Joe,
In reply to your thoughts on the inportance of processes, I'd like to ad
some interesting findings of our research in the field of organizational
communication.
I am working with a research company in the Netherlands, where my main
focus is on organizational communication. We recently finished a
pilot-study on the relationship between organizational communication on
one hand, and commitment, trust and consensus on goals and policy on the
other. In order to generate some fundamental knowledge on this
relationship, we conducted a survey in seven different (but large)
organizations. In every organization a representative sample of employees
and managers was questioned, resulting in a database with over 2000
subjects.
Of course it is impossible to measure every aspect of organizational
communication in such a large-scale pilot. We decided to focus on two
aspects: the level of information and the communication process. Level of
information refers to how well employees are informed about important
issues (like goals and policies, the what and why of major changes in the
organization, clients, competitors, the market, etc.). Communication
process refers to the communication-climate in the workplace and the
communication-style of the topmanage ment. Both climate and style are
determined by the level of openness and dialogue ( 'two- way-traffic').
The results show extraordinary strong relationships: differences in
commitment, trust (in the management) and consensus on goals and policy
can be accounted for to a large extent by differences in organizational
communication. The most dominant factor seemes to be the level of
information on goals, policies and organizational changes. But the
process-factors (communication climate and style) appear to be almost as
important: commitment, trust and consensus depend heavily on the level of
openness and dialogue in organizational communication!
The importance of 'the process' becomes even more clear, when we look at
the inter- relationship between level of information and communication
climate/style. Further analysis suggests that communication climate and
style moderate the level of information. This is possible, because level
of information is a subjective measure. For instance, when the
topmanagement is perceived to be honest and open about it's policies, the
level of information on policy will be perceived to be sufficient. But
the same information on policy will be perceived as insufficient, as soon
as there is doubt about the honesty and openness of the management. So
the communication climate and style not only directly affect commitment,
trust and consensus, but they are also the factors underlying the
perceived level of information.
I guess these findings again stress the importance of 'the process', for
instance in obtaining (consensus on) organizational change. The lesson for
managers is clear: more media and more information alone won't get the
message through, openness and dialogue will. Or, like Kim and Mauborgne
might state: without fair processes, even all the information you've got
will be insufficient!
Regards,
Michiel van Delden
CO-efficiknt Communication Research, Amsterdam
coeff@xs4all.nl
--CO-efficient <coeff@xs4all.nl>
Learning-org -- An Internet Dialog on Learning Organizations For info: <rkarash@karash.com> -or- <http://world.std.com/~lo/>