Essay on Issues of Non-verbal Communication in a Workplace

Discussion of Findings

This report will cover the issues of nonverbal communication in the workplace, and the effects that could happen without out proper training and understanding. This includes topics such as the problem defined, the impacts of the problem, problems examples, and attempted solutions.

Problem Defined

Communication is defined as “the imparting or exchanging of information or news. Communication is the means of sending or receiving information” (Webster’s Dictionary.) Nonverbal communication provides individuals a way to communicate using posture, facial expressions, and eye contact.

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The issues of nonverbal communication are when the message is not properly delivered or received. These nonverbal communication errors can cause issues in a workplace by creating tension between colleagues, miss trust from clients, and even lower the employee morale down of the company. Emotions such as anger, happiness, and disgust are easily expressed with facial movements using the eyes, mouth, and other characteristics. The way a person sits, moves their arms, places their hands, and even their posture sends a message. Chewing food, the types of food eaten, the time of the day the food is eaten at, are all creating a different message that can be translated. Think about how these nonverbal cues can help communicate a different message without words ever being spoken. 7 percent of any message to be relayed is through words, 38 percent is through tone, 55 percent is through posture and gestures which means 93 percent of communication is nonverbal (Griffith.)

The proper way to deliver nonverbal communication can increase trust, clarity and rapport between colleagues. It is important to know the signs to look for when faced with issues of nonverbal communication. Crossing of the arms, lips pressed together, and lowered eyebrows are good indications that the person is mad. Puffiness around the eyes, a red face, and slouching in posture are good indications that the person is sad. Widen eyes, a lowered jaw creating an open mouth, arms extended vertically with fingertips pointing toward the ceiling, are good indications that the person is shocked or scared. These are all easy signs to tell what and how the person is feeling. Different cultures may have different nonverbal cues, when faced with mixed signals nonverbal communication is the unconscious language that shows true feelings and intentions. The listener will resort to nonverbal communication, it is vital to know how important it is to understand and interpret these cues.

Causes of the Problem

The issue of nonverbal communication in a workplace happens when individuals are not properly trained on how to receive and decipher the message, and or if the company has different cultural backgrounds. In every company, training classes should be mandated in every orientation of a new hire. This way during training the employee can understand the company’s culture, how to greet new colleagues and clients the right way without offending anyone. The orientation should consist of how the company interacts with other companies, competitors, potential clients, and even coworkers. This simple add to orientation and training will prepare the employee for success on how to read the company's nonverbal communication style and what is to be expected from the employee. Doing this will give the employee a basic understanding of the company’s culture, why and how to nonverbal communicate effectively, and how to better communicate throughout the company. Based from the figure below all individuals have the same body gesture but have different nonverbal meanings. Knowing the different personalities of each individual will allow for a better understanding when nonverbal communication is used. Some individuals are easy to read because their expressions and facial gestures present the message clearly. Soft skills are used to understand nonverbal communication. Nonverbal communication requires active listening, eye contact, reading of the body, and understanding the message. These are all skills that are essential to be proficient at when trying to understand nonverbal communication. The way an individual judge's nonverbal communication is based from the families up bringing’s and what was taught to the individual as a child. It is human nature to fall back on the judgments and interpretations of nonverbal communication from what was instilled when growing up. The way the issue of nonverbal communication can be resolved is having an open-door policy, being able to be open to communicate with colleagues if the interpretation of the nonverbal communication is miss read. How to interpret these messages should not be based from opinion but rather than fact, making decisions or judgments without the proper facts of how the colleagues or individuals actually meant the message causes for misinterpretation.

Impacts of the Problem

Work relationships, workplace performance, clients/customers, and workplace morale are just a few examples of what can be impacted if the issue of nonverbal communication is not properly handled. Multiple occupations require direct communication with clients or potential customers on a regular basis.

The figure below indicates the communication of the negative impact can have on a company. According to an employee communication and engagement study in 2019, 80 percent of the U.S workforce reports feeling stressed because of ineffective company communication, a 30 percent jump from last year. This is an indication that communication in its entirety needs work.

Some techniques to improve nonverbal communication skills in the workplace are maintaining eye contact, keeping good body posture, acknowledging the tone of voice being used, and watching for personal space boundaries. Eye contact is essential to know the difference, if someone is trying to hide something there would be little to no eye contact. Too much eye contact can seem intimidating or confrontational, indicating that the speaker is using are soft skills to be practiced in the workplace.

Body posture and tone of voice are an important skill to distinguish between. These skills are tricky to understand because of having multiple different meanings. For example, If the speaker has crossed arms or hands on hips that could appear to be defensive or could mean the speaker is agitated. Shoulders back, hands down at the side of the body conveys an open appearance and indicates that the speaker is open to and in a neutral state. Tone of voice can convey many different meanings. The fluctuation of tone, pitch, rhythm and volume can interpret different messages. High tone can be considered shouting which can mean anger, it can also mean enthusiasm if the pitch is raised. A medium tone can mean neutral which means the person is completely content with the topic, with keeping a steady rhythm of words. Low tone can be considered whispering which means secretive or could mean sarcasm. These are all skills that can be improved on with repetition and practice.

Problem Example One

A survey was conducted of 400 companies with 100,000 employees the average loss per company of 62.4 million dollars per year because of the lack of communication between employees (SHRM.) As professionals in the business, industry communication need to be understood by all employees for quality products. The issue of nonverbal communication in a workplace is not limited to just one company. Any business that has employees are exposed to this workplace problem. This figure represents the lack of communication in the workplace.

Bethany Plaza is the CEO of Conscienta Corporation which is a management consulting and IT services firm. She shared her story of two employees having a had a hard time effectively communicating with each other and her struggle with mediating the conversation. She stated “ ...their jobs overlapped, and they depended upon one another for information. But while one was very direct with their communication, the other was more insecure about sharing information. This clash in style and personality was not conducive to a healthy and productive working environment. At first, I tried meditating all communication. But this was very time consuming and took away from my day. Next, I tried to educate them on better communication styles, explaining to each party why the other needed information...” eventually Bethany had to let one of the employees go.

Problem Example Two

Some examples of conflicts in the workplace are the types of leadership styles, personality types and working style. Some bosses are by the book and have no lenience in any policies or procedures which could be off-setting to employees. Personality types can also cause conflicts, Introverts are not as social and like to keep quiet which could cause barriers between colleagues. Working styles could also cause conflict, each individual works in an environment they are comfortable with. Working with the door shut could portray a standoff outlook and could have a negative reaction from other colleagues. There may be other employees who like to take time and really evaluate and analyze the work being done, which could cause coworkers to think the employee is lazy and may miss the deadline.

There are three main reasons why individuals struggle with nonverbal communication. The three reasons are the lack of social awareness, the lack of understanding of effective communication techniques, and the lack of confidence. Understanding these three steps are the first action in the right direction of better communication in the workplace. The first step may be as simple as telling the individual how the communication being used is ineffective and hard to understand. The next step, although the individual is now aware that how they communicate is hard to understand the individual may not know how to appropriately communicate. Giving good techniques on how to understand and effectively communicate will better educate the individual. Lastly, self-confidence, individuals struggle with the most. Encourage the individual and give support to the individual about the communication skills they have learned and how to use them.

Attempted Solution One

Building Services Group has two recruiters, Makayla and Kelsi, Kelsi is a very outgoing, loud individual, and Kelsi tends to be pushy and very demanding when certain tasks interfere with her job. Kelsi has been working for the company 5 months more than Makayla and had trained Makayla in her role. Both Kelsi and Makayla are recruiters. Makayla is the type of person who likes to have her office door shut, to get the job done and go home. Kelsi took Makayla’s nonverbal communication negatively which created awkward tension between the two colleagues. This tension was noticed by the recruiter’s boss, Chris. Chris who is the Human Resource manager asked the two girls for a sit-down conversation to figure out how to resolve the issue of nonverbal communication.

The sit-down talk included the two recruiters, the human resource manager and the human resource generalist. Chris started the conversation by saying this is the recruiter's time to talk and he was just there to listen and interject if need be. The conversation started and ended with each recruiter stating how the other one made them feel and what to do differently. Chris concluded the conversation and everyone involved went back to work.

Chris, the Human Resource manager tried to use the solution of talking it out, letting each person state how they feel and what could have done differently. This solution provides feedback to colleagues of how nonverbal communication can be interpreted and misunderstood. With different personality types, each recruiter felt the same negative feeling just in different ways. This solution of the conversation lacked accountability, an action plan, check-in points and a timeline when tensions should be resolved by. With none of these leadership responsibilities the solution provided by the Human Resource manager failed because there were no accountable steps, just word of mouth by both recruiters agreeing to do better.

Attempted Solution Two

Hayley Llyod a marketing coordinator said “Many organizations operate under the assumption that if you are in a management or leadership position, you already know how to supervise others. Higher-ups have historically equated job performance with leadership ability, and it’s unfortunately not true. This is rarely the case as people tend to get promoted based on the success of their job performance at the individual level, which rarely translates into managing others. Having unqualified people in leadership positions setting expectations and establishing norms in communication is one of the biggest challenges in effective employee communication and engagement in today’s workplace.”(people.) Hayley’s challenge is finding skillful management professionals evaluated on a team level. Resumes have succeeded and have impressive leadership performance but lack the most important skill which is effective communication.