The abil­ity to effec­tively com­mu­ni­cate and man­age inter­per­sonal rela­tions is cen­tral to a pro­fes­sional culi­nar­ian. Through com­mu­ni­ca­tion, peo­ple exchange. Com­mu­ni­ca­tion is an essen­tial attribute of human life, which is why we spend most of our time either receiv­ing or request­ing for infor­ma­tion. Lack of com­mu­ni­ca­tion cre­ates ten­sions and destroys per­sonal and busi­ness rela­tion­ships. The abil­ity to exchange infor­ma­tion or con­ver­sa­tion with oth­ers is cru­cial to the suc­cess of the indi­vid­ual, fam­ily or busi­ness orga­ni­za­tion. It should be noted, how­ever, that it is one thing to com­mu­ni­cate but quite another thing to com­mu­ni­cate effectively.

Inef­fec­tive com­mu­ni­ca­tion usu­ally results in fail­ure, as it doesn’t cause the desired response in form of feed­back from the receiver. This is an irri­ta­tion of many busi­ness orga­ni­za­tions. Many man­agers do com­mu­ni­cate, but often not very effec­tively. Lack of capac­ity to com­mu­ni­cate effec­tively on the part of man­agers is the rea­son for the fail­ure of many busi­nesses. Every firm or busi­ness orga­ni­za­tion needs an effec­tive com­mu­ni­ca­tion net­work in order to func­tion prop­erly and achieve its set objec­tives. Effec­tive com­mu­ni­ca­tion plays an indis­pens­able role which in the daily func­tion­ing of a busi­ness organization.

The ulti­mate goal of every form of com­mu­ni­ca­tion — face-to-face meet­ing, tele­phone dis­course, tele­con­fer­enc­ing, video­con­fer­enc­ing, inter­view, email, let­ter or memo — is to get an expected response in form of feed­back from the receiver to the sender. This is what effec­tive com­mu­ni­ca­tion is about. It is about ensur­ing that the infor­ma­tion is well-packaged and prop­erly trans­mit­ted, so that the recip­i­ent under­stands the mes­sage and responds pos­i­tively. In other words, effec­tive com­mu­ni­ca­tion is the one that achieves the results for which it is intended.

Oral com­mu­ni­ca­tion includes face-to-face con­ver­sa­tion, inter­view, tele­phone dis­course, voice mail, meet­ings, group dis­cus­sions, oral instruc­tions, tele­con­fer­enc­ing, and video­con­fer­enc­ing. Oral com­mu­ni­ca­tion is quick and per­mits imme­di­ate feed­back as well as imme­di­ate response to feed­back. Par­tic­i­pants can ask ques­tions and get imme­di­ate clar­i­fi­ca­tion. More­over, ges­ture and facial expres­sion can be used to rein­force the intended mes­sage. The lim­i­ta­tions of oral com­mu­ni­ca­tion include sus­cep­ti­bil­ity to errors and mis­in­ter­pre­ta­tion and lack of permanence.

Writ­ten com­mu­ni­ca­tion involves the use of writ­ten words in the forms of busi­ness let­ters, mem­o­randa, reports, min­utes of meet­ings, writ­ten speeches, and train­ing man­u­als. Writ­ten com­mu­ni­ca­tion has the advan­tages of revi­sion before trans­mis­sion, per­ma­nence and acces­si­bil­ity for ref­er­ence pur­poses. It also reduces the risk of dis­tor­tion in mean­ing; thus, it can be con­sid­ered as an ideal medium for long and com­plex mes­sages. Another advan­tage of the writ­ten medium is that it can eas­ily be repro­duced in many ways and dis­trib­uted to many recip­i­ents. One of its major lim­i­ta­tions is delayed feed­back; the read­ing of long doc­u­ments may be bor­ing and the writ­ing of a reply could also be delayed by a num­ber of other fac­tors. Writ­ten com­mu­ni­ca­tion also lacks the pres­ence of ges­ture, facial expres­sion and other forms of body lan­guage capa­ble of rein­forc­ing mean­ing in communication.

Man­agers should con­sider the cir­cum­stances and the audi­ence to deter­mine whether to use a tele­phone call, a face-to-face meet­ing, an email, a typed and signed doc­u­ment, etc. The fac­tors to be con­sid­ered when choos­ing the medium of com­mu­ni­ca­tion include: urgency, for­mal­ity, risk of mis­in­ter­pre­ta­tion, con­fi­den­tial­ity, legal impli­ca­tions or the need for future ref­er­ence, the nature and size of the audi­ence. The hall­mark of effec­tive com­mu­ni­ca­tion is a well-packaged and prop­erly trans­mit­ted mes­sage — that is, a mes­sage that is capa­ble of attract­ing the receiver’s response in form of pos­i­tive feedback.

Every busi­ness com­mu­ni­ca­tion aims to invoke some mate­r­ial and imme­di­ate response or action. Whether it is a face-to-face meet­ing, a tele­phone dis­course, a sales let­ter, a let­ter of inquiry, a memo or a report, the aim is to get some­thing done. There­fore, every busi­ness com­mu­ni­ca­tion has to use clear and per­sua­sive lan­guage in con­junc­tion with appro­pri­ate action in order to con­nect with the audi­ence and invoke the desired response.

Larry Canepa
Direc­tor of Train­ing and Devel­op­ment
Restau­rant Mar­ket­ing Partners