CQP Foundation Level
Communication and Customer Relations cheat sheet
Every chapter's key points, formulas and definitions on one page, for the last week before the exam. Each heading links to the chapter that explains it.
Introduction to communication
- Communication transmits information, ideas, attitudes and feelings through a shared system of symbols so that the meaning received is the meaning intended; a message sent but not understood has only been transmitted.
- Its elements are the sender (encoder), the message, the medium or channel, the receiver (decoder), feedback, noise and context, and feedback is the sender's only evidence that the message was understood.
- The transactional view holds that both parties send and receive at the same time, unlike older one-way models from sender to receiver.
- Media richness theory says ambiguous messages need rich channels: face to face is the richest, an unaddressed printed notice the leanest.
- The 7Cs (clear, concise, concrete, correct, coherent, complete, courteous) are an editing checklist: name the C each fault breaches, then rewrite.
Key terms
- Sender or encoder
- The person or body originating the message, who converts an idea into transmittable symbols: words, figures, gestures or images.
- Message
- The encoded content: what is actually sent, as distinct from what was intended.
- Medium or channel
- The carrier: speech, letter, email, SMS, WhatsApp, telephone, notice board, radio, a meeting.
- Receiver or decoder
- The person who receives and interprets the symbols, drawing on their own knowledge, language and experience.
- Feedback
- The receiver's response, which is the only evidence the sender has that the message was understood. Communication without feedback is transmission.
- Noise
- Anything that distorts the message between sender and receiver: physical noise, poor network, jargon, prejudice, fatigue, or an unfamiliar accent.
- Context
- The physical, social, cultural and organisational setting, which alters meaning. The same instruction from a supervisor and from a peer carries different weight.
- Shannon and Weaver (1949), the transmission model
- Information source, transmitter, channel, receiver, destination, with noise acting on the channel. Engineering in origin, and it introduced noise as a formal concept, but it treats meaning as a package and ignores context.
- Berlo's SMCR model (1960)
- Source, Message, Channel, Receiver, each with its own attributes: the source's communication skills, attitude, knowledge, social system and culture. It explains why identical messages land differently on different receivers.
- Schramm's model (1954)
- Adds the field of experience: communication succeeds only where the sender's and receiver's fields of experience overlap. It is the theoretical basis for avoiding jargon.
- Osgood and Schramm circular model
- Both parties encode, decode and interpret continuously, making communication circular rather than linear. This is the transactional view.
- Barnlund's transactional model (1970)
- Communication is simultaneous and continuous, with meaning constructed by both parties rather than transferred by one.
- Media richness theory (Daft and Lengel)
- Channels differ in their capacity to carry cues, and ambiguous messages need rich channels. Face-to-face is richest, an unaddressed printed notice the leanest. This is the theory that tells you not to make someone redundant by email.
The rest of the sheet covers
- The communication process
- Forms of communication
- Verbal communication
- Non-verbal communication
- Functional writing in organisations
- Meetings
- Interviews
- Report writing
- Customer relations
- Emerging issues in communication
- Exam technique and revision
- Glossary