This therefore should lead to greater effectiveness in terms of productivity and communication and should also lead to greater profitability.
- Changes in working practice have improved communication in organisations. This is because for example if managers are delegating tasks to the subordinates they are enriching the worker as well as allowing the user to be self esteem by taking responsibility. In addition, how employees are treated can affect on their credibility; this is because they are more likely to have confidence in people (managers/colleagues) they trust, because of their past experience of their reliability. Where as if an employee has learned to distrust someone, they are likely to ignore their messages and instructions, hence causing problems as the defectiveness of communication means the employees and managers may not be working for the same corporate objectives, hence reducing the business efficiency as well as business productivity.
- Effective communication with the firm’s suppliers and customer can bring the firm several benefits. Effective communication with customers allows the business to be more responsive to their needs and wants, hence improving the business performance hence increasing sales and profitability. This therefore ensures that the effective communication with its customers is helping the firm to achieve its corporate objectives that means everyone is working towards them. Effective communications between the business and the suppliers means that supplier delivers the stock on time that allows the business to be more productive and efficient ensuring that their machinery aren’t doing downtime, hence saving money. Effective communication with the supplier enables the supplier to give the firm trade credit, hence the firm is holding on to their money longer.
- The reasons why a large, multi-national business might experience communication problems are that because the plants are situated abroad in different locations, it may be difficult to communicate in a foreign language for example, a firm may be trying to quote on shares abroad, but due to the language skills available, this can be a problem, Furthermore, managers and supervisors may be brought in from the multinationals home country, with little tanning being given to locally recruited staff. As a consequence locals may be employed in low skilled jobs.
- A traditional retail business with many branches throughout UK might improve its communications by delayring (removement of the middle management). This would benefit the company because it means communication of information improves because there are less layers of management to distort information that is passed from top management to shop floor workers and vice versa. In addition, delayring improves the responsiveness of the organisation as decisions can be made quicker because information flows around the company quicker. This means that the organisation can be more responsive to the customer’s needs and wants.
The firm can heave a centralized structure. This will allow the senior managers to make better decisions prior to their skills and knowledge. In addition communication improves as there can be fewer decision makers.
- Communication can improve the motivation of an employee. This is because for example if an employee has been delegated with tasks then it empowers and motivates the worker. This therefore improves the communication between the employer and the employee and in the long term the business productivity should improve, for example, there may be reduced absenteeism. In addition, the relationship between the employer and the employee valued by the employer, resulting the employee with better tanning giving them the opportunity to use their talents and enjoy better working relationship with managers.
- Two reasons that cause the defectiveness of communication by the introduction of technological advancement are that employees tend to misuse the new technology. The employees spend more time on the internet and on e-mail than necessary. In addition to e-mail, people can receive abusive messages through electronic mail. In addition, employee may also start using the above facilities for non business purposes.
The second reason is that when the technology is first introduced, it causes problems for non computer literature people. This meaning that staff have to be trained, which is time consuming and costly, this therefore can also lead to redundancy if the staff can’t cope with the new system or hasn’t got the qualification to meet the requirements with the new technology.
2. Technology is a creative process which uses human, scientific and material resources to solve problems and improve efficiency.
The investment in the new technology can benefit the business in several different ways. The technology can lead to increased productivity, so there can be more produced with less and, as a consequence business profitability increases, due to meeting customer’s needs and wants. This therefore also implies the effect on waste. It means that using the new technology can save time as fewer materials are being used as well as fewer mistakes are being made. This therefore improves the relationship with the working environment, as technology can make work easier and satisfactory, without any pressure groups or complaints being made against the firm. There can also be improvements in communication e.g. fast communications via e-mail, computer network links and fax machines. All of these are examples of fast communications.
Improvement in efficiency means higher profits. This therefore meaning that dividends can be paid to the shareholders on time, so the communication with the shareholder is effective, which attracts more investors due to the good communication with the firm. Also firms can then negotiate a wage rise with its employees, if successful; the employee will be determined to work harder and will want the company to do well.
However, the technology can also cause problems for the workforce in general. The management in charge of the technological advancement has to make crucial decisions when deciding whether to purchase when the new system is made available. This can be very difficult, and often may result in purchasing the new system without any consultation with the subordinates which can demotivate due to any affects on their work once the system is up and running. In addition, tasks that were once carried out by humans can be now carried out by with fewer machines, which lead to large redundancies. Or on the other side technology has been designed and replaced which can lead to create new jobs, and in addition, few workers would mean once again the removement of the middle management and other employees, hence reducing the layers of management that improves the company’s organizational structure and meaning that the employee can now be supervised more closely due to having less layers of managers which could not be supervised due to the large number of layers of management.
So technology can be a competitive advantage as it allows greater productivity as well as better communication but can also be seen as costly as well as the difficulty involved in understanding the new technology that can slow communication in many different ways, an example would be the employee dissatisfaction because they may be low-skilled and technology being too advanced for them may cause them go on a strike which can cause problems with other business relationships, such as concentrating on fulfilling customers needs and wants.
15. I would agree to some extent that communication should have a positive affect on the workforce as a motivation. This is because communication is a crucial part of everyone in today’s dependant society. A group of employees working together as a team would be more productive efficient than individuals working on a manufacturing line. This is because the groups are socializing so their social needs are being met; hence they are being motivated through social talks with their colleagues. In addition, if the management actually explains the objectives and aims to the employees, this would also have a positive impact on the employees. This therefore implies the fact tasks being specified by the manager by consultation helps the employee organise themselves better as well as wanting greater responsibility where they can show their creativity and apply their job knowledge.
However it can be argued that workers are motivated mainly by money, so less communication would better with strict supervision. This can have a positive and a negative affect on the employee’s motivation. This is because as there is no communication taking between the employees, they are likely to ignore the responsibilities given to them and lack ambition. This therefore means that the workers would have to be controlled by management with a closer supervision. This is difficult to do so when there are many layers of management, and this is where the employee can work with a greater degree of confidence where as in a decentralized structure supervision would be carried out and the employee would be dissatisfied for example if he/she were constantly being told that they were late for work every day in which case a disciplinary action would be taken.
Overall I think that different employees have different communication needs. A business cannot generalize about the positive affects on the employees with the different means of communications. Instead I judge that employees in modern organisations are likely to be more skilled in team working, problem solving, and the use of information technology. I think that as long as the employee is recognized for their hard work, the employee will have a positive attitude towards work, furthermore, if the employees are provided that barrier where communication between colleagues is occurring, the productivity and efficiency of the business will improve as well as the profitability of the business.
