MGMT 3453 Exam 2 Review

Delivering Negative Feedback

-Adopt a team-centered orientation -Avoid sugarcoating the bad news -Explain the impacts of the individual's poor performance on organizational performance -Link to consequences -Probe for reasons performance is not higher -Emphasize problem solving rather than blaming -Be firm

Getting the Tone, Style, and Design Right

-Aim for tone of genuine concern in a professional manner -Inject some positive direction to the message, but don't provide false hope -Use a writing style that is simple, accurate, and jargon-free -Maintain a simple design

AIM Planning Process

-Analyzing your audience: understand their needs, values, and how they are influenced -Developing your ideas: wrestle with the complicated business issues at hand -Creating a message structure: most effectively reduces resistance and gains buy-in

Planning Stage

-Audience Analysis -Idea Development -Message Framework

Things to avoid/consider

-Avoid Sarcasm and Jokes in Most Cases -Avoid Rescheduling Meeting Times or Places -Consider Turning Off Sound Alerts for Incoming Texts/Emails -Identify Yourself -Clearly End the Texting Exchange -Avoid Personal Texts during Work Hours

Maintain Professionalism and Appropriate Formality

-Avoid indications that you view email as casual communication -Apply the same standards of spelling, punctuation, and formatting you would for other written documents -use greetings and names

Choosing the Right Mix of Channels

-Bad new is best delivered in person -This allows rich communication, where you can use verbal and nonverbal cues to show your concern and sensitivity -An advantage to control the message more carefully and ensure that you state the bad news preciesly and accurately

Delivering Bad News in Writing to Customers

-Bad-news messages to customers contain the same essential components as other bad-news messages -When writing this kind of bad-news messages you want to emphasize the options available, solutions the customer has control over

Guidelines for Bad News Message

-Deliver the bad news in a timely manner -choose the right mix of channels -Sympathize with the bad news recipients and soften the blow -Provide a simple, clear rationale -Explain immediate impacts -Focus on solutions and long-term benefits -Show goodwill

Understand How the Bad News Will Affect Your Audience

-Delivering bad news often creates stress, anxiety, and other strong emotions -More than with other types of messages, you may need to work hard to focus your message on serving others

Components of Setting Expectations

-Describing responsibilities -Providing deadlines -Discussing coordination

Compoents of Direct Bad-News Messages

-Ease in with a buffer -Deliver the bad news -Provide a rationale -Explain impacts -Focus on the future -Show goodwill

Components of Indirect Bad-News Messages

-Ease in with a buffer -Provide a rationale -Deliver the bad news -Explain impacts -Focus on the future -Show good will

Delivering Bad News in Writing to External Partners

-External partners can include suppliers, consultants, or joint-venture partners -You are better off breaking bad news to them in a rich communication channel, in person or by phone

Reviewing Stage

-FAIR Test -Proofreading -Feedback

Components of Persuasive Messages

-Gain Attention -Raise a need -Deliver a solution -Provide a rationale -Validate views -Give counterpoints -Call to action

Components of Mass Sales Messages

-Gain attention -Generate interest -Build desire -Call to action

Components of Announcements

-Gain attention -Give announcement -Provide details -Call to action -State goodwill

Components of Appreciation Messages

-Give thanks -Provide rationale -State goodwill

Sympathize with the Bad-News Recipient and Soften the Blow

-In person, most people make a judgment about your genuine concern for them based on many factors, including your past treatment of them and your nonverbal behavior -You may use a one- or two-sentence buffer to start the bad-news message, which softens the blow

Components of Claims

-Make Claim -Provide rationale -Call to action -State goodwill

Participating in and Leading Group Voice and Video Calls

-Practice Using the Technology before the Group Call -Use Your Webcam Effectively -Use Interactive Tools Wisely -Start the Call with Purpose and Take Charge -Follow the Guidelines of Effective Virtual Meetings

Persuade through Emotion and Reason

-Savvy business communicators understand the importance of injecting emotion into their persuasive messages -Effective communicators find ways to appeal to the core emotional benefits of products, services, and ideas

Show Respect for Other's Time

-Select message recipients carefully -Provide timelines and options -Be careful about using the priority flag -Let others know when you will take longer than anticipated to respond or take action -Avoid contributing to confusing and repetitive email chains

Building Connections with Phone Conversations

-Share Conversation Time Equally -Apply the Rules of Active Listening and Avoid Multitasking -Take Notes on Important Points and Summarize Next Steps at the End of the Call -Close with Appreciation -Follow Up on Agreements -Schedule and Plan for Your Phone Calls -Ensure Quality Audio -Open with a Warm Greeting and Use Your Caller's Name -After Brief Small Chat, Direct the Conversation to the Issues at Hand -Speak with a Pleasant, Enthusiastic Voice

Components of Directions

-State goal -Give step-by-step directions -State goodwill

Drafting Stage

-Tone -Style -Design

Principles of Effective Emails

-Use for the right purposes -Ensure ease of reading -Show respect for time -Protect privacy and confidentiality -Respond promptly -Maintain professionalism and appropriate formality -Manage emotion effectively -Avoid distractions

Reviewing Bad-News Messages

-When writing bad-news messages, always reread them several times -Place yourself in the position of the recipients so you can try to imagine how they feel and react -Consider asking trusted colleagues to review your message and give feedback -They may be able to give you a neutral and objective view of the stimulation.

Receiving Negative Feedback

-You will have many opportunities to get feedback about your performance and potential -Seeking and receiving feedback, even when it's negative, will help you develop the skills you need to make an impact in the workplace and move into new positions

Reciprocation

-a principle of influence based on returning favors

Liking

-a principle of influence whereby people are more likely to be persuaded by people who they like

Social Proof

-a principle of influence whereby people determine what is right, correct, or desirable by seeing what others do

authority

-a principle of influence whereby people follow authority figures

Scarcity

-a principle of influence whereby people think there is limited availability of something they want or need, so they need to act quickly

Buffer

-a statement to establish common ground, show appreciation, state your empathy, or otherwise express goodwill

Elements of an apology

-acknowledgement of mistake or an offense -an expression of regret for the harm caused -acceptance of responsibility -commitment that the offense will not be repeated -effective apologies should be timely and sincere

Tone

-aim for helpful, professional, reader-centered tone. Show respect for your readers' time

Making Claims

-as you write claims, keep in mind that your goal is to have your claim honored -focus on facts first and emotions second -lay out logical, reasonable, and professional explanation for your claim

Consistency

-based on the idea that once people make an explicit commitment, they trend to follow through or honor that commitment

Proofreading

-check for typos and any signals that you are not attentive to the needs of others

Audience Analysis

-consider exactly what information your audience needs and how they want to receive it

Message Framework

-create a front-loaded, direct, complete, and detail-oriented message

Coordination

-deals with the effort and timing needed to allow all relevant people to participate in a communication

Setting Expectations

-directly ties to your credibility and ability to foster interpersonal trust in the workplace -failure to do it can lead to lasting professional disappointments and breakdowns in working relationships

asynchronous communication

-does not occur in real time -individuals involved in such communication can pay attention to and respond to communications at a time of their choosing

Use Email for the Right Purposes

-email com. has a few constraints (low cost, little coordination) and high control (the writer can think them out carefully, and they provide a permanent record) -rarely appropriate for sensitive or emotional communication tasks

flames

-emails or other digital communications with "hostile intentions characterized by words of profanity, obsenity, and insults that inflict harm to a person or an organization

FAIR Test

-ensure that the message contains all needed information, and that it is entirely correct

Making Requests

-essence of people coordinating work efforts, buying and selling products and services, and maintaining work relationships

Composing Mass Sales Messages

-even when consumers do not respond with immediate purchases, these messages can raise a company's brand awareness -effective sales messages contain central sales theme -messages are strongest when they contain a coherent, unified theme that consumers can recognize quickly

Permanence

-extent to which the message can be stored, retrieved, and distributed

Expressing Sympathy

-foremost requirement of any expression of sympathy is that it be sincere -your genuine concern will compensate for any deficiencies in the words you use -handwrite your expression of sympathy on a nice card

Importance of Credibility in an Era of Mistrust and Skepticism

-heightened for persuasive messages -if audience members question your credibility, they are unlikely to carefully consider your ideas, requests, or recommendations

Maintaining Credibility when Delivering Bad News

-honesty and openness are keys -although people do not like to get bad news, they expect the truth -may assume that communicating bad news to customers shakes relationships and breeds mistrust -delivering bad news the right way actually strengthen customer relationships and increase trust when conditions improve

severity

-how serious or detrimental the bad news is

Idea Development

-identify and gather relevant, accurate, and up-to-date information

Planning

-implies that the communication can be tightly drafted, edited and revised, rehearsed, and otherwise strategically developed before delivery

Delivering Bad News in Writing to Colleagues

-in all management positions, you will need to give bad news to your boss, your peers, or those you supervise from time to time -your ability to deliver bad-news messages constructively will foster a transparent and open culture

Develop Routine Messages

-in any given day you need to produce credible messages quickly -excellent communicators can develop routine written messages in a matter of minutes -require proportionately less time for planning and reviewing

Providing Directions

-include specific, often step-by-step, guidelines for accomplishing particular tasks -in messages with procedures and directions, make the steps stand out clearly by enumerating each one

Resources

-included the financial, space, time, and other investments necessary to employ particular channels of communication

Reinterpretation

-involves adjusting your initial perceptions by making more objective, more fact-based, and less personal judgements and evaluations

manipulation

-involves attempting to influence other by some level of deception so you can achieve your own interests -by applying the FAIR test, you can avoid sending persuasive messages that manipulate others

defusing

-involves avoiding escalation and removing tension to focus on work objectives

Relaxation

-involves releasing and overcoming anger and frustration so that you can make a more rational and less emotional response

richness

-involves two considerations: >level of immediacy >number of cues available

Components of Requests

-make request -provide rationale -call to action -state goodwill

Style

-make your message easy to read. -use short sentences and paragraphs and action-oriented language

Mass sales messages

-messages sent to a large group of consumers and intended to market a particular product or service

cyber silence

-nonresponse to emails and other communications

Explicit

-nothing is implied -statements contain full and unambiguous meaning

synchronous communication

-occurs in real time -individuals involved give immediate responses to one another and engage in turn-taking

Mum effect

-occurs when the chain of messages within an organization is filtered at each level to leave out or inaccurately state the bad news -the message that top executives often hear ends up being unrealistically rosy

Email communication

-primary form of written business communication -most analysts expect it to be the primary tool for at least the next five to ten years in most companies

Persuasive Messages

-provide you with more professional opportunities and enhanced credibility, or they can close off future opportunities and diminish your credibility

negativity effect

-recipients are more likely to perceive messages that are intended as neutral as negative

neutrality effect

-recipients are more likely to perceive messages with an intended positive emotion as neutral

Immediacy

-relates to how quickly someone is able to respond and give feedback

Likelihood

-relates to the probability of the bad event occurring

Feedback

-request feedback from trusted colleagues when speaking on behalf of a team or unit

Claims

-requestst for other companies to compensate for or correct the wrongs or mistakes they have made

Responding to Inquiries

-set off each question so your readers can quickly identify responses to particular questions -you generally can do this using bullets or numbered lists and/or special formatting

Teaser message

-signal to recipients that an upcoming conversation or other communication may involve unpleasant news -prepares recipients emotionally yet does not reveal specific information -often written

Showing appreciation

-sincere expression of thanks also helps achieve business goals and strengthens work relationships

Components of Routine Messages

-state the primary message (10 or fewer words) -provide details in paragraphs of 20 to 80 words -restate the request or key message in more specific terms -state goodwill

Texting in the workplace

-texting is a relatively new and undeveloped form of communication in the workplace, and attitudes toward it vary significantly -many professionals consider texting in the workplace as impersonal, uninteresting, rude, intrusive, or inadequate

Control

-the degree to which communications can be planned and recorded, thus allowing strategic message development

Controllability

-the degree to which the bad-news message receiver can alter the outcome

Constraints

-the practical limitatons of coordination and resources

Implicit

-the request or some of the rationale for the request may be implied -the reader needs to read between the lines to grasp the entire meaning

Indirect

-they provide the rationale for a request before making the specific request

Creating Announcements

-to prevent employees and customers from ignoring announcements, the subject line must be specific and must create interest

Announcement

-updates to policies and procedures, notice of events, and other correspondences that apply to a group of employees and/or customers

Design

-use for subject lines and formatting to let your readers process and find information immediately

cyber incivilty

-violation of respect and consideration in an online environment based on workplace norms -active, passive

Direct

-you being with a main idea or argument and then provide the supporting reasons

Ensure Ease of Reading

1. Provide a short, descriptive subject line 2. Keep your message brief yet complete 3. Clearly identify expected actions 4. Provide a descriptive signature block 5. Use attachments wisely

Most effective communication channels for coordinating work

1. Scheduled meetings 2. Email 3. Landline phone