Part A: Foundations
Introduction to communication
Key takeaways
- Communication is the process of transmitting information, ideas and meaning from one party to another so that it is understood as intended.
- Its eight elements are sender, message, encoding, channel, receiver, decoding, feedback and noise, and they operate as a cycle rather than a straight line.
- Feedback is the element that turns one-way transmission into communication, because without it the sender cannot tell whether the message was understood.
- An effective message follows seven principles: clarity, conciseness, completeness, correctness, courtesy, consideration and concreteness.
- Barriers fall into five categories: physical, language, psychological, organisational and cultural.
What communication is
Communication is the process of transmitting information, ideas and meaning from one party to another so that it is understood as intended, the shared foundation every later chapter in this paper builds a specific skill or channel on top of.
Communication in organisations
- Coordinates the activities of different people and departments toward common goals
- Enables decision-making by moving information to where it is needed
- Builds and maintains relationships with staff, customers, suppliers and regulators
- Motivates and directs staff toward performance expectations
- Projects the organisation's image to the outside world
Elements of communication
The communication process
These elements operate as a cycle, not a straight line: a sender encodes a message and sends it through a channel, the receiver decodes it and returns feedback, which the original sender then interprets in turn, noise capable of intruding at any stage.
The communication process fails at identifiable points, and naming the point is what makes an answer useful rather than generic. The sender may encode poorly, choosing words or symbols the receiver does not share. The channel may be wrong for the message, such as delivering bad news by email that needed a conversation. Noise may distort the message in transit, whether physical noise, semantic confusion or the receiver's own preoccupations. The receiver may decode it through assumptions the sender did not intend. And without feedback the sender cannot tell that any of this has happened, which is why feedback is the element that turns one-way transmission into communication.
Principles of effective communication
- Clarity: the message says exactly what is meant
- Conciseness: no more words than the message needs
- Completeness: everything the receiver needs to act is included
- Correctness: accurate facts, grammar and tone
- Courtesy: respectful of the receiver
- Consideration: framed from the receiver's point of view
- Concreteness: specific, not vague
An effective communication system
- Clear reporting lines so messages reach the right person
- Channels matched to the message (urgent, sensitive, routine)
- Feedback mechanisms built in, not left to chance
- Consistency between what is said and what is done
Barriers to effective communication
Exam tip
The eight elements of communication and the five barrier categories are the two most reusable checklists in this whole paper, later chapters (oral, written, non-verbal, technology-mediated communication) are best revised as specific applications of these two lists, not as unrelated new material.
Self-check
(a) List, in order, the eight elements of the communication process. (8 marks)
(b) A manager sends a memo in English to a factory floor team whose first language is Kiswahili, and several instructions are misunderstood. Identify the specific barrier category, and state which of the 1.5 principles was most directly breached. (3 marks)
(c) State three functions communication serves within an organisation. (3 marks)
Show worked answer
(a) Sender; message; encoding; channel; receiver; decoding; feedback; noise (8 marks).
(b) A language barrier; the principle most directly breached is clarity (or consideration, framing the message from the receiver's point of view), since the message did not say exactly what was meant to an audience that could not decode it as intended (3 marks).
(c) Any three of: coordinates activities toward common goals; enables decision-making; builds and maintains relationships; motivates and directs staff; projects the organisation's image (3 marks).