Communication Barriers Report. Communication in the Workplace Report

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The following report primarily concerns the analysis of communication in the working environment, as it has always been one of the most challenging spheres in terms of interpersonal communication. Hence, the setting that is going to be examined consists of a team of 10 staff employees and management, as the communication between various employee groups tends to be rather complicated because of different perceptions of the same situation. Indeed, when speaking of both verbal and written interactions between the management and staff, there are a few obstacles needed to be overcome in order to convey the message efficiently.

Considering the patterns of communication in the workplace, such barriers as attitude, behavior, poor listening, and emotional disconnect may be outlined. These obstacles are primarily observed in face-to-face communication between the employees. Moreover, if such notions as attitudinal and behavioral barriers frequently happen during communication with the top management, the other barriers take place between the staff employees on a daily basis. In terms of the behavior barriers, female employees deal with the implicit gender stereotyping that disrupts the overall workflow and efficiency. Another detail worth mentioning prior to the analysis is the fact that the current management team tries to address the issues through HR training programs, but the output to the training has not been visible yet:

Attitudinal barrier is a communication inhibitor caused by a poor level of interaction between employees of different status (e.g., manager-employee relationship pattern) and one’s inability to perceive treatment through the prism of status in the workplace.
Behavior barrier is a communication inhibitor caused by one’s biased or stereotyped attitude towards others (e.g., implicit gender stigmatization in terms of communication with women) (Rani, 2016).
Poor listening barrier is a communication inhibitor caused by the receiver’s inability to listen to the speaker carefully and, thus, perceive the message properly (e.g., attention span problems or a lack of desire to stay focused on the message content)
Emotional disconnect is a communication inhibitor caused by one’s failure to keep personal feelings and emotional state separate from professional interaction with the receiver (e.g., passive aggression towards employees caused by something happening in the speaker’s private life).

Communication Example	Barrier Name	Selection Justification
During a meeting with top management, a female employee presents various ideas on efficiency improvement. While listening to the colleague, managers nod and smile, but it is evident that they do not consider the information professionally. When male employees represent similar ideas, management is more engaged in communication.	Behavior barrier (implicit gender bias)	The following barrier was selected to characterize the example because behavior communication barriers primarily deal with stereotypes and biases that disrupt the quality of the message conveyed. In the example, the quality of interaction is clearly undermined by the management’s implicit bias in terms of women in the workplace.
During everyday communication, managers tend to avoid small talks in the workplace. While employees believe that such behavior is predetermined by the feeling of superiority, management tends to think that close communication with staff may be unprofessional.	Attitudinal barrier	The example can represent the issue of attitude inhibitors because both communication actors perceive the situation from different perspectives on status and power.
The supervisor addresses performance feedback to the employees, but the same mistakes were discussed over and over.	Poor listening barrier	The example justifies the presence of poor listening, as it concerns the process of the employees’ failure to focus on the supervisor’s comments in order to ensure efficiency in the future.
At the beginning of the working day, the supervisor responded rather aggressively to the employee, asking for advice. Later during the day, the supervisor apologized for his reaction and offered assistance.	Emotional disconnect barrier	The following example shows that at the beginning, the supervisor was unable to separate his emotional state from professional communication. Therefore, a breach in communication was observed.

Having considered the aforementioned precedents of communication barriers in the workplace, it may be concluded that the overall efficiency evaluation is 74. Taking into account that 75 points presuppose average efficiency within the organization, 74 is a marker for communication that is just below average. The overall communication efficiency is considered satisfactory for the overall organization’s outcomes, yet the precedents taking place in the team significantly undermine the potential quality of these outcomes.

The most challenging aspect of communication is the existing gap between the management and staff members, as they tend to perceive communicative situations from opposite angles. Nevertheless, the current management does their best in order to improve communication and encourage barriers’ removal from the overall interaction. Such evaluation is also given due to the fact that the organization is aware of the present issues, providing them with the advantage to pay attention to the barriers before they evolve into a full-scale disaster. Hence, it may be concluded that the issue of communication barriers, especially when dealing with behavior, attitude, listening, and emotional intelligence, serve as a severe obstacle in the way of any organization’s efficiency.

Reference

Rani, K. U. (2016). Communication barriers. Veda’s Journal of English Language and Literature, 3(2), 74–76.

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