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Summary of the conversation. 3
Consider the case of one of the popular mockumentary-style TV show, The Office. In the episode “Stress Relief: Part 1” of this TV show, the team of face situation of fire danger in the building (Avila, M, 2018). The miscommunication that took place between the workers leads to a catastrophic consequences.
This episode begins with a playful Dwilight intrigues that attempt to start a fire. The purpose of this firing is to inform the office workers how unplanned they are if there were a fire in the building. This fire results in the utter panic and fury of yelling. Firstly, the workers experience a situation of message overload. It refers to the situation in which an individual is flooded with multiple messages at a single time that he/she is unable to process information from it. It is considered as a barrier that prevent the workers to exit from the building safely. They were unable to exit from the building as they were involved in selectively hearing that results in performing those things that they love to listen. But, if the workers listen to all the directions of the Dwlight carefully, then they could have easily exit from the building safety. This is referred as the selectively hearing as the individual listens to intrigue things. For example, exclaimed made by Michael that ‘we’re trapped’. Apart from this, it causes panic among the workers.
Analyze of the conversation in terms of the following components of the interpersonal communication process: encoding, decoding, physical noise, physiological noise, psychological noise, semantic noise, and filter of lifetime experiences.
Interpersonal communication process is a process through which people share their feelings and information through verbal and non verbal messages. The non verbal communication aften involves the face expression, body language and tone of voice etc. The type of miscommunication that we observe in this episode is the verbal communication (McShane, J, 2017). The Dwlight make use of the informative speech to explain the procedure of the safe exit from the building. He explains the correct steps that the workers should take for the safe exit from the buildings and what are the things that they should ignore. He tells the workers what they are doing correct or what they are doing incorrect. The purpose of his communication is to explain the procedure of the safe evacuation in case of fire emergency. But, since the employees were in panic situation, more information is conveyed through non verbal communication. The panic was clearly visible from the eyes and mouth. It is difficult to forget the scared faces of the office’s workers.
Another type of communication that is observed in this episode is emotional communication. The entire group of worker reacts to this situation in an emotional manner (Morton, R, 2015). For example, every one of them got panic and then, they take their action. As a result of their action, they started fighting to move out of the fire. We regard this as a physiological impression of the emotions expressed by the workers. At a particular point of time, they become overwhelmed and were unable to think effectively. This sense of fear affects everyone in the office and they start affecting the emotions of each other. This fear event leads a situation in which the workers believe that their life is in danger and they got stressed. Dwlight tell them to use their surge, but it does not work. Stanley was, in fact, was unable to breathe and seems to like he will have a heart attack.
Three strategies the characters in the conversation could have adopted to increase shared meaning and avoid miscommunication (The strategies in terms of reducing noise and adapting to the filters of others).
Communication is a best source of sharing information among the people in the organization. By using certain strategies, we can make the communication process and its purpose effective. The following are the three strategies that could be used to avoid miscommunication in this situation. These strategies will also help in reducing the noise and filters of others in the workplace.
The first strategy is to provide necessary document (4 Ways to Avoid Miscommunication at Work, n.d.). Dwlight should have distributed the printout of the purpose of this meeting. For example, he should explain the tips and steps to consider for dealing the fire situation in the building. By getting the printout, the co-workers can read the entire document and know the purpose of the meeting.
The second strategy is to listen actively. When someone is meeting with his co-workers for the meeting, then it is the duty of everyone to listen to the instructions made by the senior (Wimmer, G, Meyers, C, Porter, H & Shaw, M, 2012). Also, take notes of the important key points that you should consider or learnt from the meeting. For example, the co-workers have take notes of the steps that they should consider for moving out of this fire situation.
The third strategy is to take help from the non-verbal clues. Apart from listening to the instructions made up the Dwlight, it will be better to pay attention to the non verbal communication. The co-workers should pay attention to the appearance, body tone, eye contact and body language of the Dwlight.
Overall if we look at this situation, we can observe that Dwlight is one of the popular characters of this episode of the Tv show The Office. The show and its writers have performed a great job in explaining theories of communication and its impact on the day to day life (Craft, K, R, 2008). Although the efforts made up the Dwlight leads to miscommunication in the organization, but it was genius plan and the plan helped in workers in dealing the fire situation in the building.
- 4 Ways to Avoid Miscommunication at Work. (n.d.). Retrieved from http://www.canon.com.sg/thinkbig/4-ways-to-avoid-miscommunication-at-work.
- Avila, M. (2018). 8 unforgettable blunders by Michael Scott in 'The Office'. Retrieved from http://www.today.com/id/42786034/ns/today-today_entertainment/t/unforgettable-blunders-michael-scott-office/#.XIs028kzbIU.
- Craft, K, R. (2008). Representing Work: What The Office Teaches us about Creativity and the Organization. Open Access Theses. 130.
- McShane, J. (2017). How Miscommunication Screwed the Employees of Dunder Mifflin. Retrieved from https://medium.com/@jack_mcshane28/how-miscommunication-screwed-the-employees-of-dunder-mifflin-4a9cc04ec626.
- Morton, R. (2015). Analysis on the interpersonal conflict: The office fictitious and non fictitious conflict and ending. Journal of media and communication studies. 7(4). Pp. 75-80.
- Wimmer, G, Meyers, C, Porter, H & Shaw, M. (2012). Learning Vicariously: Students' Reflections of the Leadership Lessons Portrayed in The Office. Journal of Leadership Education. 11(2). Retrieved from http://www.journalofleadershiped.org/attachments/article/91/Wimmer%20Meyers%20Porter%20_%20Shaw.pdf.
