Ryans Top Ten Takeaways & Final Exam Instructions
COM 403 Organizational CommunicationInstructions: For the Final Exam, you need to respond to 3 of the following statements below, including #1 and 2 of your choice. Your responses to these takeaways should demonstrate your mastery of the concept(s) represented by:
– Explicating, in your own words, the main idea(s) represented in the provided statement;
– Identifying the theoretical/conceptual work (including authors/theorists) that provides the basis for the concept(s) and the intellectual discussion surrounding the concept(s);
– Explaining the implications of the concept(s) for organizational practice in general; and
– Describing how your understanding of this concept might shape your life in general and specific organizational practice in your chosen field (if you are not sure what that will be yet, pick a career or area of work that is among the possibilities).
Your response to each statement should be roughly 3-4 double-spaced typewritten pages (so a total of 9-12 pages), demonstrate an excellent understanding of the concept, and employ quality writing. You should properly reference the texts that you cite in the paper (those that you have read in the class) using APA style, and list them on a references page. The exam format will be open-book, open notes, take-home. You must submit the exam by 4:00 p.m. on Friday, December 21, to Blackboard. 1. Communication is both a tool used to exchange information and as a process to constitute meaning. Thus, to understand the fullness of the work done by communication, we must understand communication in transmission, transaction, and constitutive frames. Thus, communication not only explains how messages are transmitted or how meaning is transacted in an organization, but also explains how social order (at the macro-level) is created, realized, sustained, and transformed in micro-level interaction processes. The process is reflexive, as through our everyday interactions we produce the social order, which then acts back on us, and by acting in ways consistent with the existing social order, we reproduce it.2. As communication scholars (if you want, fake it until you make it ), we cant be satisfied with just examining one-way message transmission as communication. Instead, we must focus on what Goffman called the act and Weick referred to as the double-interact, referencing the two-way interactional elements of any communication. This concept is applied to many of the concepts weve explored in this class, such as power (i.e. one only has and enacts power to the extent that another affords that person power), leadership, organizational structure, culture, etc.3. Organizations and their properties (such as management practices) are (at least partially) social constructions. Thus, many social structures can be seen as an arbitrary, routine, and habitual way that social interactions have come to be played out. As such they have no stature except as reproduced and legitimized in ongoing social interaction (Deetz and Brown, 2006, p. 181). Thus, how we communicate to organize, create, and work within these things we call organizations is important, and can be altered.4. In these organizations, some ends (outcomes) are constituted as more important than other ends, often by those with greater power than others. Economic ends have largely been the most important, and in the US, generating quick profits without regard for long-term viability has reigned supreme, while we have (in many cases) pursued that end without regard to the great expense to natural resources, family life, individual identities, etc. As such, the corporation and its values affects us in significant ways as persons, consumers, and members of society.
5. In todays world, post-bureaucratic forms of control reign supreme, though residue of the types of control are easily recognized in everyday organizational practice. The forms of control utilized in organizational management practice have developed in significant ways over the last two centuries. New post-bureaucratic forms of control focus less on controlling work, and more on controlling the worker, and operate in a sneaky, below-the-surface manner (think cultural management). Understanding how forms of post-bureaucratic forms of control work helps us to recognize that we are being socially created, taught to desire the things we desire, and being drawn us into consumeristic lifestyles in a (we like to act like its a) Godless society.6. There is not always just one (right) way to view any sort of phenomena. Rather, our concepts dont just name abstract ideas, but they provide us with (new) windows on the world (Deetz, 1994, p. 589). Thus, new windows help us think clearly about the perspective from which we view the world and therefore engage the world. Continually challenging ourselves see through alternative perspectives enables us to effectively engage and dialogue with others, discover new ways of relating and organizing, and share the love of Jesus in this world.7. Emerging collaborative communication structures are based upon a realization of the powerful innovative potential of bringing together multiple voices and stakeholders. As Christians who should be experts in operating as the Body of Christ, we can be leaders in 21st century business and organizational life, carrying over the Biblical truth of the necessity (and Godly plan) of collaboration to these contexts.8. Whats best in organizational life is contested and highly situational in regard to leadership, structure, clarity of information or task, etc. Therefore, we want to resist the urge toward simplification of mindsets, practices, etc., but instead embrace and realize the complexity and contextuality of sound organizational practice. And in so doing, we can operate with (more) humility and openness, ready to learn better ways of doing as God continues to develop us.9. Organizational life rarely reflects (all) our ideals. Neither separating ourselves from it completely living like a hermit in Montana nor blindly engaging in it jumping in without thinking about what else (other than just generating profits) is happening seems to be the answer. So, finding ways for our efforts to engage wisely in organizational practice to meet organizational, individual, and societal needs should sufficiently challenge us for years. We can, and should, engage in ways to make change in organizational life. 10. Our ways of seeing the world and therefore asking questions about the world shape what we actually find out about the world. By appreciating alternative ways of viewing social phenomena (from quantitative methods that privilege objective treatments of phenomena with numerical measures to qualitative methods that take seriously nuanced, situated interpretations of phenomena) we are better able to see more fully what is going on in a particular context. Through ethnographic inquiry, we underscore the importance of meaning and interpretation based on our situated experience.
Are you looking for a similar paper or any other quality academic essay? Then look no further. Our research paper writing service is what you require. Our team of experienced writers is on standby to deliver to you an original paper as per your specified instructions with zero plagiarism guaranteed. This is the perfect way you can prepare your own unique academic paper and score the grades you deserve.
Use the order calculator below and get started! Contact our live support team for any assistance or inquiry.
[order_calculator]