Ineffective Communication in the Business at Elite Fashion House - Case Study Example

? Impacts Of Ineffective Communication On The Business At Elite Fashion House Prepared by ------------- Executive Manager, Elite Fashion House Prepared for John Brown OPERATIOS DIRCETOR, Elite Fashion House March 26, 2011 Memorandum Date: March 26, 2011 To: John Brown, Operations Director Elite Fashion House From: Executive Manager Elite Fashion House Subject: Impacts of Ineffective Communication on the Business at Elite Fashion House. According to your instructions I have thoroughly examined the impacts of ineffective communication on the business at Elite Fashion House. This report presents the facts and figures about the present situation and the recommendations to improve the situation in future. In order to judge the problems and barriers that the people are facing while communicating at Elite Fashion House I prepared a questionnaire which is given to every fifth person off an alphabetical list covering both the internal and external communicators. Over all it appears that lack of good communication is generating many problems and ineffective communication is plaguing the business at Elite Fashion House. It is recommended that either a series of lectures should be arranged to improve the communication skills of the workers or a coordinator should be hired to handle all such matters generating form bad communication. I really enjoyed working on this project. Please give me a call if you would like additional details. Sincerely ----- Executive Manager, Elite Fashion House. TABLE OF CONTENTS PAGE LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS 1 EXECUTIVE SUMMARY 2 INTRODUCTION 3 History 3 Internal communication 3 External communication 3 RESEARCH 5 Language 5 Listening skill 5 Prejudgment 5 Relationship 6 Body language 6 Method of communication 7 RECOMMENDATIONS 10 CONCLUSION 11 LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS 1) Organization Chart of the Company 4 2) Graph Body Language 6 3) Graph Internal communication 8 4) Graph External Communication 9 EXECUTIVE SUMMARY It is a hypothesis that ineffective communication is plaguing the business at Elite Fashion House so in order to do the intensive research the survey method is used. There are two types of communication going on in Elite Fashion House, internal communication which is done with the workers of the company at all levels and external communication which is done with the customers, suppliers, banks and government officials. A questionnaire is prepared to pin point the major barriers to effective communication. Then the questionnaire is randomly given to every fifth person off an alphabetical list including both internal and external communicators. After getting the feedback a data is prepared to highlight the different reasons that are causing the ineffective communication. It turned out that in internal communication 60% role is played by language and 45% is played by relationship in making the communication ineffective. While in external communication the causes of unsuccessful conversation are prejudgment 65% and body language 40%. It is recommended that either a series of lectures should be arranged to educate the workers about the importance of effective communication and to teach them how they can develop this skill or to hire a coordinator who will supervise all the problems generating from ineffective communication. Elite Fashion House is a small stitching unit established in 1988. It prepares branded items for the ladies and runs its own showroom. It is doing good business and growing gradually but for past few years there is a slow decrease in revenue. The different departments are blaming each other in this context. The initial investigation points out that the roots cause of all the problems is misunderstanding and lack of effective communication. Although this is a chronic problem and the history of communication is never praiseworthy in the past at Elite Fashion House but now the problem is coming to the surface because of the expansion in the business. In Elite Fashion House two types of communication is in vogue, internal communication and external communication. External communication means the interaction with customers, suppliers, banks authorities and government officials etc. while internal communication is done with the employees at different levels. In order to understand the flow of internal communication we must see the organization chart of the company. It clearly shows that a lot of communication is going on within the company. There are three departments in the company, the Finance Department, the Operational Department and the Marketing Department. So there is an inter department communication and the communication done within the department. Taylor suggests that communication can take place vertically, horizontally and diagonally. In downward communication the senior staff communicates with junior staff while in upward communication messages are sent to manager or director. Horizontal communication takes place between people of the same status. Diagonal communication involves more than one department and the outcome of good will and respect between people (10). ORGANIZATION CHART AT ELITE FASHION HOUSE Managing Director Finance Director Operations Director Marketing Director Finance Manager Buying Controller Marketing Controller Transport Manager Accountants Executive Manager Foreman Manager Sweepers Janitors Cutter Tailor Dyer Salesgirls Taylor in her book “Essential Communication Skills” mentions that there are many communication barriers, responsible for a message not being communicated correctly or for a message being distorted (9). I developed a questionnaire on the basis of these barriers in order to find out the most important cause of the lack of communication at Elite Fashion House. Language: The effectiveness of language whether written or oral depends on our choice of words. In business communication the language we use should be simple and clear. Lack of vocabulary and poor grammar leads to ambiguity. Due to this drawback people are not able to express their ideas fully and comprehensibly. The data of the questionnaire shows that 60% are not satisfied with the language used during in-house communication and 25% are not satisfied with the language of external communication. The example of the use of inappropriate language can be illustrated from the letter written from the finance department to the tax department on January 10th 2010. The reasons for the late tax return are stated in such an intangible way that it is difficult to understand them. Listening: Listening is a very critical skill. In order to understand what the other person is saying we must listen carefully. It is rightly said that we listen what we want to listen. So we must always concentrate and give full attention to the words of other people. In EFH it is found that the lack of effective communication is the outcome of the lack of listening skill. In EFH the employees are not listening and understanding each other properly thus generating communication problem at all levels. According to data collected with the help of questionnaire 30% customers complain about the listening attitude of the showroom staff. While 30% employees complain about the listening behavior of the colleagues and seniors. Pre-judgment: Our knowledge, experience, education and background often affect our understanding. We have fix ideas and concepts about many thing and we don’t want to change them. This problem specially comes to forefront when we are having intercultural communication. The data shows that 65% of the external communicator thinks that the employees are partial and give verdict without listening the whole complain. For instance Mr. Takabashi, our prestigious customer from Japan came to visit our showroom. He bowed to the sales girl Natasha, which is a customary greeting in Japan but she insisted on shaking hands. Moreover the Director of Marketing Department is reluctant to do business with Muslims because he thinks all the Muslims are terrorists or fundamentalists. Such types of prejudices are very harmful for a business that wants to spread it wings internationally. Relationship: communication may fail or break if the relationship between the sender and the recipient are not good. On the other hand good relationship depends on effective communication. So in a way they both are interdependent. The data points out that 45% internal communicators think that they have good relations with their coworkers while only 20% of the external communicator thinks to have a positive relation with the company’s employees. Body Language: Body posture, facial expressions, tone of voice and body gestures plays an important role in communication. Bentley is of the opinion that the messages conveyed through body are very strong. With body language we can express all sorts of emotions such as love, surprise, nervousness, pain and impatience (12). The following pie chart shows the importance of body language during business communication. Taylor Shirley, Essential Communication skills, Singapore. Longman publisher. 2000. Print According to Taylor 55% of our communication is done through our body language while the pitch of our voice also plays an important part. The role of the spoken words is only 7% during the whole conversation. It shows that although we speak a lot of words during our conversation but their impact is only 7% while our few gestures or facial impressions leave a lasting impression on the mind of the listener. Method of communication: The method we choose to deliver our message is also very important. We have to use different methods to communicate the message that is urgent or the message that is confidential. Choosing the wrong time, wrong method and the wrong place to send the message is a great barrier to effective communication. According to the data 35% of the external communicators think that the method of communication is not right. For example a customer from UAE complained that he received a phone call in the middle of the night simply because the manager forgot about the difference in time zoon. Moreover sometimes the important orders are delivered verbally and when they are not followed properly there is not any proof left that whether they were aptly emphasized or not at the time of deliverance. After discussing the barrier to communication in detail I would like to present the data in form of graph so we can have a clear picture of the whole situation. The first graph shows the intensity of the problems in communication within the company while the second graph shows that how the external communicators comment on the communications skills of the employees. GRAPH SHOWING BARRIERS TO INTERNAL COMMUNICATION Language--- 60% thinks that lack of vocabulary and poor grammar is responsible for the ineffective communication. Listening--- 30% blames that the other person is not listening attentively. Prejudgment--- 20% thinks that preconceived ideas are responsible for ineffective communication. Relationship--- 45% thinks that a poor relationship generates problems in communication. Body language--- 25% considers that body language plays a very important part during conversation. Method of communication--- 30% thinks that wrong method spoils communication. GRAPH SHOWING BARRIER TO EXTERNAL COMMUNICATION Language --- 25% thinks the part played by language is important. Listening---- 30% complains that the people don’t listen. Prejudgment---65% thinks prejudgment main cause of ineffective communication. Relationship---- 20% blames that bad relationship hinders conversation. Body language---- 40% considers that body language an important factor. Method of Communication----- 35% gives much importance to the method of communication. Recommendations: The whole survey clearly points out that ineffective communication is plaguing the business at EFH. So it is the need of the hour to improve communication skills at all levels. There are two options to rectify the situation. Option 1: It is recommended that a series of lectures are delivered on the importance of effective communication. All the employees should be guided how to enhance their communication skills. After the lectures they should do some practical work and learn to write clearly and concisely. Advantages: 1) The employees will understand the importance of effective communication. 2) All the workers will learn and improve their communication skills thus minimizing the problems generating due to ineffective communication. Disadvantages: 1) The company has to hire a good lecturer permanently as the company is hiring the new employees all the time. Moreover a lot of time will be wasted on the writing practice. 2) There are some quick learners and some slow learners so everybody will learns according to his own capacity which does not give us a guaranty that the problem will be solved. Option 2: As a second option it is recommended that a new post for a coordinator is created who would be responsible to solve all the problems generating due to ineffective communication. Advantages: 1) He will work as a coordinator between different departments resolving their communication problems. He will also be responsible for the interdepartmental communication. 2) He will supervise all the external communication done with customers, suppliers, banks and government. Disadvantages: 1) It is always difficult to create a new post in a company because new post means more expenditure moreover apparently it a nonproductive post. Conclusion:After much studying and probing deep into all the details it is recommended that the company should hire a coordinator. Although the cost for the company will initially rise but in the long run it is going to be very beneficial for the company. Some of the benefits are stated below 1- It will be easy to control and coordinate the business activities. 2- It will certainly help to have better relation with the customers. 3- It will also improve relation with the suppliers. 4- It will surely motivate the employees to learn clear and concise language of business communication. WORK CITED Taylor Shirley, Essential Communication Skill, Singapore, Longman Publisher, 2000. Print. Bentley TJ, REPORT WRITING IN BUSINESS, India, Viva Books PVT. LTD., 2006. Print. Read More