15.5 Violet’s Web Poster

Organizational culture is still a very polemic subject. Although many companies advocate on their behalf that they value diversity, that they communicate with their employees, and so on, they do not necessarily practice what they say. Consequently, the members of such organizations tend to be resistant to changes.

One of the most common tools used by companies before promoting any change, like Violet mentioned, is interview and survey. These are, indeed, excellent channels to perceive what changes employees expect, and what changes are good for the organization. However, many companies do not take it seriously, and as consequence, employees do not give enough credit to tools that could help the organization to head towards assertive directions.

In my view, it would be better if companies did not make any attempt to conduct any interview or survey, if their real aim is not to make assertive directions based on the data collected.

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15.4 Hapa’s Web Poster

To me, it makes all sense that employees do not accept changes without questioning them. Human beings are used to question things since early age. To illustrate it, think about a child, whose parents say he or she can not play outside the house without supervision. Most likely, this child will want to know why he or she can not play outside by himself or herself. If a vague “because yes” will not convince the child. The same happens in the companies. Managers make changes but need to do a better job showing the employees why those changes make sense and will be beneficial.

“The level of employees’ involvement in the process also creates buy-in, essential for sustainable change” (Sobo & Sadler, 2002). Clearly when employees are somehow involved in those changes and understand why they are necessary, they will engage in the process expecting that the outcome of it will be positive for all parts involved.

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15.3 Crives’ Web Poster

Crives discussed organizational communications climate and work-related outcomes. Fantastic picture! Indeed employees who do not know what’s going on in the company barely can see, hear, or talk precisely about anything. Again, the fact that Crives did not find articles that directly related to the initial theme he intended to research was a challenge my project partner and I faced ourselves. Fortunately, like Crives, we could find links related to our area of interest. I indeed believe that employees who receive information on a timely manner are happier at work, and consequently, will think carefully before leaving the company.

The way Crive designed his web poster was quite interesting. The arrows made his findings clear at the first sight. I was a real pleasure to read your Web Poster, given that my main areas of interest are Organizational Communication and Intercultural Communication.

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15.2 Kartik’s Web Poster

Kartik discussed cross-cultural communication issues in USA and India organizations. His web poster indeed provides useful information for multinational businesses and whoever else is interested in understanding the dynamics of USA/India trade. There is no doubt about the importance of the relationship between India and USA, given that both countries have been more and more unified by business’ interests.

I learned interesting information about India. I did not know that a handshake did not mean the same in the US and in India. When it comes to handshake, Brazil, for instance, interprets it like USA: a strong handshake means interest and a gentle one indicates one does not care or is afraid of something. Indeed non-verbal communication plays a big role in intercultural relationships. In terms of similarities, Brazil is a collectivist country like India. So whenever US executives deal with Brazilians executives, they need to bear in mind this cultural difference. Like Kartik, since I started my Masters program at SJSU I have been encountering similar contextual intercultural situations that teach me valuable lessons.

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15.1 Kristle’s Web Poster

Kristle chose a very interesting theme for her Web Poster: Building Corporations through Leadership. The image she selected is adequate in the sense that it speaks by itself and the links direct visitors to interesting content related to the theme.

The introduction is engaging in a way that invites even those who might not be entirely interested in the dynamics of leadership.

It is clear what Kristle’s interests are. It would be interesting if she had added brief information on the timeframe she established to be where she wants to be.

In future research Kristle mentioned that the articles do not directly talk about leadership, but have relation to it. My feeling is that many of us experienced similar situation. My project partner and I experienced also found very interesting articles which somehow were related to our area of interest, but did not necessary addressed the question directly.

The conclusion is straightforward, and it points out that not everybody can be a leader. In times when people strongly advocate their leadership skills, it is important to remind what a real leader is!

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11.5 Ideas related to COMM 244

My main area of interest within communication is Organizational and Intercultural communication. It is amazing how my horizons expanded after taking this Organizational Communication class! The textbook chosen for this class is so rich in information, and I feel it is a resource I can rely on in the future when I am dealing with different contexts of organizational communication.

This was my first on-line class, and I certainly enjoyed it. However, I feel the discussions could be deeper if the format was in person class. The organizational communicational scenarios could be studied through case studies, for instance. Overall this class added value to my professional life, and the knowledge acquired will certainly constitute important piece in my “sand box”.

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11.4 History & Communication

I can not help! My main topic for today is Barack Obama!
Since I earned the right to vote when I turned 16 years I have never been as interested in politics as I am this year. As a permanent resident of the United States, unfortunately I still can not vote in America. But I feel good that, through my communication skills, I impacted many people who voted yesterday.

As much as I agree with Barack Obama in terms of what America needs and he is the one who can make those changes happen, my main argument talking to American voters is the importance of acknowledging that if Barack Obama is in the power, the merit needs to be attributed to those African Americans who endured prejudice, humiliation, pain, and all sort of injustices in the past. It is not possible to forget History, otherwise the purpose of his glory is totally defeated.

The link between History and organizational communication I want to establish is that there are still lots of nonsense prejudice within the organizations (managers who favor some employees and mistreat others, misconceptions about cross-cultural employees, etc). Either implicit or explicit, it is crucial that organization communication deals with these dilemmas in order to have History of better work environment for everybody.

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11.3 Future Research

It was very interesting to work on the annotated bibliographies for the COMM 244 class. Our research is focused on Global Business Communication – Intercultural mannerisms. Fortunately we did not have a hard time to find peer reviewed journal articles on our area of interest. In terms of future research, however, it will be valid to have more articles focused on other aspects of Intercultural mannerisms. We noticed that most articles touched cross-cultural negotiations as the main aspect of intercultural mannerisms. We believe that there is much more to be explored in this area.

Based on how people portray themselves throughout the organizations I have worked at, I see that aspects such as informal conversations over the coffee room, phone conversations, dress code, and cultural festivities within the ethnic employees should be highlighted as important aspects of intercultural mannerisms. It would be wonderful to see more finding on these additional aspects I just mentioned.

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11.2 Business Ethics

One of my favorite concepts discussed in COMM 244 was ethics in communication. This concept, so present and so absent in the organizations nowadays is indeed something that occupied my thoughts for long hours along this course. It is sad to realize that although the majority of companies defends that they have ethics in their businesses, actually, they have total lack of ethics in their businesses.

My final project in my undergraduate program was a thesis with focus on child labor. It broke my heart to realize that so many companies employee child labor. When I was collecting some interviews, many employers told me that they were actually doing a big favor by contracting children in their factories. They’d rather seeing children working than in the streets. My whole argument was that every single child deserves to enjoy the childhood in school, deserves to have time to play, to enjoy life with their loved, to be kids, instead of spending 12 hours working in a factory.

Bottom line is that the unethical behavior of many companies is so pervasive that many parents I interviewed sort of shared similar beliefs defended by these companies. Of course I only interviewed poor people, who obviously were struggling for more financial income. But from that point on, I started paying closer attention to how companies behave in the name of their own “ethics”.

Garota de Ipanema

11.1 Elections & communication approach

Today is certainly a remarkable day in the American History: it is election day! I thought it would be interesting to make it a topic for my blog because it is a subject that calls my attention, and because I believe it has everything to do with organizational communication.

In my entire life I’ve never been so into Politics like now. The way mass media has reported information about the presidential candidates is astonishing to me. What has counted the most since the campaigns started around 18 months ago is race, gender, and minor details that do not even deserve attention.

Establishing a comparison between organizational communication and how mass media reports information, I see that both have the power to manipulate information to convey the message they want. As a result, the same way employees get frustrated with misleading information within an organization, voters feel twisted and frustrated with how mass media portrayed information the way they wanted during this election season.

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9.5 Different context of Change

"Scientific management focused on changes that would create efficient routines (p. 317)." My current job is perfect to illustrate this passage of the textbook. As a subdivision of Human Resources, my department is responsible for processing transactions - such as hires, separations, position creates, promotions, leave of absence, return of leave of absence, among others.

The Personnel Data Maintainers (PDMs) are the ones who handle these requests. So for every request we receive from our internal clients - managers and supervisors, we must follow a checklist to process them following what one once established as correct.

One of the negative aspects of blindly following these checklists is that they are rarely updated. Then, whoever is brand new to the PDM position can not perceive whether the information is updated or not. But they still want us to follow the checklist as if it was our bible.

The problem here is that sometimes what is considered efficient to one might not mean the same to another individual. While I understand that some standardization/routine is necessary to bring order to the organizations, I also believe in creative solutions. Clearly change is not so welcome in this department. In other words, it is what Frederick Taylor implied in his theory of systematically documenting inefficiencies: “change per se is not good".

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9.4 The Ambiguity of Multiple Meanings

“Change is the process by which alteration occurs in the structure and function of a social system” (p. 315).
Recently some contractors were hired by the company I work for. From this point on, they will be granted benefits, access to Internet, and all additional benefits full time employees have at this company. So I would say name it change.
“We also use change to refer to a solution. The implication of planned change in organizations, along with related ideas such as organizational development and continuous improvement, is that we can control change” (p. 315).
To minimize the number of work related accidents, my company decided to promote a “safety moment” prior to every single meeting. By doing so, they believe they can make people cognizant of the importance of working in a safe environment.
“At other times, however, people talk about change as if it were something over which we have no control, as if it were something that happens to us” (p. 315).
For this scenario, I would mention the contractors who have not been hired by this company. Talking with some of them, they said that although they did their best during the interview, it was up to managers to make the final decision. So the fact they were not get the position this time was something totally out of their control.

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9.3 Individual or Group Sources

“Conflict also occurs when people perceive that valued relationships or identities are threatened” (p. 285). This passage of the textbook motivates me to talk about one of the companies I worked for in 2007. Right now this company is facing hard times due to the economic crisis in the US, and it will potentially “close the doors” this year. Talking to a former co-worker she described the current scenario to me:

a) Employees do not respect their leaders;
b) The meetings are not productive because employees interrupt the speaker all the time;
c) Employees do not quite say what they are thinking;
d) Employees have no personal tone in their voices anymore;
e) Employees rarely agreed about anything.

Clearly this challenging moment that this company is going through has threaten relationships and identities. Hence, employees have minimum tolerance with all disconfirming messages they have been provided with.

Garota de Ipanema

9.2 Managing conflict effectively

Listening is indeed something human beings do not know how to do effectively, because people tend to speak more than listen. This passage of the textbook reminds me of my grandmother asking me if I knew why humans have one mouth and two ears. As a child, I gave her the right answer: probably because we are supposed to listen more than talk.

But when it comes to practical situations, we tend to speak abundantly, and listen poorly. On page 281 of the textbook the authors defend that “a key skill for people in conflict is empathic listening – trying to understand the other party’s accounts and their reasons for seeing the situation differently.”

Having had the opportunity to work in diverse environments I realize that it is really challenging to listen when the other part presents his or her truths. In my view, managing conflict with other people requires first of all the willingness to listen to what the other part has to say, without becoming defensive right away.

Garota de Ipanema

9.1 Box 10.2 - Attribution Principles in Conflict Communication

On page 278 of the textbook the author alerts that the elements distinctiveness, consistency, and consensus should be taken in consideration before drawing conclusions about determined situation. However, people not always seek these three elements before coming to their own conclusions. In the situation illustrated on box 10.2, Marie suggests that “the women feel excluded from certain activities and processes, both at work and outside of work.”

In order to identify these three elements, first, we would need to know if the actor (Marie) always has attitude with the entity (John). This is called distinctiveness. Marie believes that none of the other guys excluded women at work before John’s arrival; second, it is important to know how often Marie has this behavior with John. This is called consistency. Women have been excluded at work and outside work for the last six months; and finally, we would need to know if everyone acts rudely with Marie. This is called consensus. Apparently Marie feels that the other men in the group only exclude women because John encourages them to do so.

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8.5 Electronic Monitoring in the Workplace

From the perspective of the employees, technology enables to accomplish goals in an efficient manner. For instance, videoconference systems connect employees who are oversea; email helps employees to communicate faster with almost all levels of the organization. In addition to that, because employees tend to spend more time at work then with their families, sometimes they use technology to resolve personal issues, such as pay bills, communicate with their family and friends, etc.

From the perspective of the organizations, in addition to all the benefits cited above, technology also enables to monitor employees, and assure certain order within the companies. According to page 265 of the textbook “electronic monitoring of employees’ work behavior is becoming more common in many sectors, and it takes several different forms.” Where I work, for instance, people only can have access to the building using a Smart Badge. Managers and Team Leads can control how many times employees enter or leave the building in one day. In addition to being a security measure, this is also a way to monitor employees.

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8.4 The “Who” of Power

I will talk about the Presidential Campaign in the United States. During the presidential debate last night, the Republican candidate, John McCain defended himself using this phrase: “I am not George Bush!” Although he has been one of Bush’s #1 supporters, he realized that it is too bad for him if people associate him with Bush. With the financial crisis going on, not only American people, but individuals from all over the world see clearly that if Bush hadn’t spent so much money in the war, this financial crisis would not be going on right now.

Although it seems too late to realize that his affiliation with Bush impacts negatively his campaign, McCain tried to convince people that “he has nothing to do with Bush”. People, on the other hand, see that Bush, as maximum authority had enough power to avoid this crisis. And he simply did not. Page 245 of the textbook illustrates that “In certain organizational structures you know exactly who to blame. These people are visible; they are public; and they may have absolute control. To be able to point to someone or some group who is in charge is comforting in a way because you know where the power is coming from and exactly how it’s being exercised.” So by pointing all the fingers to Bush’s direction people somehow feel better. At least people know that this chaotic economic situation in the US, which is impacting many other countries, was originated by wrong decisions made by the current president of the United States.

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8.3 Encountering Power

I remember having criticized my parents for behaving in certain ways when I was younger. Whenever I asked for their permission to go out with my friends, they used to go over a long questionnaire before agreeing or disagreeing on letting me go out. In my view there was no need for so many questions, so many concerns. As funny as it can be, I tend to reproduce this same behavior with my young brothers with the pass of years. And of course my brothers complained a lot as well.

Based on the example I provided above, I am not quite sure about what exactly shaped my parents’ view on certain things, but I certainly know that many of my attitudes came from them. Consequently, I agree with the statement on page 245: “you might be able to identify key moments, turning points, or memorable messages that led to the development of certain attitudes, but you might not be able to pin down the source of other beliefs.”

Garota de Ipanema

8.2 Teams versus Groups

Before reading chapter 8 of the textbook I believed that team and group was synonymous, but apparently they are not. On page 225 of the textbook there is a clear distinction between both. While “team has been defined as a small number of people with complementary skills who are committed to a common purpose, set of performance goals, and approach, for which they hold themselves accountable; “group, on the other hand, is simply a collection of people with something in common: six people waiting at a bus stop can be considered a group, but certainly not a team.”

Applying both concepts in real life is not so simple, though. For instance, when a student decides to join someone else to develop a school project, I would assume that this partnership would be considered team. However, students not always have the same level of commitment along the project. So this partnership appears to be called group, instead.

Another scenario would be at work. Companies insist on using the word “team” when referring to their employees, we often see groups of employees. Although employees have certain standard qualifications – such as professional background, they not always commit to the projects at the same level. Hence, in my understanding, team and group are two buzz words which have been widely used, however without appropriate criteria.

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8.1 Self directed work teams

Nowadays companies expect that employees are able to do multiple things at the same time. In addition to that, whenever one employee is on vacation, on leave of absence, or even decides to leave the company, the remaining employees need to assume additional responsibilities in order to keep high production. Clearly there is no such thing as hiring an individual to perform one unique task.

On page 222 of the textbook it is implied that “when a team member is absent, no replacement workers are provided. The team is expected to continue a high level of performance by adapting procedures to compensate for the missing member.” Companies focus on results, and they pressure employees to keep high level of performance, even though other members of the team are missing. In other words, the show must go on.

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