Even with the sender and audience (receiver) clearly identified, the flow of communication is rarely neat. The audience filters the communication and reacts. Thus, if your message does not factor in the audience’s perspective—including knowledge, interests, needs, and expectations—you are less likely to achieve the intended purpose of your communication. When the purpose is to persuade or influence, you will undoubtedly have to overcome objections.
Review this week’s Learning Resources, especially:
• Quintanilla, K. M., & Wahl, S. T. (2017). Business and professional communication: KEYS for workplace excellence. Thousand Oaks, CA: SAGE Publications.
o Chapter 11, “Informing and Persuading”
o Chapter 12, “Speech Design”
Post a cohesive response based on your analysis of the Learning Resources and your professional experience. Be sure to discuss the following:
• Using a past or current employer, identify the various audiences with whom the organization must communicate. Be sure to include both internal and external stakeholder groups and summarize their basic communication needs (types of information they need, how frequently they need communication, what formats they would likely need it, etc.).
- If you do not have employment experience, please use volunteer or civic experience. You may use Walden University or an organization in which you can readily identify the various audiences.
• Based on your analysis, explain how each specific group’s communication needs differ.
• Provide an example of an external communication from an organization that you found in the news media.
o Summarize the communication, including the intended audience, the purpose and a summary of the communication.
o What questions or concerns do you have after reading the communication?
o What recommendations do you have that would improve the communication (i.e., make it more effective for its intended audience)?
• Evaluate at least two specific best practices for mass communication for external stakeholder groups. To what extent do you think they apply to internal communications?
Sample Solution
