Sunday, November 8, 2015

Chapter 8: Organizational Communication Ethics

After reading this chapter I have come to realize that organizational communication ethics is a concept that applies to my everyday life. I had just assumed by the title that this was communication within major companies, which it is, but it is also so much more. The text book defines it plain and simple, “Organizational communication focuses on the form of communication needed to get a particular task done (139).” The “good” within this notion is not totally concrete. Generally, the “good” of organized communication is different for every group, organization, or party. As long as there is a “dwelling place” for communication to take place, then the “good” keeps its integrity. If there is no functional way for a group to organize communication, then the organization cannot function.
The institution, or “publicly recognized” structure must also follow community of memory. This means that the organization has a clear, structured method of retaining the integrity of the institution so that it can keep information that develops the group. According to the text, this makes the organization the “what” and the organized communication strategies the “how” or the way the group can continue to exist.

I was in a student group last year, Public Relations Student Society of America. As a communications group, it was naturally well organized. Weekly meetings, contact over email, and updates over social media allowed for clear direction and communication. By having multiple ways to keep the group together, there was a clear sense of unity and organization. If there were no clear ways in which the group was being run, then nobody would show up to functions, and there would be no way to know what was going on. In every aspect of my life there is some form of organized communication similar to this, and it really makes me realize that this form of communication is something I have interacted with for the longest time.

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