One of the aspects that we haven’t discussed as much in class are the functional reasons for communication. In this article from Fortune magazine, the former CEOs of JetBlue, Starbucks, and Motorola explain how the lack of communication was instrumental to them becoming unemployed.
David Neeleman (formerly of JetBlue Airlines): I didn’t have time to update the board on everything. If you don’t, somebody else will. You have to be able to give them an accurate picture of what’s going on, or they develop their own perceptions and start creating their own stories. And then they make their decisions. How do you keep these people up to date and give them the whole picture? That’s the job of the CEO, and I failed.
Jim Donald (formerly of Starbucks): I made it a habit of every other week updating the board through an e-mail on revenue, any store openings, any issues around the world.
Neeleman: When things start going south, communication should increase. Even if you think you’re doing enough, you’re not doing enough. I didn’t do a good enough job because [board members] developed their own perceptions of where things were headed.
It’s an interesting read, both from a communications perspective and from a management perspective.
As you all begin preparing for your final team presentations next week, I thought this slide show might be helpful to you. There are probably 10,000 people on the internet with their own ideas of how to put together a PowerPoint presentation, but this is one of the few I have found that integrates the delivery and communication aspects of the presentation equally with the technological aspects.
Again, I was very pleased with the quality of speeches last night. I saw improvement in everyone from the first night, and I thoroughly enjoy hearing about everyone’s interests and personal causes (whether everyone agrees with them or not). I think such diversity in the classroom environment keeps things interesting, and there were definitely some lively Q&A sessions after many of our speeches. I’m looking forward to the personal aspects you will each bring to this week’s Faith Integration papers and speeches.
Next week, I’m looking for some specific feedback related to the team teaching assignments. I’ve been collecting some of your feedback so far to pass along to the school along with my personal feedback, and you will have the chance to share it again in your end-of-course surveys. Please think about the last two weeks of class over the coming week so you will be able to answer the questions. I have a feeling I already know the answers, but I don’t want to second guess anyone.
Below is the PowerPoint that I use for the reading assignments for Workshop 3. Again, because last night was a team teaching event, you didn’t see these, but these are what I feel are the core concepts that are essential to get out of the reading. Hopefully, we will have time in the next two weeks to follow up where necessary.
One of the mass media that I think your textbook ignores is video gaming. In terms of revenue generated, video game hardware and software is a multi-billion dollar industry that stands right up there with the motion picture and television entertainment industries. It fits as one of the mass media by definition, because the software is the same no matter where it is purchased geographically, and it is meant to be consumed by a large, diverse audience. In fact, on the subject, DVDs and video downloads would also fit into this category.
When the video game Grand Theft Auto IV was released earlier this month, there were concerns that it would actually cut into movie revenues of the key male 18-29 demographic, because players would stay at home to play the game. This mirrors the same concerns over lost work productivity when other video game releases such as the Halo and Madden NFL franchises coincided with “sick days”. The game ended up generating $310 million of revenue in first-day sales and $500 million in first-week sales. The link has some other interesting details about the game.
As a communication medium, gamers can go online via the internet and play a character in a Massively Multiplayer Online Role Playing Games (MMORPGs) or create a virtual character to live in a virtual world such as Second Life. If you’re unfamiliar with either of those terms, Google them or ask your kids. Either they or their friends are probably playing them. People befriend other players through the game, communicate with each other, go out on missions together, or in the case of Second Life, open businesses and engage in transactions together.
There are also negative arguments against the violence and morals of some of these games and how they influence children. The industry uses a ratings system, but it is not always enforced and parents that buy the games don’t always pay attention. So, video games often come under the same scrutiny as television violence, and perhaps even more so, because in violent video games you feel like you are actually engaging in some of those activities. Here is an interesting excerpt from a blog on Wired.com:
The purpose of this article is geared more towards salespeople and how to communicate with sales prospects in a way to earn their trust, befriend them, and eventually earn a sale. However, there are many aspects of the article that apply to the discussions of interpersonal communication in your textbook.
On the surface, you might look at this story and think, “Well, duh!” However, as we shift our attention this week to organizational communication, there are some interesting ideas we can draw from this article about how communication affects more than just our personal relationships.
There were a lot of great speeches and great speakers last night during class. I always enjoy the informative speeches because we learn a little bit about everyone in class, their interests, and their experiences. I’m looking forward to your speeches this week and next. I’m hoping everyone is able to make some improvement based on the class feedback from last week, and I’m hoping that everyone will be able to stretch their speaking abilities a bit this week.
Below is the PowerPoint that I use for the reading assignments for Workshop 2. Of course, last night was a team teaching event, so you didn’t see these, but there are some points here that I would like to reiterate in Workshop 4, and we’ll have some activities to reinforce the concepts.
Here is another good site that interactively discusses some of the topics of this week’s reading, such as paralanguage, body language, tone of voice, proximity, and cultural uses of time, space, clothing, and gender. If some of the concepts of Chapters 2 and 3 were not clear to you, this site gives a good overview, and the rest of the topic of Language and Culture on the main page is probably worth of exploration as well.
I’m looking forward to seeing what our team has to teach the class tonight and hearing your informative speeches. It’s always neat to learn a little bit about everyone’s interests and what you enjoy in your spare time.
There is an interesting quiz at this web site. There are only about six or seven questions, but the questions are interesting in that they try to get you to decipher body language, examine the cultural aspects of communication (something I kind of wish were emphasized more in this course by the university), and predict how people will react to certain situations. There is a video series that goes along with this, and I think I might see if the university has one that I can preview for use in one of our later workshops.
One of the topics of this week’s reading is the process people use to listen to what is communicated to them and what they do with that information internally once it has been communicated to them. I found this interesting list out of the University of Minnesota-Duluth student handbook. Although this list applies more to a classroom environment, you could also apply this to a meeting at work or to the presentations your classmates will be giving this week.
Maintain eye contact with the speaker.
Focus on content, not delivery.
Avoid emotional involvement.
Avoid distractions.
Treat listening as a challenging mental task.
Stay active by asking mental questions.
Use the gap between the rate of speech and your rate of thought.
I think my favorite one out of the list is the one about treating listening as a challenging mental task. While it is easy to tune out poor communicators and blame them afterwards for their lack of skills, there are some occasions where what we are listening to is important to our jobs or even our lives. If a 911 operator sounded like he or she didn’t know what you were talking about, wouldn’t you take the time to actively listen to the person on the line and make sure they understood your location and situation? And, vice versa, those types of people are trained to decipher what a person in a highly emotional state is saying so they know what type of help to send and where to send it.
There’s a really good video on improving your listening skills in the Bachelor’s curriculum. I’m going to see if I can grab it for Workshop 4. I know a lot of people were bothered by the video choice this past week, although I think it was good for review.
