Executive summery
This case study report is a result of the call by the Junior, the owner of KJVM AMI FM radio station for a review of his organizations internal communications. The report looks into the factors that led to the dismissal of Mr. Dawson who had been a faithful employee of the organization for a long period of time. The report then gives recommendations on how communications can be enhanced to prevent a repeat of such dismissals.
The conflict that led to the dismissal of Mr. Dawson was as a result of poor business communication skills and techniques that include lack of proper: communication, emotional intelligence, conflict management among other issues such as dishonesty, and poor ethical values.
Following the identified problems that are facing the organization, the report holds the opinion that a transformation be undertaken with regard to: the organizational culture that has existed since the company changed ownership, the management team as well as policies and ethical values that are held by the company, especially with respect to how employees are handled.
Introduction
Business communication refers to the aspect of relaying information within a business entity or among business structure. A passage of information in communication in a business environment may be intended for promotion of a given good or service, or for administrative purposes of an entity. This paper seeks to give a report on a case study that involves business communications.
The paper will identify technological, legal and ethical issues that are necessary in business communication together with principles of business communication. The paper will then analyze critical issues that caused communication problems in the company subject to the report together with the causes of these issues.
The paper will also look into the people who were responsible for these issues in the subject company’s case study as well as the communications strategies that could have been used by the company to resolve the conflict that faced it.
Discussion
Bellow is a discussion and review of the problems that led to the frustration and subsequent dismissal of Dawson as an employee with Junior’s company. The actual problem into the issue is based on the inefficiency and the inability of the administration to establish a concrete communication mechanism leading to communication breach between Junior who is the company’s executive and his employees.
Junior’s managers have as a result taken advantage of the situation to drive their personal interest in the company. A clear understanding of essential communication issues together with appropriate changes in the management system of the company will help Junior to establish a better working environment for his employees.
Communication
Communications is a very important tool to the success of management. Some of the significant elements of communication as illustrated by Spence include the ability to identify and pose technical questions and then sit back and wait for responses that are provided. An administrator then analyzes the provided response with the aim of obtaining a very clear understanding of the drive to the given response.
Focussing on an employee to understand their issues thus follows the basis of communication in a business set up (Spence, 2009). The case that is witnessed in the Junior’s company illustrates a poor level of communication as demonstrated by the chief executive who does not take time to communicate with his employees.
He assumes a busy schedule that does not have time for his workers even when such employees have serious problems to be solved by him. Dawson who faces a seemingly harsh and unfair treatment for example tries to reach out to Junior but he does not even want to listen to the employee.
The managers in the company are also much concerned about their personal drive to listen to the employee. The lack of direct communication between Junior and his employees as well as that between the management and the employees is a significant problem in the company (Shafer, 2000, p. 59).
Emotional intelligence
Another key issue which is an element of business communications is emotional intelligence. Some of the features of emotional intelligence include “sensitivity, self disclosure, assertiveness, dynamic listening, criticism, team communication and analyzing relationships” (Knapp and Daly, 2002, p. 343).
A leadership that employs emotions intelligence in dealing with its staff will therefore be more sensitive to the needs of the staff. The consequences that actions against a staff can results in are for example thus considered before actions are undertaken against the employee.
Dynamic listening and assertiveness are also tools that are missing in the institution. In response to dynamic listening, an individual employee is given time to express him or herself concerning issues that may be bringing conflict between the employee and the management.
Serious consideration is then offered to the employee in an understanding manner in which help strategies can be adopted to assist the employee into adjusting to the organization’s system, which is if the problem is with the employee. Assertiveness as a communication tool also enables an individual to stress on a point that is probably being ignored in a communication.
Whether because the other party to the communication does not identify the point or chooses to ignore it. Assertion therefore helps to clear doubts in communication and room should be given to enable for assertion.
A fostered level of interpersonal relations across management levels which can concurrently be achieved through evaluation and analysis of such relations is another tool that the company lacks. A missing link is realized in which the chief executive officer is not informed of the relationships among his employees (Knapp and Daly, 2002, p. 343).
Elements of lack of emotional intelligence is quiet evident with respect to the case study. The characteristic treatment that Dawson is given is a feature of lack of emotional intelligence on the side of both his two immediate supervisors and the company’s chief executive.
As Knapp and Daly (2002) explained, individuals who have a history of social problems in their lives tend to be restrictive and give less regards, or no regard at all to what other people are going through. These individuals tend to be self centred to an extent that they may not like or appreciate successes that are registered by other individuals.
Such are the identified features of the two managers who move in to plot for the removal of Dawson from the organization on the grounds that he is making a lot of money from the organization and at the same time have influence over many of the organization’s other employees.
These two features are the basis of the conflict in the organization and the top manager is not informed because the organization lacks a mechanism of monitoring how its employees relate with each other and what could be causing such relations. Acculturated level of emotional intelligence could have helped Junior to identify and solve the problem before it was late (Knapp and Daly, 2002, p. 343).
Siljander (2008) also argued that emotional intelligence is more like a complementary element to managerial skills. He holds the opinion that in the absence of emotional intelligence, management is not complete and therefore experiences a lot of inefficiencies.
This opinion is evidenced in the case study as the personalization of management by the two supervisors leads to the loss of an employee who had for a long period of time been considered to be productive to the organization. There is also a resultant discomfort among the remaining employees posing a threat to the management (Siljander, 2008, p. 293).
Conflict management
As an organization with many employees, conflicts are bound to arise between individuals. Such conflicts can however be avoided or even resolved if appropriate communication techniques are acculturated in the organization. An initiative at personal level which includes “communicating ideas assertively and respectfully” is for example one of the ways of solving conflicts (Beck et al., 2009, p. 367).
If a conflict can not be solved at a given level of the administration then it should be referred to the next administration level. The inability to identify, appreciate and resolve the conflict between Dawson and the two managers therefore contributed to the problems that arose in the organization (Beck et al., 2009, p. 367).
Other communication problems in the company
The series of events in the case study illustrates problems in the communication mechanisms that had been adopted by the company through its newly established management. One of the problems realized about the company’s communications is the inefficiency in how messages are relayed. An employee is for example given a notice of a meeting whose agenda is withheld.
When the employee goes for the meeting which he expected to have departmental workers, he only finds two managers who ask him to resign and leave the office in less than an hour’s time. An agenda for a meeting, which is a piece of information that a person should be given before the meeting (Sikkim University, n.d.), was not even availed to this employee.
A call for resignation or sacking of an employee should also be subject to a notice. Inefficiency, therefore, constitutes a problem in this organization’s communication. The employee is even not given any explanation as to why the action was being taken against him.
The selective action against the employee, since he was the only person who was asked to resign together with the manner in which the employee was handled at the meeting also gives a reflection of some level of discrimination against the employee. Elements of distrust and poor communication techniques are thus realized (Tripathy, 2008).
The treatment that the employee was given was even rude, unfair and inconsiderate. The two managers who handed him the letter did not seem to bother about the impacts that the action could have on the employee, his dependants or even other employees of the organization. Poor ethics can therefore be sited as another problem facing communications in the organization.
It is clear that problems of ethical values of empathy as well as restraining from causing harm or damage to an individual are evident in this case (Davis and Emerita, n.d.). Unavailability for options to the employee as he was strictly compelled to resign also cites ethical problems since a solution requires a wider and consultative step that has options to be considered (Mayer, 2001).
Lack of proper “upward information flow” that is a key tool to improving relations between employees and managements was also a problem in the organization with respect to this particular case. The employee who is victimised to the point of dismissal is not given even an opportunity to communicate to the management.
The two managers who deliver to him his resignation letter do not provide an interactive environment. The top administrator was also not willing to talk or even listen to the employee as he bluntly expressed to the employee that he could not discuss the matter with the employee (Guffey, Rogin and Rhodes, 2009, p. 22).
Another problem that is realized in this company is a high level of dishonesty on the side of two managers who were introduced into the firm after the death of the founder and former owner of the company.
The acts such as withdrawing accounts that belonged to the victim employee, blocking the employee’s access to his incoming calls and frustrating his contributions as well as raising his work targets were later realized to be management moves not to motivate the employee but rather to portray him as inefficient worker who is turning out to be a burden to the company.
The two managers had even confided in another employee who later informed the victim that all those moves were meant to just make ground for his dismissal. Conditions such as daily reporting to one of the managers were imposed on the victim and not any other employee in the firm.
It has been noted that if applied, “honesty in business communication increases efficiency of participating business enterprises” (Riffert, 2005, p. 248) as well as the productivity of individual employees in a business organization (Riffert, 2005, p. 248).
The dishonesty that the two managers together with the company’s top director showed towards the employee can have an impact on other employees who can be demoralized by the harsh treatment that is indicate employment insecurity in the organization.
The two managers and the new owner of the company are therefore responsible for the communications problems that strained the relationship between the company and the employee.
The cause of the subject problem was, according to the case study, discrimination against the old employee which was coupled with a high level of jealousy over the high amount of money that the employee was earning together with the influence that he had in the company (Riffert, 2005).
Conclusion
Communications
The company lacks key elements of basic communication techniques that even hinder a direct communication between an employee and the management. There is also a broken link between employees and the top management of the company.
Emotional intelligence
A level of lack of emotional intelligence is noted in the company’s two supervisors who discriminatingly and at a personal level frustrate an employee with less regards to ethical values and possible impacts to either the employee or the company.
Conflict management
Conflict resolution which is achievable through communication is rendered impossible by the poor communication level that has been developed between the employees and the management.
Other communication problems
The change in administration of the subject company led to introduction of inefficiencies in management that were characterized by personalized feelings and attitudes rather than management skills. A change in the form of administration is therefore necessary.
Recommendations
The problem that emerged between the management and employees of the company was as a result of the unfair treatment and final dismissal of one of the company’s employees. The company’s top manager is later informed of the true circumstances that led to the dismissal of the employee and he is now faced with another conflict with the staff.
Conflict resolution is a measure to restore a disturbed peace that was previously experienced in a system. The first step to conflict resolution is to understand the causes of a particular conflict. The top administrator, Junior, should further investigate the dismissal of the employee to have a basis of solving the conflict.
He should further investigate the characters of the two parties that led to the cause of the conflict, the two managers and the dismissed employee. He must also look into his inefficiency that contributed to the conflict as he ought to have discovered and resolved the problem at an earlier stage.
The top manager must also exhibit conflict resolution mechanisms that include admitting failure to take appropriate actions and rise to the occasion to control the operations of the business. Measures like self control and professional approach are also essential strategies in conflict resolution that the administrator can use to resolve conflicts in his company (Business, n.d.).
References
Beck et al. (2009). Business Communication and Technologies in a Changing World. Australia: Macmillan Education Aus.
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Guffey, M., Rogin, P and Rhodes, K. (2009). Business Communication: Process and Product. New York, NY: Cengage Learning.
Knapp, M and Daly, J. (2002). Handbook of interpersonal communication. California: SAGE.
Mayer, A. (2001). What makes a problem an ethical problem? An empirical perspective on the nature of ethical problems in general practice. Web.
Riffert, F. (2005). Alfred North Whitehead on learning and education: theory and application. Newscattle, UK: Cambridge Scholars Press.
Shaffer, J. (2000). The leadership solution. New York, NY: McGraw-Hill Professional.
Sikkim University. Internal business communications- guidelines for meetings. Web.
Siljander, R. (2008). Introduction to Business and Industrial Security and Loss Control: A Primer for Business, Private Security, and Law Enforcement. Illinois: Charles C Thomas Publisher.
Spence, J. (2009). Awesomely Simple: Essential Business Strategies for Turning Ideas into Action. San Francisco, CA: John Wiley and Sons.
Tripathy, P and Reddy, P. (2008). Principles of Management. New Delhi, India: Tata McGraw-Hill Education.