Scenario

In a 1950 article for Fortune, journalist and best-selling author William H. Whyte noted “the great enemy of communication, we find, is the illusion of it. We have talked enough; but we have not listened. And by not listening we have failed to concede the immense complexity of our society–and thus the great gaps between ourselves and those with whom we seek understanding.” The illusion of communication in the workplace has become even more of an issue with the proliferation of communication tools, greater workforce diversity, political polarization and globalization.

Your Task

Scan the news for coverage of a communications failure or select a scenario from your readings—a few that come to mind are the Boeing 737 Max crashes and the Covid-19 pandemic—and analyze the scenario using the communication process model. Using terminology from the module, identify the relevant barriers to communication. Conduct additional research—for example, reading post-ops of the situation—and briefly comment on how the barriers were overcome—or not.