Communication is the conveying of messages by exchanging thoughts or information via speech, visuals, signals, writing, or behavior. Communication requires a sender, a message, and a recipient, although the receiver may not be present or aware of the sender's intent to communicate at the time of communication. Communication requires that the communicating parties share some area of commonality. The communication process is complete once the receiver has understood the message of the sender.
Perhaps the most time-honored form of communication is storytelling. People have told each other stories for ages to help make sense of the world, anticipate the future, and certainly to entertain. The art of storytelling draws on your understanding of yourself, your message, and how you communicate it to an audience that is simultaneously communicating back to you. Your anticipation, reaction, and adaptation to the process determine how successfully you are able to communicate.
Communication involves actions that confer knowledge and experience, give advice and commands, and ask questions. These actions may take many forms depending on the abilities and resources of the individual communicators. Together, content and form make messages that are sent towards a destination. The destination can be oneself, another person, or another entity (such as a corporation or group of people).
Business Communication Basics
Business communication is the transmission and exchange of information between people in an organization to facilitate business activities. Business communication encompasses marketing, brand management, customer relations, consumer behavior, advertising, public relations, corporate communication, community engagement, reputation management, interpersonal communication, employee engagement, and event management. It is closely related to the fields of professional and technical communication.
Business communication takes place within an organization and across organizational boundaries. Many organizations have a communications director who oversees internal communications and crafts messages sent to employees. It is vital that these internal communications are clear and managed in a timely way. Poorly crafted or managed communications could misdirect employee effort, cause confusion, and even foster distrust or hostility.
Dimensions of Communication
Communication has four primary components:
- Message (the content being communicated)
- Source (who the message comes from)
- Form and channel (through which medium)
- Destination/receiver/target (to whom)
Wilbur Schram, an authority on mass communications, argued that it is important to examine both the desired and the unintentional impact a message may have on its target.
Levels of Semiotic Rules
Communication can be described as information transmission governed by three levels of semiotic rules for making meaning:
- Syntactic (formal properties of signs and symbols such as letters or numbers)
- Pragmatic (concerned with the relations between signs/expressions and their users)
- Semantic (relationships between signs and symbols and what their meaning)
Communication is social interaction that requires at least two people who share a common set of signs and semiotic rules. Note that this does not apply to intrapersonal communication such as diaries or self-talk that occurs without interactions with others.
People communicating
Business communication takes place in marketing, brand management, customer relations, consumer behavior, advertising, and public relations.
Example
Perhaps the most time-honored form of communication is storytelling. People have told each other stories for ages to help make sense of the world, anticipate the future, and certainly to entertain. The art of storytelling draws on your understanding of yourself, your message, and how you communicate it to an audience that is simultaneously communicating back to you. Your anticipation, reaction, and adaptation to the process determine how successfully you are able to communicate.