COMMUNICATION PROCESS-2

COMMUNICATION PROCESS-2

PROCESS AT COMMUNICATEES‟ END (RECEIVERS‟ PART)

The entire process at the communicators‟ end repeats in two parts:
 Inward journey
 Outward journey
The process follows all the steps as described above.

COMMUNICATION MODEL

In managerial terms, the process of communication follows the following six steps:
1 Sender has a idea to communicate (Conception)
2 Idea becomes a message (Encoding)
3 Message is transmitted through a medium (Transmission)
4 Message is received by the other person (Decoding)
5 Message is interpreted by the receivers‟ mind (Interpretation)
6 Receiver responds and give a feedback to the sender (Feedback

(1) Conception
(i) Mental images
All individuals are continuously bombarded by information flowing from
 Sights (Scenes)
 Sounds
 Scents
These streams of sensation are conveyed to the human mind. Each individual has a unique „mental filter‟ because of own experiences, exposures, emotions etc. The mental filter converts these streams of sensation in to a mental map of the event that becomes the basis of perception of the reality. No two mental images of the observers of the same event will be identical!
All sensations received in the mind go through the process of abstraction and simplification.

(ii) Psychological factors

A person tends to hear what he wants to and rejects what he does not want to hear. This is because of several factors as below:
 Sensory factors
 Demographic factors
 Psychographic factors
 Loyalty of individuals
 Personality of individuals

(iii) Technical aspects
These days communication is greatly influenced by the technology and choice of the medium of transmission. Followings should be taken in to account:
 Transmitter
 Transmission process
 Receiver
In most cases, a certain amount of repetition may be desirable to ensure that the message is not mutilated.

(iv) Role of being logical and systematic
The message, to be effective, should be logical and conveyed in a systematic manner. Messages suffer from:
 Logical errors
 False analogy
 Concluding from limited data
 Understanding syllogism (Deductive logic)
 Arguing in circles
Usually in such cases, the middle of the message remains undisturbed but most receivers tend to get misled.

(v) Conclusions
Arriving at the conclusion from the various conflicting and diverse factors is the real issue. As a rule, four possible conclusions are:
 Valid and true
 Valid and false
 Invalid but true
 Invalid and false
Communicators have to avoid the pitfalls and look for valid and true conclusions.

(2) Encoding

The process of how the mind converts an idea into words is not yet fully understood. Choice of words by the speaker depends up various factors as below:
 Subject
 Purpose
 Audience
 Personal style
 Mood
Besides, length of the message, tone and style are influenced by:
 Content of the message
 Familiarity of the receiver(s)
 Emotional conflicts
 Difficulty of expressing ideas

(3) Transmission

Choice of transmission mode depends upon the followings:
 Message
 Audience
 Need of speed / urgency
 Situation
In all cases, it is important to control the transmission link. This not only ensures its availability but also avoids distortion and level of noise. Also, remember that longer the chain of communication, bigger is the problem of ensuring correct transmission of the messages.

(4) Decoding

The receiver has to read or hear the message before he can understand it. One of the most common barriers to communication is the lack of attention by the receiver. Human mind tends to drift when it is forced to hear something. It is said that mind is like a horse; it is very difficult to control it. Usually, a person‟s mind has around 6,000 ideas flashing across in one day!
There are many words in all the languages with multiple meanings. To be able to understand the correct meaning in the context of the message or the way sender has used it to convey his intent is quite a challenge.

(5) Interpretation

If the background and the experience of sender and receiver vary considerably, understanding of the message can be very different. Following three diagrams show pictorially the impact on getting the meaning and understanding of the message:

Little amount of Average amount of Large amount of
shared experience shared experience shared experience
Dissimilar meaning Similar meaning Very similar meaning
Misunderstanding Average degree of High degree of
understanding understanding

(6) Feedback

Communication is a two way process. The communication loop is not complete until the sender of the communication receives a feedback from the receiver. The feedback may be verbal or non-verbal through the body language. Many a times, audience conveys through expressions, gestures or sounds. A sensitive speaker can always understand the feedback from the way the receivers stoop forward or backward, the way they yawn and the way they twitters their fingers. There are a large numbers of cues, signs and signals to pick up and interpret!