McGraw-Hill/Irwin

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 Chapter 4
Navigating through the
Business Environment
Environment Interpersonal
Technology Communication
10 Trends Time Management
Ethics
First Jobs
Corporate Culture
Business Environment
 Shaped by
 Technology
 Trends
 Ethics
 Corporate Culture
 Interpersonal Communication

4-3
Technology
 Electronic tools
 Social networking
 Information overload
 Data security
 Electronic privacy

4-4
10 Business Trends
1. Focus on Quality and
Customers’ Needs
2. Entrepreneurship
3. Diversity
4. Globalization and
Outsourcing
5. Balancing Work and
Family
4-5
10 Business Trends, continued…
6. Teamwork
7. Job Flexibility
8. Rapid Rate of Change
9. Innovation
10. Concern for the
Environment

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Ethics
 Daily communication decisions involve
ethics
 Language, graphics, and document
design can all be ethical or
manipulative

4-7
Corporate Culture
 Vary widely among organizations
(even those within the same field)
 Wise companies use it to retain
workers
 International differences can impact it

4-8
Interpersonal Communication
 Communication between people
 Includes multiple skills
 Listening
 Conversation
 Nonverbal
 Networking

4-9
Listening
 Crucial to building trust
 Harder on job than in class
 Information not as organized on job
 Jobs require listening to feelings as
well as information
 Nods, smiles, frowns show you’re
listening

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Active Listening
 Receivers demonstrate
they’ve heard /understood a
speaker by feeding back the
literal meaning, emotional
content, or both
 To create active responses
 Paraphrase content
 Mirror speaker’s feelings
 Ask for information/clarification
 Offer to help solve the problem
4-11
Avoid Listening Errors
 Inattention—cause of listening error
 To reduce errors
 Paraphrase what the speaker has said
 Allows speaker to correct your understanding
 Check your understanding with speaker
 Write down key points
 Deadlines and related information
 How work will be evaluated

4-12
Avoid Listening Errors, continued…
 To reduce errors
 Don’t ignore
instructions that
seem unnecessary
 Consider other
person’s background

4-13
Five Blocking Responses

 Ordering, threatening
 Preaching, criticizing
 Interrogating
 Minimizing the
problem
 Advising

4-14
Conversation Style
 Denotes our conversational patterns
and the meaning we give to them
 Consider these features:
 Rate of speech
 Rate of turn-taking
 Persistence if turn not acknowledged
 Preference for personal stories
 Tolerance of simultaneous speech
 Abrupt topic shifting
4-15
Nonverbal Communication
 Communication without words
 Signals such as smiles and gestures
 Can be misinterpreted as easily as
words
 Be aware of
 Spatial cues
 Body language

4-16
Networking
 Ability to connect with many different
kinds of people
 Create connections before they are
needed
 Being part of the grapevine
 Even more important as you climb
corporate ladder

4-17
Networking, continued…
 Three workplace networks:
 Conversational—who talks to whom
 Expertise—who can be turned to for
advice
 Trust—who can be trusted with sensitive
information

4-18
Time Management
 Crucial to success of professionals
 Prioritize demands of your time
 Complete most important demands
first

4-19
Time Management, continued…
 Follow these tips
 Keep lists
 Ask yourself where you want to be in
three to five years
 Do large, important tasks first
 Break large tasks into small ones

4-20
Time Management, continued…
 Follow these tips
 Create blocks of times
 Avoid time sinks
 Decide at the end of today what you
will do tomorrow
 Evaluate performance at end of week

4-21
First Jobs
 Reread all your materials on
organization, its competition, the
industry
 Network with people in the field
 Talk to recent hires
 Be observant
 Find a mentor

4-22
First Jobs, continued…
 Ask lots of questions
 Be pleasant and polite to everyone,
including support personnel
 Be punctual, dependable, organized,
resourceful, and discrete
 Use technology professionally
 Go the extra mile
 Enjoy yourself!
4-23