Introduction
Communication is defined as a process of conveying and receiving ideas and information through a mutually shared system of symbols and embedded in a context and situation. (Bhasker, 2013)
It is important that communication is effective to make sure the person we are trying to communicate is able to recognize and understand the message. This is especially important in organizations as an effective communication process can help having less misunderstandings, which usually creates conflict, time wasting and mistakes. There are many variables or factors that influence the effectiveness of communication, some of these are found in the organizational environment, some in the people involved personalities, a combination of those factor may lead to really effective communication or to inadequate or inefficient communication on organizations.
The purpose of this essay is two analyze two real-life examples of organizational communication, one where communication was done in an effective way and another one that where it was done inefficiently, and to evaluate the factors that influenced the outcome of the given scenarios.

Effective Communication Example
The following scenario happened last semester. We were a group of 4 people that were going to do a group presentation, so in order to get sort out the outline of the presentation we all agreed of having meeting and aim for a high grade from the start. Since each one of us had different ideas on how the presentation should go, we made turns of around five minutes each so we could listen to everyone and did not interrupt the person who was talking, we let the person finish and then we asked any questions and doubts we had. At the end of the meeting we had a good general idea of what approach we were taking for the presentation by collecting the best ideas from each member and everyone had a clear idea on what they needed to do. We also made a facebook group so we could finish the work together.

As previously stated, this scenario reflect effective communication skills. We took advantage of the group structure we had, so one key factor was the organizational structure. Our group had an all channel communication pattern we each one of us received an equal amount of information and at the same time during the meeting, so all of us contributed in problem solving tasks and giving ideas in a less time consuming way. In one of her Studies, Dr. Raman(2009) supports this motion by stating that it is necessary for employees at all levels of a company to be aware of all the information that affects or will affect a decision. It was also agreed that we should first listen carefully to others suggestions, and active listening was also an important aspect since it also allowed us to give feedback to each other’s suggestions and look for ways to improve. Listening is so important to decision making, that managers must improve their listening skills (Bell, Smith 2005). Furthermore, in one of their studies, Ahmed et al. (2010) stated that one of the most important determinants of organizational performance is the ability to listen and respond to feedback. It is also important to mention that this feedback was done in a polite and adequate way, without making the person receiving the feedback that we were judging him or that we had a problem with him. Communication apprehension is defined as "an individual's level of fear or anxiety associated with either real or anticipated communication with another person or people. During presentation episodes, high state Communication Apprehension has been shown to be related to excessive attention to self, which results in poorer performances in public speaking situations (Daly et al, 1989). Speakers experiencing state Communication Apprehension, because they are more self-focused and miss external cues, as a result, they lose some of the opportunities they may have to adapt to audience reactions. The ability, in a public speaking situation, to determine whether the speaker's point is being understood or whether the audience is paying attention is really important. Self-esteem and self-awareness play a critical role in this situation, the emotions we display when presenting an idea shows the people surrounding us how the feedback they are providing is affecting us. It was important that during the meeting everyone kept motivated towards achieving a good grade, so everyone took the feedback given in the best possible way when they were doing their proposal and gave feedback aiming to improve the proposals with useful advice. Organizational strategy is only successful if feedback is actively encouraged from those who are responsible of implementing the strategy. During the meeting, we all shared our ideas in full and nobody felt like not showing interest on talking. We were all able and willing to speak fluently and give our ideas properly. This directly impacted the effectiveness of our communication. It is known that high willingness to communicate is associated with increased frequency and amount of communication, which are in turn, associated with positive communication outcomes. On the other hand, low willingness to communicate is associated with low amounts of communication and therefore communication is poor. (Johnston et al 2000)

Ineffective Communication Example
This next scenario will show ineffective communication and its consequences. We were a group of 4 people doing a group assignment. We needed to come up with an organization scenario but 2 of the members could not attend the first meeting due to classes. On the meeting, we decided the type of industry we were going to do. One of the guys did not show any commitment of wanting to do the assignment, and he only started caring about it one week before the deadline. When he found out we were going to do the assignment about a healthy food organization, he did not like the idea and told us that we should follow his idea of type of industry. Another group member did not like this at all, since everyone else was pretty much done with their part of the assignment and started yelling at him and called him names. We had to talk to the course coordinator about the situation and allow us to finish the work without him, so we ended up doing more work ourselves.

One of the important factors that lead to this ineffective communication was the poor conflict resolution skills we had. A competent communicator is one that adapts his behavior to the situation, uses more constructive conflict management strategies, and is sensitive to the needs of others. (Olson 2012) One of the group members got so frustrated that used an aggressive language towards the troublesome group member, this verbal attack could have easily lead to something worst. Olson concluded in his study that the use of aggression indicated an inability to communicate competently, supporting this factor. Furthermore, Raman (2009) also states that emotional reactions such as anger, fear or embarrassment influence how we understand other’s messages and also influence how we transmit our messages, we may lose the ability to gauge the meaning of the messages we receive and will respond defensively or aggressively. In this case it would have been more appropriate to use assertive behavior. Assertive behavior is often associated with given orientation of tasks, as a result it is also a strong predictor of leadership emergence in small groups.(Snaveli, McNeill 2008).With assertive behavior people are able to express themselves in an honest, direct and non-destructive way. Assertiveness is not intended to hurt the other person, it gives the other person a more accurate idea on the issues and how willing we are to negotiate towards resolving the conflict. (Archee et al.2013) If someone is holding on to grudges based on past actions, his ability to see the reality of the current situation will be impaired. Rather than looking to the past and assigning blame, we should had focused on what we could do before the conflict, to solve the problem.
Other factor that had led to ineffective communication was the low information sharing between us. When planning the first meeting, 2 people out of 5 could not make it. We arranged the meeting through a facebook group and we assumed that everyone had checked their inbox account. We usually make assumptions and end upset because at the things are not going as we planned and get a different outcome. We should had make sure that everybody had seen the message and was happy with the proposed date, relevant information sharing is a very important aspect of effective communication and we should had told what we were thinking and not to assume that people already has the same information as everyone. This leads to another factor, which was avoiding communication. Unfortunately, the troublesome group member did not say anything about the issues he had with the chosen type of Industry until very close to the due date. Even though he was in the facebook group as a member, he did not told us once that he had an issue, he failed to communicate. Communication problems could emerge because we don’t feel comfortable saying what we think or what we want, it could also be the case that the person does not want to upset other people, but in the end it causes more frustration, anxiety on themselves and this will most likely lead to conflict. Communication is necessary for an organization as the bloodstream is to a person, hardening of the arteries impairs his efficiency, and so may a hardening of the communication produce a similar impaired efficiency (Liu 2011). As stated above, this failure to communicate “impared” the whole group.

In conclusion, I had analyzed two scenarios of communication in organizations. The first one was done in an effective way, we took advantage of the organizational structure so that we all had the same amount of information from the beginning until we finished. We also made sure that we had good listening skills for each other’s suggestions, in that way we would also be able to provide useful feedback that would improve the overall presentation. For this factor, a high self-esteem on each of the member was required and everyone acted accordingly, took the feedback assertively and positively. All these factors helped us obtain an efficient organizational communication and we ended up making a good presentation.
On the second scenario, the poor conflict resolution skills and aggressive behavior were some of the factors that lead us to inefficient organizational communication. Poor information sharing due to avoiding communication is the other factor that lead us to an inappropriate organizational working environment and end up doing more work ourselves instead of trying to solve the problem in another way. An alternative solution was given in the form of using assertive behavior with the troublesome group member, in this way we may have been able to solve the issues he had, avoid conflict and start working together towards achieving a good grade.

Word Count: 1818

Reference List
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