Some Barriers to Communication in Workplaces.
Communication barriers are obstructions
that lead to the distortion, disruption or even prevention of successful
communication. They can be both temporary and solved quickly and easily, or
they can be rooted deeply and take a long time to fix.
Gender Differences, for as long as
anyone can remember, men and women tend to have very different conversation styles.
One example of such differences is women preferring to communicate face to face
whilst men could be comfortable no having any direct body language such as
sitting side by side and focusing on a certain point away from the person
communicating with him. This kind of communication really comes down to
cross-cultural communication more than anything else. For this kind of barrier
to be removed, there needs to be a gateway that encourages an awareness and
appreciation of gender-specific differences in conversational style. With these
kinds of implementations, work atmosphere can remain professional and
organizational communication can be enriched.
Cultural Diversity, thanks to
globalization and the expansion of company’s outstretching to anywhere on the
planets, many different people of different cultures are capable of working
under one organization. Despite all the many benefits that are included in
this, it is also a factor that can upset the stability of communication. As a
result of this, further aspects such as motivation, teamwork and leadership can
all suffer as a consequence. When a
person from one culture views an individual from another culture with prejudice
based on stereotypes, this creates very tough, emotionally impacting barriers
to overcome. A gateway through this kind of diversity barrier is training
employees to increase their cultural awareness and sensitivity that could be to
develop a guide for an organization to base its understandings and interactions
on with members of the other culture.
Language, another aspect that can
cause uncertainty in communication could be a direct result of the previously
mentioned cultural diversity or due to multilingual individuals, but language
can be another barrier to communication. Some people within an organization may
not know any form of communication other than that of the most technical
terminology. Individuals of the same language capabilities may use jargon or
expressions that are only known among them and nobody else within the
organization. For this to be fixed, the simplest and most direct and
declarative form of language is in the workplace, to keep everybody in
synchronization and understanding among one another.
References
Nordmeyer, B. (n.d.). Barriers to workplace communication.
Global post. Retrieved from http://everydaylife.globalpost.com/barriers-workplace-communication-1406.html