Clampitt's five common communication strategies

https://myclasses.argosy.edu/d2l/le/content/22563/viewContent/1041321/View

lectures

This week we'll discuss some techniques used by high-performance organizations. Employees in high-performance organizations use combinations of process interventions and OD interventions. Process interventions focus on understanding processes and how people relate to one another. OD interventions involve using specific interventions to solve problems. Both process and OD interventions are required to implement successful change management initiatives.

What are Process Interventions?

In an organization people communicate with one another either as a part of formal groups or through informal interactions. Often the dynamics of these interactions can create problems or prevent the group from resolving differences.

Process interventions are designed to understand various processes involved in formal group and informal interactions. When you are involved in process interventions your role shifts to that of a coach. For example, a coach works with a football team to help identify and assign various roles to players such as who should be the quarterback or wide receiver. While doing so the coach focuses on the abilities and skills of players in the team. The coach diligently observes players during the game.

To improve performance the coach works in tandem with players to build an effective team. The key responsibility of the coach is to enable players to make crucial decisions while on the field.

In an organization supervisors may observe the strengths and weaknesses of various team members. Supervisors also observe how team members relate to each other. Based on these observations the supervisors assign appropriate tasks to team members. The supervisors also help team members relate better to each other and contribute to improving team performance.

Process Interventions (2 of 2)

Process Intervention Techniques

Process interventions involve several steps—the primary and the most crucial is observing and listening. A process intervention technique that can be often used by you is to participate in team meetings with the purpose of obtaining process data.

You can track the following activities:

Who initiates discussions?

Who does the most listening?

Does anybody interrupt the conversation? If yes, who?

Who holds the leadership in the team? Is it the team leader or another person informally regarded as the leader by the group?

Who makes decisions? How are they made?

How do various individuals behave?

Who talks to whom?

You can gather such data by observing several group interactions and conversing with other employees. This data provides you an excellent insight into how the group interacts. You and the team members can analyze if current processes enable the team to be productive. The team can work towards the following ways to improve productivity:

How can quiet listeners contribute their ideas?

How can some employees stop dominating the conversation?

How can decision-making be more participatory?

While handling process interventions the idea is not to solve identified problems. Instead the entire focus is on improving processes.

Need for Process Interventions

Why should you be concerned with interpersonal processes? The reason is that ignoring processes can often result in the failure of change initiatives. If the team leader is dominating and overbearing it may result in quashing ideas contributed by team members. Talkative team members often ignore suggestions made by quieter peers. Decision-making that is not participatory may result in resistance from employees.

Process interventions are very important, but they cannot be isolated from OD interventions to solve organizational problems. A successful employee is one who simultaneously examines and conducts these interventions.

OD Interventions (1 of 2)

What are OD Interventions?

Earlier you learned about problem diagnosis. OD interventions specifically focus on resolving diagnosed problems. They focus less on processes and more on issues at hand. For example, Total Quality Management (TQM) is an OD intervention to improve quality and performance. Another OD intervention is to engage in job redesign to improve performance.

Continuing the analogy of a football team the coach works with the team to improve performance, not relationships. The coach shows how to make a better pass or score a goal. Practice sessions are held and the team works together to improve the play. The coach organizes practice matches and replaces players and equipment if necessary.

In an organization the supervisors seek resources to improve performance. At an organizational level restructuring or downsizing may be deemed necessary. Technology resources may need to be added or replaced. The motivation or morale of team members may be low and morale boosting techniques and strategies may need to be initiated.

OD Interventions (2 of 2)

OD Intervention Techniques

When engaging in OD interventions external help may often be sought. The external change consultant needs to possess function-specific expertise. For example, replacing the current technology system with enterprise-wide IT solutions such as Oracle or SAP will require the expertise of technology consultants. Another example is when an organization lacks vision and direction; a strategic planning expert may need to be called in.

During the implementation of change initiatives you should not lose track of the systemic view to organizations. You may recall from earlier weeks that all the systems in an organization are interrelated. A technical change implies that employees may need to learn new technologies, change their working styles, or report to new bosses.

You should bear in mind that there are several overt and covert issues that will need to be monitored during change initiatives. Overt issues are easily identifiable and often documented, such as attendance and absenteeism, production efficiency, and quality. Covert issues often go unnoticed such as interpersonal relationships, emotions, feelings, morale, identity, and commitment. Your task is to recognize such issues and ensure that they are taken into account during process changes.

Ultimately the success of any intervention lies in acceptance as much as fulfillment of expectations. So OD interventions and process interventions go hand in hand.

Several OD interventions can be used depending on the problem at hand. These interventions will vary depending on whether the change is targeted at the individual, team, inter-group, or organizational level. Job enrichment, TQM, role analysis, career planning, cultural analysis, survey feedback, appreciative inquiry, force field analysis, and so on are some examples of OD interventions.

Many of these interventions require considerable experience and expertise, and you can benefit from using a simple OD intervention—the technique of goal setting. Goal setting enables individuals to measure their performance and raise standards.

Summary

This completes Module 3!

In this week you learned about various techniques adopted by organizations for the successful implementation of change management initiatives. Employees in high-performance organizations use the combination of process intervention and OD intervention techniques to implement change management initiatives.

You learned that interventions focusing on understanding processes and team dynamics are referred to as process interventions. You also learned that using specific interventions to solve problems are called OD interventions.

Next week you'll learn about specific OD interventions, goal setting and MBO. You'll learn how to set goals and work towards achieving them. You will also learn that the MBO technique is an extension of goal setting that can be extended to the entire organization at all levels.

Module 3 Readings

Complete the following reading early in the module:

Module 3 online lectures

READING FROM ARGOSY TEXT BOOK. https://digitalbookshelf.argosy.edu/#/books/1260003663/cfi/6/40!/4/10/56/2@0:39.8

From the assigned textbook, Managing Organizational Change 3rd read:

Change Communication Strategies

Change Management, Processual, and Contingency Approaches

Note: While reading, make notes of pertinent and important facts. You will be required to reference your readings in discussions and apply them in the week's assignments.

Chapter 7

Change Communication Strategies

Learning objectives

By the end of this chapter you should be able to:

LO 7.1Identify key elements in the change communication process.

LO 7.2Understand how gender, power, and emotion affect change communication processes.

LO 7.3Understand the power of language in influencing responses to change.

LO 7.4Explain and assess appropriate strategies for communicating change.

LO 7.5Understand how successful communication processes vary with the type and stage of organizational change.

LO 7.6Assess the utility of a range of different change communication channels, including applications of social media.

LO 7.1The Change Communication Process

The ways in which changes are presented and discussed are critical to success. All of the approaches to change management explored in chapters 9 and 10 give communication a central role in the process. Understanding and commitment depend largely on how change proposals are communicated. From their review of the literature on change processes, Karen Whelan-Berry and Karen Somerville (2010) note that communication is one of the most frequently identified change drivers, by explaining the need for change and how change will be achieved. Poor communication is a leading explanation for change failure. The evidence also suggests that change communication should be two-way—telling and listening. Communication is thus important throughout the change process, and not just at the beginning—and it should be resourced accordingly, addressing resistance, encouraging individual adoption and support, highlighting key issues, and sustaining momentum.

Whelan-Berry and Somerville (2010, p. 181) define change-related communication as “Regular two-way communication specifically about the change initiative, its implementation, related successes, challenges and their resolution.” With regard to taking the corporate vision to groups and individuals, communication “facilitates employee understanding and engagement” and “addresses employees’ questions and concerns through two-way communication, which allows individuals to remain committed to the change. It also ensures that any obstacles are properly identified and removed” (p. 181). To sustain momentum, communication “signals the organization’s commitment to the change initiative, communicates successes and challenges, and ongoing change implementation” (p. 181).

Lars Christensen and Joep Cornelissen (2011) offer a novel, counterintuitive perspective on the significance of change communication. They first note that communication has attracted increasing attention due to a number of factors: the nature and consequences of stakeholder communications; the emergence of ideas such as corporate social responsibility, sustainability, and corporate citizenship; and the growing numbers of corporate communication professionals, procedures, and systems. They see communication as “an important force of organizing” and as “the building block of organizations” (p. 398) because the act of communicating constructs or defines the change in the understanding of those who are going to be involved. In other words, change communication is a key part of the process of collective sense-making (see chapter 9).

Change communication, they note, aims to influence the opinions of many different audiences, inside and external to the organization. This suggests that clarity and consistency are important. However, Christensen and Cornelissen (2011, pp. 402–3) argue that organizations have to work with many voices, with different views and ideas (technical term, “polyphony”). In other words, it may often be desirable for change communications to be ambiguous and inconsistent, for the following reason:

[V]ague and equivocal language allows organizations to talk about themselves in ways that integrate a variety of members and stakeholders without alienating anyone. Too much clarity and consistency in the formulation of “shared values” may actually prevent managers from establishing accord with some corporate audiences. Although writings in corporate communication and branding call for organizations to eliminate ambiguity, ambiguity is

206

essential in promoting “unified diversity,” the ability for differences to coexist within the unity of the organization. Ambiguity and polyphony may even be a conscious management strategy designed to foster identification and reduce tension by allowing different audiences to apply different interpretations to what is seen as one corporate message.

The process of communicating change—what is going to happen and why—can therefore be more complex than it first appears. In this chapter, we explore the communication process and then discuss different communication strategies, before considering the evolving role of social media in corporate communication. First, however, we will consider how images of change management influence communication strategies, and the implications for change managers.

Communication Is Not a “Soft” Function

The American consulting company Towers Watson (2013) argues that communication is key to organizational performance. From a global survey of 650 organizations, they found that those with effective communication practices were three times more likely to show superior financial performance, compared with those that did not use those practices. The best practices were:

Helping employees to understand the business

Educating employees about organization culture and values

Providing information on financial objectives and organizational performance

Integrating new employees

Communicating how employee actions affect customers

Providing information about the value of individuals’ total compensation package

Asking for rapid feedback from employees about their opinions of the company

Borrowing from consumer marketing, Towers Watson also argue that effective organizations categorize employees into groups based on the value of their skills and on personal characteristics. This approach to employee “segmentation” means that communication strategy can be tailored to focus on behaviors that are critical to performance. The most effective companies pay close attention to employees when they are planning change, evaluating culture, and assessing employee readiness and the impact that change will have. Middle and frontline managers need to be good at articulating what employees need to do differently to be successful, communicating what change means to individual employees, and creating a sense of ownership about change initiatives.

Three factors in particular now put a premium on “communication effectiveness”:

Workforce: Increasingly diverse workforce, with rising expectations of the employment deal

The stakes: The competitive advantage to be gained from “discretionary effort”—the willingness of employees to “go the extra mile” to improve company performance

Shorter timelines: The need to communicate rapidly, driven by developments in technology and globalization, tighter resources, and increased concerns for security

They conclude:

Today, top-performing organizations are building community—fostering the sense that employees at all levels are in it together. These organizations create the opportunity for social interaction using the latest new media technologies, display the appetite and courage to hear from employees, and establish ongoing forums conducive to collaboration rather than top-down communication. Those that do this well typically see better financial performance. (Towers Watson, 2013, p. 9)

207

Dianne Gayeski and Jennifer Majka (1996) argue that one of the challenges for communicators concerns the expectation of what can be achieved. They argue that an outdated “director” image has dominated our understanding, linking corporate communication with control and manageability. They claim that communication is better understood in terms of chaos and complexity (a “nurturer” image). The nurturer image may decrease the frustration of not being able to control events in the way that a director image assumes. Change managers may be able to shape but not always control the communication of change. More generally, each of the six images of change outlined in chapter 2 is associated with a different strategy for communicating change; see table 7.1.

TABLE 7.1

Change Images and Communication Purpose

Image

Purpose of Communication

Director

Ensure that people understand what is going to happen and what is required of them. Answer the why, what, who, how, and when questions. Present the “value proposition” of the change. Modify leadership style and information to “fit” the type of change and organizational levels affected. Avoid “spray and pray” methods, which lead to message overload. Do not distort the message.

Navigator

Outline the nature of the change, paying attention to the range of interests affected, power relationships, and actions that could disrupt the change. Problems identified can thus be addressed, and the change “replotted” if necessary to generate the best outcomes in the situation. To win staff over, “tell and sell” communication methods are appropriate.

Caretaker

Let people know the “why” of the changes, their inevitability, and how best to cope and survive. This involves the use of reactive communication methods, recognizing employee concerns and responding accordingly (“identify and reply”).

Coach

Ensure that people share similar values, and understand what actions are appropriate to those values. Model consistency in actions and words. The director “gets the word out”; the coach “gets buy-in” to change by drawing on values and positive emotions. Team-based communications are effective (not top-down led by chief executive). Key messages are emphasized to check understanding and encourage two-way dialogue (“underscore and explore”).

Interpreter

Give employees a sense of “what is going on” through storytelling and metaphors. Recognize the multiple sense-making that occurs in different groups with regard to change. Present a persuasive account of the change to ensure that as many people as possible will have a common understanding. Recognize that not everyone will accept the change story. Aim to provide the dominant account using “rich” personal and interactive communications (media richness is discussed below).

Nurturer

Reinforce the view that change processes cannot always be predicted, and that creative and innovative outcomes can be achieved, even though few in the organization could have anticipated these.

We will first outline a classic model of the communication process, indicating how language, power, gender, and emotions are central to an understanding of how this operates. We will then consider how this model applies to change communication, and explore the dilemmas facing the manager designing a change communication strategy. Is it possible to communicate too much? How can communication strategy be tailored to the type of change, and to the phases of the change process? Should the aim be to “get the word out” or the “get buy-in,” or both? Where should responsibility for communicating change lie? The different images in table 7.1 are likely to offer different answers to these questions. Finally, as explained earlier, we will then assess the use of different media for communicating change, including the evolving use of different forms of social networking technologies.

Modelling the Communication Process

Interpersonal communication typically involves much more than the simple transmission of information. Pay close attention to the next person who asks you what time it is. You will often be able to tell how they are feeling, and about why they need to know—if they are in a hurry, perhaps, or if they are anxious or nervous, or bored with waiting. In other words, their question has a purpose or a meaning. Although it is not always stated directly, we can often infer that meaning from the context and from their behavior. The same considerations apply to your response. Your reply suggests, at least, a willingness to be helpful, may imply friendship, and may also indicate that you share the same concern as the person asking the question (“We are going to be late”; “When does the film start?”). However, your reply can also indicate frustration and annoyance: “Five minutes since the last time you asked me!” Communication thus involves the transmission of both information and meaning.

This process of exchange is illustrated in figure 7.1, which illustrates the main components of interpersonal communication. This model is based on the work of Claude Shannon and Warren Weaver (1949), who were concerned with signal processing in electronic systems, rather than with organizational communication.

FIGURE 7.1

Exchanging Meaning: A Model of the Communication Process

At the heart of this model, we have a transmitter sending a message through an appropriate channel to a receiver. We will consider the range of change communication channels later. It is helpful to think of the way in which the transmitter phrases and expresses the message as a coding process. The success of communication depends on209the accuracy of the receiver’s decoding; did the receiver understand the language used, and also tone and implications of the message. Feedback is therefore critical, to check understanding. Communicationoften fails where transmitters and receivers have different frames of reference and do not share experience and understanding, even if they share a common language. We make judgements—which may or may not be accurate—about the honesty, integrity, trustworthiness, and credibility of others, and decode their messages and act on them accordingly. When communicating details of a major changeinitiative, therefore, it cannot be assumed that all of the recipients of the message will have the same understanding as each other, and as the transmitter.

Perceptual filters also play a role here, particularly affecting our decoding. This can involve, for example, a readiness or predisposition to hear, or not to hear, particular kinds of information. Preoccupations that are diverting our attention can also filter information. Past experience affects the way in which we see things today, and can influence what we transmit and how, and what we receive. In an organizational setting, people may have time to reflect, or they may be under time pressure, or experience “communication overload,” which again means that some content may be filtered out.

The physical, social, and cultural context in which change communication takes place is also significant. In organizations where staff are widely dispersed across a number of locations, the ability to share and compare views is more difficult than when everyone is in the one place. The logistics of communicating with a large number of dispersed staff can be complex and costly. The casual remark by a colleague across a café table (“We could all be laid off by the end of the year”) could be dismissed with a laugh. The same remark made by a manager in a formal planning meeting could be a source of alarm. If an organization’s culture emphasizes openness and transparency, staff may become suspicious if communication is less informative than expected. However, staff may also become suspicious if management (without a good explanation) suddenly start to share large amounts of information openly in a culture that has in the past been less transparent.

Context is particularly important when considering change communication, as this can influence how receivers will decode a message. One aspect of an organization’s context that is critical in this respect is past history. Change communication is more likely to be welcome in an organization with a track record of successful changes than in one where past changes have been seen as ineffective or damaging. Current circumstances are also a key feature of the communication context. Is change a positive response to business growth and development, or a defensive approach to problems that will lead to budget and staffing cuts? If staff feel that they have been misled by management in the past concerning the goals and consequences of change, that perception is likely to have an influence on the decoding of further communication concerning change proposals.

When designing a communication strategy, it is therefore important to assess how aspects of the context could affect the coding and decoding of the message, and to design the message content and channels accordingly. Terry Nelson and Helene Coxhead (1997) highlight three particular problems to consider when designing change communications:

210

Message overload: More new information is provided more quickly than recipients can process.

Message distortion: Intentional or unintentional misinterpretation when transmitting or receiving the message.

Message ambiguity: As noted earlier, ambiguity allows different interpretations, but this should not exceed recipients’ ability to tolerate ambiguity (which can be reduced by anxiety).

These problems can be avoided by adopting a common language with regard to the change, and where top management consistently model the desired behaviors. Enhancing employee involvement and self-esteem, and using specialist staff to monitor the change process, can also help to reduce communication errors.

Anything that interferes with a communication signal is called noise by electronics experts, and this applies to interpersonal and organizational communication, too. This does not just refer to the sound of equipment, or other people talking. Noise includes coding and decoding problems and errors, perceptual filters, and any other distractions that damage the integrity of the communication channel, including issues arising from the context. Relationships can introduce noise, affecting the style and content of conversation (formal or informal) and what we are prepared to share. Status differences can introduce noise; we do not reveal to the boss what we discuss with colleagues. Motives, emotions, and health can also constitute noise; coding and decoding are affected by anxiety, pressure, stress, and also by levels of enthusiasm and excitement. This last point is particularly significant, as change communication itself can, of course, generate anxiety and stress, or stimulate excitement.

LO 7.2Gender, Power, and Emotion

The basic communication model that we have discussed can help to explain why communication sometimes breaks down. However, we also need to understand the impact of gender, power, and emotion on communication in general, and on change communication in particular.

Gender

Gender differences also affect the communication process. Here are two examples:

Confidence and boasting. Women tend to emphasize their doubts and uncertainty, but men tend to express greater confidence and play down their doubts.

Asking questions. Women are more likely to ask questions than men; the downside is that male managers may interpret women as knowing less than their male peers.

An assessment by a male manager of how well a woman is coping with change, compared with male colleagues, may thus conclude: “She seems very uncertain since she is always asking questions.” However, this assessment may have more to do with gender differences related to a willingness to question (about the change) than to real differences in attitude toward the changeitself.

Deborah Tannen (1995, p. 141) also observes that even the apparently simple choice of which pronoun to use can influence who gets the credit:

In my research in the workplace, I heard men say “I” in situations where I heard women say “We.” For example, one publishing company executive said, “I’m hiring a new manager. I’m going to put him in charge of my marketing division,” as if he owned the corporation. In stark contrast, I recorded women saying “we” when referring to work that they alone had done. One woman explained that it would sound too self-promoting to claim credit in an obvious way by saying, “I did this.” Yet she expected—sometimes vainly—that others would know it was her work and would give her the credit she did not claim for herself.

Other gender differences relate to how feedback is given and received, how compliments are exchanged, and whether the communication is direct or indirect. Kate Ludeman and Eddie Erlandson (2004) argue that many senior managers are “alpha” males: fast thinkers who have opinions on every topic, who are analytical, data-driven, impatient, and think that they are smarter than most other people. As a result, their communication style can intimidate those around them. Alpha males are not good listeners, they miss subtleties, and they put others under extreme pressure to perform.

The alpha male communication style can be softened with coaching (see exercise 7.2), but this is not an easy transformation. When a male manager changes to a communication style that is not direct, competitive, confrontational, and authoritative, they can be seen as “going soft,” becoming “touchy-feely,” and “losing their grip” (Linstead et al., 2005, p. 543). The change manager may therefore need to find a balance between maintaining credibility with colleagues while adopting a communication style that is appropriate to the change context and to those who are involved.

Power

The use of language can also reflect underlying power and gender relationships—factors that can also interfere with the change communication process (as with communications in general). For example, the manner in which change managers seek staff comments on proposals can reinforce power differentials. Telling staff to provide input may result in responses different from those obtained when the request conveys respect for their opinions. Power differences are normally a barrier to communication. Those who are more powerful may not wish to disclose information that could make them appear to be less powerful or that could weaken their power base. Those who are less powerful may not wish to disclose information that could potentially be used against them.

The term “power tells” describes the various signs and clues that indicate how powerful someone is—or how powerful they want to be (Collett, 2004). The power tells of dominant individuals include:

· sitting and standing with legs far apart (men);

· appropriating the territory around them by placing their hands on their hips;

· using open postures;212

· using invasive hand gestures;

· smiling less, because a smile is an appeasement gesture;

· establishing visual dominance by looking away from the other person while speaking, implying that they do not need to be attentive;

· speaking first, and dominating the conversation thereafter;

· using a lower vocal register, and speaking more slowly;

· being more likely to interrupt others, more likely to resist interruption by others.

The power tells of submissive individuals include:

· modifying speech style to sound more like the person they are talking to;

· more frequently hesitating, using lots of “ums” and “ers”;

· adopting closed postures;