PCOM Midterm Test Review
Estimating your Credibility
- Your readers will JUDGE your recommendations, requests, another messages based on their view of your CREDIBILITY - many entry-level professionals have relatively LOW PROFESSIONAL credibility because they are viewed as the newcomers.
Barriers to Team Effectiveness
-Ineffective communication -Lack of effective chartering and goal setting -Lack of clarity and goal setting -Low morale -Low productivity -Lack of trust
Frustrating Aspects of Being Part of a Team for Business Professionals
-Ineffective use of meeting time -Ineffective communication among team members -Lack of accountability -Individuals who don't complete assignments -Lack of preparation in meetings
What are character-based traits?
Character has always been important in business relationships, especially long-term, collaborative relationships. It is becoming even more important—especially for leaders—in an increasingly open, transparent, connected, and interdependent workplace.
Behaviors help drive acquired diversity:
(1) making sure everyone is heard; (2) making it safe to let team members express novel ideas; (3) giving team members decision-making authority; (4) sharing credit; (5) giving useful feedback; and (6) putting feedback into action. In short, these behaviors drive an innovative, "speak-up culture."
Types of Meetings
- Coordination meetings primarily focus on discussing roles, goals, and accountabilities. - Problem-solving meetings typically involve brainstorming about how to address and solve a particular work problem. In actuality, nearly all meetings involve both coordination and problem solving.
Principles of Difficult Conversations
- Embrace difficult conversations - Assume the best in others - Adopt a learning stance - Stay calm/overcome noise - Find common ground - Disagree diplomatically - Avoid exaggeration and either/or approaches
Identifying Reader Benefits and Constraints
- For many messages, this is the SINGLE MOST IMPORTANT planning step - Your readers respond when you provide them with something that they value -Values: refer to enduring beliefs and ideals that individuals hold. Since values are at the core of belief systems, appeals to an individual's values can have strong influence. Generally, people hold workplace values—beliefs and ideals about the appropriate way to approach business problems, resolve issues, and choose goals. - Priorities: involve ranking or assigning importance to things, such as projects, goals, and task. Priorities tend to shift more often than values.
Changing your Reputation
- Set up a time to TALK with your boss - Ask your boss if you can take any HIGHER RESPONSIBILITY projects - make sure you fit in with the corporate culture in terms of PROFESSIONAL DRESS and communication style - Attend a lot of meeting to get to know as many COLLEAGUES as possible - Create a PROFESSIONAL BLOG about a niche area
Components of DifficultConversations
- Start well/declare your intent - Listen to their story - Tell your story - Create a shared story
How should difficult conversations be handled successfully?
-Business professionals routinely—often on a daily basis—encounter difficult conversations, especially when working in teams and collaborating with others. -Difficult conversations are approached with apprehension, nervousness, anxiety, and even fear. Difficult conversations often center on disagreements, conflict, and bad news. -Many people prefer to avoid difficult conversations because they want to avoid hurting the feelings of others or want to avoid conflict.
Run Effective Virtual Meetings
-Start the meeting with social chat -Start with a contentious question -Asking "what do you think about" questions -Make sure each team member is involved -Articulate views precisely -Take minutes in real-time -Focus on your teammates and avoid multitasking -Use video when possible
Principles of Effective Team Communication
-Teams should focus first and foremost on performance -Teams go through four natural stages to reach high performance -Effective teams build a work culture around values, norms, and goals -Effective teams meet often -Effective teams embrace differing viewpoints and conflict. -Effective teams find out the communication styles and preferences of one another -Effective teams provide a lot of positive feedback and evaluate their performance often -Effective teams feel a common sense of purpose
When should meetings be scheduled?
-The best time for a meeting is between 8am and noon -you should avoid meetings, especially brainstorming meetings, during the least productive times of the day
What is the AIM process of developing business messages? What are the components?
-The most important stage of creating effective business messages is planning -The AIM planning process unleashes your best thinking and allows you to deliver influential messages The AIM Planning Process focuses on three areas: (1) Audience analysis; (2) Idea development; and (3) Message structuring. In short, the planning process should include analyzing the needs of your audience, developing sound ideas that meet those needs, and then structuring your message.
To build well-reasoned business positions, avoid the following types of logical inconsistencies:
-Unsupported generalizations - Faulty cause/ effect claims - Weak analogies - Either/ or logic - Slanting the facts - Exaggeration
Planning for Meetings: Essential Questions
-What is the purpose of the meeting? What outcomes do I expect? -Who should attend? -When should the meeting be scheduled? -What roles and responsibilities should people at the meeting have? -What will be the agenda? -What materials should I distribute prior to the meeting? -When and how should I invite -What logistical issues do I need to take care of (reserving rooms, getting equipment, printing materials)?
What are barriers to effective listening?
-lack of time -lack of patience and attention span -image of leadership -communication tech -fear of bad news or uncomfortable info -Defending -"Me too" statements -Giving advice -Judging
Chapter 1: Credibility (38 questions in pool)
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Chapter 2: Interpersonal Communication and Emotional Intelligence (27 questions in pool)
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Chapter 3 Team Communication & Difficult Conversation (32 questions in pool)
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Chapter 5: Creating Effective Business Messages (45 questions in pool)
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Chapter 9: Routine Messages (47 questions in pool)
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Message Structuring
1. Framing the primary message: - What is the primary message? - The primary message should be a simple/vivid statement (15 words or less) captures the essence of your message. 2. Setting up the logic of your message. - What are your supporting points? - What do you want to explicitly ask your readers to do (call to action)? - How will you order the logic of your message?
What is the stakeholder view?
A sense of accountability implies an obligation to meeting the needs and wants of others. It also involves an enlarged vision of those affected by your business activities. It takes a stakeholder view that includes all groups in society affected by your business. Thus, a sense of accountability involves a feeling of responsibility to stakeholders and a duty to other employees and customers
Creating and Distributing the Agenda
Agendas provide structure for meetings. For most meetings, preparing and distributing an agenda ahead of time allows each meeting participant to form expectations and prepare. Most agendas should include items to be covered, time frames, goals and/or expected outcomes, roles, and materials needed. You can foster more effective meetings by getting others involved in the agenda-creation process.
Analyzing the Business Problems
Analyzing the business problem typically involves uncovering relevant facts, making conclusions, and taking positions. - Facts are statements that can be relied on with a fair amount of certainty (most things are not absolutely certain in the business world) and can be observed objectively. - Conclusions are statements that are reasoned or deduced based on facts. - Positions are stances that you take based on a set of conclusions. In the workplace, you will often make recommendations, which are a type of position.
How should a professional gain trust?
As a future manager and executive, you can control your reputation as a credible communicator by focusing on three well-established factors: competence, caring, and character
Understand business ethics and when a code of ethics is required.
Business ethics: The commonly accepted beliefs and principles in the business community for acceptable behavior. business ethics involve adhering to laws; safeguarding confidential or proprietary information; avoiding conflicts of interest and misuse of company assets; and refraining from accepting or providing inappropriate gifts, gratuities, and entertainment.
Understand the elements of credibility: Caring, Competence, Character.
Caring: understanding the interests of others, cultivating a sense of community, and demonstrating accountability. Competence: the knowledge and skills needed to accomplish business tasks, approach business problems, and get a job done. Character: Refers to a reputation for staying true to commitments made to stakeholders and adhering to high moral and ethical values.
How should a writer choose between bulleted or numbered lists?
Consider whether the order of the items is important
What are the differences between Personal values vs. Work values (corporate values)?
Corporate values: The stated and lived values of a company. Personal values: Those values that individuals prioritize and adhere to. If one is living corporate values that do not match one's personal values, then there is a lack of integrity.
Running effective meetings
Create tradition, culture, and variety Set expectations and follow the agenda Encourage participation and expression of ideas Build consensus and a plan of action Closing the meeting Dealing with difficult people
How should teams/groups write papers or reports? How do they handle editing, etc.?
Creating a strong, precise, and coherent document with many writers is challenging. As you write with teams or other groups, consider applying the following tips: - Start Right Away -Work Together at the Planning Stage -Make Sure Your Roles and Contributions Are Fair -Stay flexible and open -Meet in Real Time Consistently and Ensure the Writing Reflects the Views of the Group -Discuss How You Will Edit the Document Together -Consider a Single Group Member to Polish the Final Version and -Ensure a Consistent Voice
Idea Development
Developing great business ideas involves sorting out the business issues and objectives, collecting as many relevant facts as possible, and making sound judgments about what the facts mean and imply. You are making sense out of often complex and confusing pieces of business information. Business professionals use many methods of bringing out their best thinking. Some write notes, some draw diagrams, some brainstorm with colleagues, some write ideas in outline form, and some just examine the ideas in their minds. Generally, for complex problems, such as the opening case, writing ideas down in some form is an important part of developing sound ideas. In this section, we focus on three broad areas: (1) identifying the business problem/s; (2) analyzing the business problem/s; and (3) clarifying objectives.
audience analysis
Effective business communicators possess an uncanny ability to step into the shoes of their audience members. They think about their audience's needs, priorities, and values. They envision how their readers will respond when getting the message—in thought, feeling, and action. They also consider how the message will impact their working relationships. Effective business communicators regularly take the following actions to tailor their messages to others: Identify reader benefits and constraints, consider reader values and priorities, estimate personal credibility, anticipate reactions, and consider secondary audiences.
What does it mean for employees to be engaged? What type of behavior is seen when employees are engaged?
Engagement is a measure of how much employees are connected emotionally to their work, how willing they are to expend extra effort to help their organizations meet their goals, and how much energy they have to reach those goals. A study showed that companies with highly engaged employees were nearly three times as profitable as companies with low engagement among employees. A key influence on this employee engagement was the credibility of business leaders. For example, in highly engaged companies, 77 percent of employees said that their managers act consistently with what they say, whereas just 29 percent said the same in disengaged companies.
What are active listening skills: clarifying, probing questions, etc.?
Ways to show that you are engaged in what a person is saying. making eye contact and asking questions shows a person that you are listening to what they have to say.
What are the characteristics of high trust relationships?
Establishing credibility allows you to communicate more easily and more influentially. Extensive research has shown that high-trust relationships lead to more efficient and superior work outcomes. In terms of ease of communication, credibility leads to less resistance from others, increased willingness to cooperate, and less likelihood of miscommunication. In high-trust relationships, since individuals willingly and freely give the benefit of the doubt, communication is simpler, easier, quicker, and more effective.
Should routine claims express emotion?
Focus on facts first and emotions second, if it all
Following Up After Meetings
Follow up by distributing the minutes of the meeting. Ex) Memo, email, team blog The minutes serve as a record of what your team accomplished Minutes of the meeting should include the date and time, team members present, decisions, key discussion points, open issues, and action items and related deadlines. You can also include names of people who were invited
What are the steps in team development and what happens during each?
Forming stage: - Team members focus on gaining acceptance and avoiding conflict Storming stage: Team members open up with their competing ideas about how the team should approach work Norming stage: the team arrives at a work plan, including the roles, goals, and accountabilities Performing stage: teams operate efficiently toward accomplishing their goals
virtual teams
Generally consist of team members located at various offices (including home offices) and rely almost entirely on virtual technologies to work with one another. -Organizations increasingly rely on virtual teams to complete projects, initiatives, and a variety of other tasks. -80 percent of professionals in multinational companies report working on a team that is located in different locations.
What should the tone of a routine message be?
Helpful, professional, and reader-centered tone
What should be remembered about messages that provide directions and set expectations?
Include specific, step-by-step guidelines for accomplishing particular tasks, make them steps stand out clearly
Embracing Differing Viewpoints
Inherent diversity: involves traits such as age, gender, ethnicity, and sexual orientation. Acquired diversity: involves traits you acquire through experience, such as customer service experience, retail experience, or engineering experience Disassociation: is a process by which professionals accept critique of their ideas without taking it personally and becoming defensive Association: the psychological bonding that occurs between people and their ideas.
What are the differences between Introverts vs. Extroverts?
Introverts: Tend to get much of their stimulation and energy from their own thoughts, feelings, and moods. Extroverts: Tend to get much of their stimulation and energy from external sources such as social interaction.
Why is transparency in ethics and communication important?
Involves sharing all relevant information with stakeholders "a principle that allows those affected by administrative decisions, business transactions or charitable work to know not only the basic facts and figures but also the mechanisms and processes."
What is emotional intelligence and what are its domains (self-awareness, self-regulation, motivation, empathy, social skills)?
Involves understanding and managing emotions to serve goals, empathizing with others, and effectively handling relationships with others. Business managers do better with a higher EI
What is the difference between the Learner vs. Judger mindsets?
Learner: You show eagerness to hear others' ideas and perspectives and listen with an open mind. You do not have your mind made up before listening fully. Judger: People have their minds made up before listening to others' ideas, perspective, and experiences. View disagreement rigidly, with little possibility of finding common ground.
Be familiar with the elements in the process of communication: meaning, encoding, decoding.
Meaning: Refers to the thoughts and feelings that people intend to communicate to one another Encoding: the process of converting meaning into messages composed of words and nonverbal signals Decoding: the process of interpreting messages from others into meaning.
Setting Up the Message Framework
Most business arguments employ a direct or deductive approach. In other words, they begin by stating the primary message, which is typically a position or recommendation. Then they lay out the supporting reasons. Most business messages conclude with a call to action. The call to action in many cases is a more detailed and elaborate version of the initial position or recommendation.
Should routine messages use an "other-oriented" tone?
No one wants to feel bossed around, so make sure you achieve a positive, other-oriented tone
How should professionals handle potential unethical behavior?
Often employees fail to speak up when they observe potentially unethical behavior. Business professionals remain silent for four basic reasons: - They assume it's standard practice. - They rationalize that it's not a big deal. - They say to themselves it's not their responsibility. - They want to be loyal. when you observe unethical behavior. It's part of your job. You can challenge rationalizations with questions such as these: - If this is standard, why is there a policy against it? - If it is expected, are we comfortable being public about it? -I may be new here, so I might not understand our policy clearly. But, shouldn't we . . .?
What is interpersonal communication?
One goal of interpersonal communication is to arrive at shared meaning (a situation in which people involved in interpersonal communication attain the same understanding about ideas, thoughts, and feelings. Many barriers interfere with achieving shared meaning, including external noise, internal noise, and lifetime experiences.) Shared meaning a situation in which people involved in interpersonal communication attain the same understanding about ideas, thoughts, and feelings. The interpersonal communication process is the process of sending and receiving verbal and nonverbal messages between two or more people. It involves the exchange of simultaneous and mutual messages to share and negotiate meaning between those involved.
Closing the Meeting
One priority should be to end the meeting on time. Before ending the meeting, summarize what you have accomplished. In just a few minutes, you can recap action items that the team has agreed on. After a meeting ends (even for those you do not lead), you should mentally evaluate your performance. Consider these questions: - How much information, analysis, and interpretation did I provide? - Did I communicate my ideas even if they conflicted with someone else's? - Did I participate in the implementation of the timeline? Did I meet deadlines? - Did I facilitate the decision-making process? Or did I just go with the flow?
Understand the different types of noise: semantic, psychological, physiological, physical
Physical noise: external noise that makes a message difficult to hear or otherwise receive. (Examples include loud sounds nearby that interrupt verbal signals or physical barriers that prevent communicators from observing nonverbal signals. Physical noise can also be a function of the medium used.) Physiological noise: refers to disruption due to physiological factors. Illness, hearing problems, memory loss. Conversely, a communicator may have a difficult time sending a message due to physiological constraints such as stuttering, sickness, or other temporary or permanent impairments. Semantic noise: occurs when communicators apply different meanings to the same words or phrases. (For example, two people may have different ideas about what an acceptable profit margin means. One manager may have a figure in mind, such as 10 percent. Another may think of a range between 20 and 30 percent.) Psychological noise: refers to interference due to attitudes, ideas, and emotions experienced during an interpersonal interaction. In many cases, this noise occurs due to the current conversation—the people involved or the content.
What are the steps in creating a routine message?
Plan: Identify the exact needs of your audience, gather relevant, accurate, and up-to-date information, create a front-loaded, direct, complete, and detail-oriented messageWrite: Aim for a helpful, professional, reader-centered tone, show respect to your readers time, apply a concise, easy-to-read, action-oriented style, use subject lines formatting to create a simple navigational designReview: Get feedback when writing on behalf of a team or unit, ensure your message is FAIR, make sure to proofread
Why is audience analysis important in routine message creation?
Since your readers are likely overloaded with many other messages, your primary challenge it to make sure they pay attention
Corporate values and business ethics
The Society for Human Resource Management espouses corporate values as the essence of business ethics. It defines business ethics as "organizational values, guidelines, and codes," and it emphasizes "behaving within those boundaries when faced with dilemmas in business or professional work."
What is the Post-trust era, and why does it exist?
The public overwhelmingly views businesses as operating against the public's best interests, and the majority of employees view their leaders and colleagues skeptically.
What should a writer remember about the subject line for an announcement?
The subject line must be specific and must create interest
team charters
The team charter provides direction to the team in how it functions to meet shared objectives. Common elements of team charters include purpose or mission statements, values, goals, team member roles (including leadership), tasks, ground rules, communication protocol, meeting protocol, decision-making rules, conflict resolution, and feedback mechanisms.
What is the filter of lifetime experience and how does it impact the communication process?
an accumulation of knowledge, values, expectations, and attitudes based on prior personal experiences This filter is an accumulation of knowledge, values, expectations, and attitudes based on prior personal experiences. When people have more shared experiences, communication is easier
What is nonverbal communication and how does it impact the communication process?
ex: gestures and expressions that effect communication by giving underlying messages to people about your attitude or feelings toward something
What is the FAIR Test? (define each letter and know the purpose of each)
facts, access, impacts, respect The FAIR test helps you examine how well you have provided the facts; how well you have granted access to your motives, reasoning, and information; how well you have examined impacts on stakeholders; how well you have shown respect. As you respond to these questions, you ensure that your communications are fair to yourself and others. -how well you have provided the facts -how well you have granted access to your motives, reasoning, and information -how well you have examined impacts on stakeholders -how well you have shown respect. -Facts: confident in them, clear assumptions, don't make them seem better than they are or misuse their logic-Access: allowed access to decision making info, allowed manager input, open about motives and not a hidden agenda-Impacts: impact on stakeholder, looked at impact of ethical corporate and legal-Respect: show that you cared about others ape rations, thoughts, feelings and well-being
Working in virtual teams
focus on building trust at each stage of your virtual team, meet in person if possible, get to know one another, use collaborative technologies, choose an active team leader
Most Common Functions of Teams
handling special projects, completing the work of particular departments, developing internal systems innovations, creating customer service innovations, developing product innovations, engaging in employee development, and reducing time to market for products and services.
How are honesty and competition connected?
honesty encourages competition on merits and prohibits competition by cheating. Honesty brings better quality of products and services, this allows a company to be more successful in gaining and retaining customers.
Team culture
refers to a set of shared perceptions and commitment to collective values, norms, roles, responsibilities, and goals. Typically, teams rapidly develop such shared perceptions and commitment during the norming stage. Only at the performing stage do these shared perceptions and commitments lead to high productivity.
What is incivility and how does it impact communication?
rude or unsociable speech or behavior
