Communication is the means of transferring the knowledge to a group. How and in what way the knowledge will be transferred has been continually researched upon. Communication strategy would be different for people with different personality types or the number of teams, which is just right for optimum learning to take place. Therefore, knowing one’s personality type before learning is commenced is important because it will allows one to avoid communication strategies that does not work for them or to imbibe skills to cope up with a strategy which is widely used, but does not suit one’s personality. This paper describes two communication strategies that best fits three personality types viz. adventurer, organizer and giver. Therefore, this paper describes the communication strategy best suited for the above-mentioned personality types.
The main characteristics of an adventurer lie in his ability to adopt to different fields and in his courage and daring attitude. He believes in problem solving and spontaneity of action. He is flexible, nontraditional, and has an uncanny adeptness to negotiate. The communication strategies that are best suited for an adventurer is to encourage nontraditional form of communication. The learning must be related to hands on experience rather than a monotonous classroom lecture. Simulations and games stimulate the adventurers. Given these characteristics, the next section will look for two communication strategies best for an adventurer.
Communication strategies may entail various forms. For an adventurer the best form of communication will be to study in a group or team learning. Team learning has the advantage of associating with people and usually does not follow conventional teaching methodologies (Cosse & Ashworth, 1999; Al-Rawi, 2008). Teamwork is good for an adventurer as he is eager to try on new things and does not believe in traditional communication medium. His presence in workplace is enhanced due to his ability to utilize his theoretical knowledge practically and this is possible more in case of teamwork. However, it is important to ascertain the optimum size of the team, which will optimize the communication and therefore learning or performance. This is so because researchers believe that team size has an effect on team performance (Cosse & Ashworth, 1999, p. 98). Usually it is believed that smaller teams allows greater knowledge sharing as the relationship among team members become more cohesive however, in other cases large teams are more successful as intimate environment need to be avoided. However, the concept of social loafing must be considered as the performance of the team is affected if there is a problem of free riding in the team.
In this case, the team cohesiveness may be encouraged through leadership intervention and instilling the mission, vision, and strategy among the team members (Cosse & Ashworth, 1999, p. 92). Therefore empowering the teams allows greater performance as has been exemplified by PRO-TEC Coating Co. (Adrian, 2008, p. 42). Employees at PRO-TEC work in self-administered teams and leaders fix problems as and when they are identified (Adrian, 2008, p. 42). Therefore, an adventurer will not only be better off in a team, which is fully empowered in a culture, which inculcates empowerment for employees.
Therefore when making a communications strategy one must consider two aspects – first the personality of the employees and the culture of the organization. Communication strategy will be effective when the employees are cohesive in their attitude and are aligned with the organizational culture, which will support their ideas. Organizations today believe more in empowering their employees in order to make them more comfortable, receptive of communications from the management, and enhance their performance.
References
Adrian, N. (2008). Small Busienss, Big Feat. Quality Progress 41(7) , pp. 40-44.
Al-Rawi, K. (2008). Cohesiveness within teamwork: the relationship to eprformance effectiveness – Case study. Education, Business and Society: Contemporary Middle Eastern Issues 1(2) , 92-106.
Cosse, T. J., & Ashworth, D. N. (1999). The Effects of Team size in a Marekting Simulation 7(3). Journal of Marketing Theory and Practice , 98-106.