CAUSES OF CONFUSION

Homophones - words spelled differently but sounding the same. Examples: complement and compliment; principle and principal; stationary and stationery; there and their.

Malapropisms - words used for others because they sound similar. Example: You can illiterate a common cold with hose hip syrup, instead of you can alleviate a common cold with rose hip syrup.

Colloquial meanings - where an established word develops a new additional meaning outside of the traditional definition. Example: "Catch up" with the latest news, or that new boy at school is "square".
 
Ambiguity
Words in sentences influence other words used with them (particularly words which they are written next to). This can lead to the same word having two possible meanings. These second meanings tend to appear without the writer noticing them. You should review what you write sentence by sentence to eliminate such words.

Causes of ambiguity
1.Vague reference of pronouns
Example: If the food is not hot enough for the dog, boil it. 
The pronoun “it” has been used in a way which does not clearly indicate that the food should be boiled. If misread, you may think that the dog should be boiled.

2. The rule of proximity is ignored
Example: The lady with the red hat entered through the door with a dog.

3. Adverbs not placed properly.
Example: He luckily won  
Or
Luckily, he won.

4. Bad punctuation
Example:
The boy was not chosen because he was young.
Or
The boy was not chosen, because he was young.
In the first sentence it is not clear whether he was or was not chosen. He might not have been chosen because he was young, or he may have been chosen but for some other reason.
The comma in the second sentence gives a clearer explanation: he definitely was not chosen.

5. Ambiguous words
A chemist who advertises "We dispense with accuracy".

 
SIMPLICITY