Introduction
Communication barriers in an organization are anything that hinders communication or a two-way process of communication. Communication barriers vary from physical and organizational factors to barriers such as language and cultural differences. Effective communication is critical in helping organizations, individuals, and team members achieve their goals and objectives. Organizational tasks and operations involve collaboration between individuals or teams, making effective communication critical (Rani, 2016). This paper discusses the importance of communication in the workplace while elaborating how communication barriers can impact organizations or individuals in meeting their goals and objectives. Furthermore, the paper discusses various strategies for overcoming these communication barriers.
Importance of the role of communication in the workplace
Good communication is a mandatory requirement for the proper functioning of any organization. Communication in the workplace is not just about relaying information but connecting with people, building teamwork, establishing trust and transparency, minimizing errors, and improving productivity in the workplace (Jenifer & Raman, 2015). Therefore, communication plays a crucial role in fulfilling an organization’s goal. Effective communication functions in the workplace vary from organization to organization depending on the organization’s operations, goals, and objectives. However, effective communication leads to improved performance, reduced errors, ease of transfer of knowledge and innovative ideas, and enhanced staff engagement and employee retention (Rani, 2016), as discussed in the section below.
Effective communication improves productivity and effectiveness in the organization. Many organizations’ functions depend on collaboration between individuals or teams, such as departments, to accomplish their objectives. Therefore, good communication enables an organization to achieve its objectives faster and effectively, making it more productive. Effective communication also increases productivity by reducing errors and the cost of operation, leading to increased productivity (Rani, 2016). Secondly, communication increases staff engagement and reduces employee turnover. Employees are motivated when their managers keep them informed about various developments in the organization, giving them a sense of belonging and making them stay longer within the organization.
Good communication also helps an organization implement its change management initiative successfully. Implementing a change initiative requires a lot of communication, and many organizations fail because of a lack of effective communication. The current dynamic business environment makes change management initiatives and effective communication mandatory (Kapur, 2018). For the change process to be effective, it is essential for the employer to communicate why the change is happening, what it entails, its benefits, and its impact. Effective communication also drives innovation and knowledge sharing within an organization. Employees can share innovative ideas and expertise with their colleagues, making the organization more innovative and productive. The teamwork that results from effective communication in an organization plays a crucial role in establishing unity of purpose, which makes employees cooperate and work more purposely in helping the organization to achieve its goal (Jenifer & Raman, 2015). In line with this, effective communication helps achieve organizational alignment, as elaborated below.
Effective communication plays a significant role in helping organizations’ leadership to align employees’ goals to the organizational purpose. Studies show that only a few organizations successfully align staff goals with the organization’s purpose (Jenifer & Raman, 2015). Effective communication is a crucial tool through which a company’s executive familiarizes employees with the organization’s visions, missions, values, and purpose. Furthermore, effective communication helps collaboration between departments. The different departments need to work in collaboration with each other to achieve the goals of the organization (Goutam, 2013). Working as a team is only possible if transparent, open, and honest workplace communication exists. Furthermore, an environment of trust and teamwork where members of one department know that they can count on other department members to fulfill their duties leads to cohesiveness and effectiveness in the workplace.
How barriers to communication can impact an organization meeting its goals and objective
Communication barriers significantly impact the organizational objectives because, most of the time, the management may not know such barriers exist. If a manager’s communication style pisses off his employees, they may not tell him. Likewise, if there is a communication barrier between employees and the management and the junior staff cannot get the managers to listen, the organization’s leadership will not know there is a problem. Because of this, the organization cannot fix the problems that ail it. Establishing a good rapport within the organization is the best strategy to deal with this problem (Rani, 2016). However, such a strategy may not work in hierarchical organizations because communication is based on positions and ranks, not friendship. Nevertheless, being friendly and maintaining positive rapport may help people open up even in organizations with a hierarchical communication structure.
Communication barriers may also lead to increased inefficiencies and errors (Rani, 2016). Individuals and team members can fail to understand what is being communicated due to excess information or jargon. Furthermore, the use of different communication styles from that of the intended audience may cause difficulty in understanding. Failure to understand the information communicated may lead to people acting incorrectly, leading to errors, inefficiencies, and losses (Kapur, 2018). Some strategies that can help overcome this barrier include using simple words and phrases and breaking down the information into smaller chunks that will be easy to understand.
Communication barriers can also lead to stereotyping and alienating people, leading to an incohesive workplace environment. When there is no effort to bridge communication barriers in a work environment characterized by cultural and language barriers, a group of people can feel alienated. Consequently, this barrier in communication leads to a lack of trust and transparency among individuals in a team resulting in poor performance (Kapur, 2018). The lack of trust could also lead to other problems, such as conflicts and conflicting views among employees in an organization. Using inclusive language and appreciation of different cultures can be an effective strategy for overcoming this communication strategy. Lack of trust and transparency among employees can lead to a toxic work environment which negatively affects productivity.
How barriers to communication can impact an individual and a team in meeting its goals and objective
In the same way that communication barriers negatively impact organizations, they can also affect individuals and teams meeting their goals and objectives. Organizations are made up of individuals and team members, so communication breakdown impacts individuals and team members before moving to organizations. Some ways barriers to communication can negatively impact individuals and teams are alienation, conflicts, lack of engagement, increased employee turnover, and lack of career progress (Rani, 2016), as further discussed below.
Language and cultural barriers can lead to the alienation of individuals or team members. Language and cultural differences make people associate only with people they are comfortable with, making minority groups feel alienated and unwanted (Jelani & Nordin, 2019). Furthermore, language and cultural differences cause discrimination and stereotyping, which causes people to treat people from minority groups unfairly. The discriminatory treatment may lead to low self-esteem and unworthiness, which can also impact the performance of these individuals and teams (Jenifer & Raman, 2015). Communication barriers can also lead to conflicts among individuals and team members. Conflicts can arise from different perspectives, such as religious and political views. Conflict can also occur due to fighting for limited resources or simply hating each other. While conflicts can be a barrier to effective communication, they can also lead to other negative consequences, such as fighting, litigation, and even loss of employment.
Communication barriers can also lead to a lack of staff engagement which can lead to reduced productivity and increased employee turnover. When the employer holds back important information from employees, they may feel unwanted and their contributions unimportant. Consequently, employees will start distancing themselves from making important decisions and holding back on important information. The lack of morale in individuals and group members may cause them to start looking for employment elsewhere, causing increased employee turnover. Similarly, communication barriers can cause individual and team members to stagnate in their career growth. When employees hold back and withdraw important information due to feeling unwanted, they distance themselves from important responsibilities that can make them grow professionally.
Strategies for overcoming barriers to communication
Organizations can employ various strategies to overcome communication barriers, helping them to achieve their goals and objective. The first strategy is to appreciate language and cultural differences in the workplace by using inclusive language. Understanding and appreciating different cultures helps employees from different cultures to have a sense of belonging and connect easily with other staff (Goutam, 2013). Moreover, focusing on the message and not the person when receiving and interpreting information will help to reduce biases and discrimination arising from language and cultural differences.
Breaking down the information communicated into smaller chunks and delivering it over a prolonged period is the best strategy to overcome information overload (Jenifer & Raman, 2015). Additionally, simple words and phrases will help an individual understand faster than long and complex phrases full of jargon. Deferring communication until the audience is in the right state of mind is another strategy that helps to break communication barriers caused by tiredness and negative attitude. In case of language barriers, the communicators can seek the service of an interpreter. Additionally, gestures and other non-verbal communication, such as body language, can help in case of language barriers but can also help reinforce the message being communicated.
Conclusion
Communication barriers are anything that acts as a barrier to communication or a two-way communication process. Communication barriers can adversely impact the ability of organizations, individuals, and team members to meet their goals and objectives. Communication barriers may reduce organizational productivity, increase errors and inefficiencies, and result in an incohesive work environment. Furthermore, communication barriers can cause a lack of trust and transparency in the workplace, which creates alienation among groups of individuals. Some strategies to overcome communication barriers include breaking down the information into smaller chunks and using simple words and phrases free of jargon.
References
Goutam, A. (2013). Effective communication at the workplace. Irc’s international journal of multidisciplinary research in social & management sciences.
Jenifer, R. D., & Raman, G. P. (2015). Cross-cultural communication barriers in the workplace. International Journal of Management, 6(1), 348-351.
Kapur, R. (2018). Barriers to effective communication. Delhi University.
Jelani, F., & Nordin, N. S. (2019). Barriers to effective communication at the workplace. Journal of Modern Languages and Applied Linguistics, 3(2), 7-18.
Rani, K. U. (2016). Communication barriers. Journal of English language and literature, 3(2), 74-76.
write