2. Objectives
To define the field of Business
Communication & PR.
To communicate expectations regarding
conduct, content, tutorials and
assignments.
3. Agenda
Learn about the course, its themes, and its
plans
Course outline & changes
Define the MCOM area
Discuss the different course assignments
and expectations
4. Course outline: Course objectives
Students will be able to:
Identify and define the basic communication
models, messages, practices, images and
symbols;
Students will be expected to be able to identify
their role, their audience and their focus when
constructing a report;
Describe and reflect on effective team
communication processes and practices in an
intercultural environment;
To recognize the key role played by
communication in organizations.
5. Defining the area considering
communication, businesses & self
Let‟s start by defining what is management
To manage
To bring about; to succeed in accomplishing
To take charge or care of; to dominate; to influence by
tact, respect or artifice
To handle, direct, govern, or control in action or use
To contrive to get along
Managing and management contradictions
6. So what‟s communication?
“ability and willingness of an individual to
participate responsibly in a transaction
in such a way as to maximize the
outcomes of shared meanings”
(see your 1st reading)
Communication competence
7. Communication Defined
Communication as transaction
Linear Model
Interactive Model
Transactional Model
Communication as a process
Communication as Shared Meaning
9. Communication Competence Defined
Varying degrees: Depends & changes
We not me oriented: Relationships & audience
Effectiveness: Determined by receiver
Appropriateness: Rules, norms & taboos
Communication = socially constructed and shared
meanings/understandings
Management = shaping and influencing others
Managing = ongoing processes
10. Elements of communication competence
Knowledge
Skills
Sensitivity
Commitment
Ethics
What‟s missing???? (critique)
11. Our Conceptions of this paper
Introduction to Business Communication &
PR
Communication central to good management
“Organizations are first and foremost
communicating entities”
(Clegg, Kornberger & Pitsis 2005, p.301)
Organisations consist of people, relationships
and stories
12. Business Communication & PR is
concerned with …
Organisations
Communication
Individuals and groups
Society, cultural values and context
Therefore – construction, interpretation and power
issues
All this expressed through various business
communication
processes, practices, activities, language, beliefs
systems, rituals, symbols etc
13. So in essence the course is about …
Managing relationships and looking at the
complex dynamic between
self, others, organisations and society
The construction and interpretation of
identities, diversities and futures
Claims to knowledge = power
What we have been, are and could be
expressed through communication
14. Unit I- Foundations of MCOM Theories:
Identity context and resources
Introduction to MCOM
Constructing and communicating
meanings
Intercultural communication
Organizational Communication at work
15. Unit II Developing and communicating
identity and identification
Organizational culture
Socialization: entering and leaving
organizations
Team work and Team Processes
Resistance and participation in
organizational communication
16. Unit III: Identity events and performing in
organizations
PR & Corporate Communication
Interpersonal communication
Professional Identity
Symbols, Images and discourses
17. Unit IV Developing management
communication skills
Basic qualitative analysis
Writing reports
Making presentations
Writing Literature Reviews
(this section of the course objective is achieved
through the Assignment1)
18. Summing up: So the course could be
defined as …
One definition is:
“Management communication is the process
of making and taking sense in, and
of, organizations and involves the
negotiation of meaning through
actions, behaviour, discourse, metaphors,
myths, signs, and symbols”
(Mckie, personal communication, 2000).
19. Information on course assignment
More detail in week 2
Compulsory tutorials start week 2
Course objectives and assignments
Test 1- Week 6
Mid Term Exam – Week 8
Team report (Group) – completion of specific tasks in
groups & team presentation- Week 9
Test 2- Case Analysis (individual) – Week 13
Final Exam – Week 16
20. Example of Task For Group Assignment
Please remember throughout the course
you will be given group/individual task for
completion and to be documented inside
your “Assignment-1”
You require
Minutes of your group meeting for completion of
the task- documenting all the discussions
Copies of the individual reports of the members
(handwritten notes also acceptable)
21. In the business of identities
In your groups think about the following:
How do businesses shape their
communications?
How do „others‟ communicate to businesses?
Can a business have an identity?
Can you name one/two organizations that you
like and one/two you dislike?
Editor's Notes
Culture and diversityWider social, legal and economic context
As we progress let’s see if this is still an appropriate way of defining and understanding the course