EFFECTIVE COMMUNICATION AND ITS IMPORTANCE TO SECRETARIAL FUNCTIONS (CASE STUDY OF THE IBARAPA POLYTECHNIC, ERUWA)

ABSTRACT
From time immemorial, communication has been the means whereby living things pass information or correspondence to one another.
In this project, an attempt has been made to give concisely, the essentials of good communication, though, it is hoped that the main purpose in writer’s mind on this topic is to enlighten people in the approach of communication that produce more reaction and better response to the message. The importance of communication to the secretary is to be conscious of the vital importance of communication to the desired message in appropriate form.
In other words, secretaries are needed in every type of organisation or office in carrying out responsibilities. One of these responsibilities is the use of effective communication in the organisation; there would not be an abundant flow of information for decision making. Further more, if a form of communication is being used correctly, there should be a desirable feedback. However, when there is a breakdown or any interference in communication, the communication tend to be in effective. For any management to function and succeed in their undertakings there must be a competent secretary with good qualities who is able to make an effective and efficient use of communication.
The function of a secretary under life’s process, because of the need of the effective communication. Management spend their time to make sure that any secretary employed on a well organisation should at least know much about communication process so much so that a manager’s effectiveness cannot be improved without the knowledge of his secretary.


TABLE OF CONTENTS
Title Page
Certification
Dedication
Acknowledgment
Abstract
Table of Contents

Chapter One
1.0     Introduction
1.1     What is communication?
1.2     Importance of communication to the secretary function        
1.3     Basic rules of Effective communication to the
secretary function
1.4     Barriers of Effective communication
1.5     Solution to Effective communication problems
1.6     Background to the case study

Chapter Two:
2.0     Literature Review
2.1     Secretary’s Opinion
2.2     Law backing the duties of a secretary
2.3     Personal Attributes

Chapter Three
3.0     Channels of communication
3.1     Effective Communication Diagram
3.2     Types of communication
3.3     Sources of Information
  Chapter Four
4.0     Methodology and Research Design
4.1     Research Question
4.2     Sample and Sampling technique
4.3     Research Instrument
4.4     Administration and collection of Research Instrument
4.5     Method of Data Analysis
4.6     Data Presentation and Discussions

Chapter Five
5.0     Summary and Conclusion
5.1     Recommendations
          QUESTIONNAIRE
           REFERENCES

CHAPTER ONE
1.0       INTRODUCTION
Communication has been the means whereby living thing pass information to one another. It is also the hit blood of any organisation because, without communication no organisation can exist.
Secretaries are needed in any type of organisation or office to assist managers (middle management and the executive) (top management level) in carrying out their responsibilities and one of those responsibilities is the use of effective communication in the organisation. Without secretaries, the use of communication and rapid flow of information will not be abundant for decision making.
Further more, if communication is accordingly it will elicit a feedback, but when there is a breakdown or any interference in communication, it tends to be ineffective thus: any institution may not function and succeed in her undertaking unless, it engages the services of a competent secretary with good qualities who is able to make an effective and efficient use of good communication systems. For instance, if any of method could be used to describe the function or duties of a secretary, it would be by communication. Therefore, we can see that communication is a life-long process in every organisation. The need for effective communication was borne out of the management desire to train secretary, spend their time and energy over the years to make sure that any secretary employed in a well organized business should at least have a four grade in communication courses, most especially in English Language.

1.1       WHAT IS COMMUNICATION?
The word “Communication” is derive form the Latin and French words “Communicate” meaning “to share” while from the French word “comnia” means “common” one can see from these that we communicate with people with  whom we have something to share. It involves the act of passing information with oneself (interpersonal) communication, to somebody and receiving a reply (feedback) as it relates to earlier information. The person giving the information (originator) tries to motivate or guide or organize people to do their work. This can only be achieved through the spoken or written words.
In the olden days, prior to the development in technology, communication was carried out in primitive forms, town crises more mainly used as sources of communication or announcement to the people and other forms of primitive system of communication. As the time passed on, there was development in technology and therefore, the scope of communication has to be widened by making ways for modernized process of communication.
Therefore, these are several definitions of communication from difference authors. According to Wilbur (1954) he defined communication as an act of establishing contact between sender and receiver with the help of a message encoded and by the sender and receiver and decoded by the receiver.
According to Peter Little: Communication is the process by which information is passed between individual or organisation by means of previously agreed symbols.
I essence, communication is the passing of information between two or more people within or outside the organization.

1.2       IMPORTANCE OF COMMUNICATION TO THE SECRETARIES FUNCTION          
Communication is a two way process of impacting information to others and attending to information received. A high degree of skill and care are needed in communicating with people effectively.
Misunderstandings are common and a determined attempt is needed to cutdown the possibilities of mistakes. However, before communicating, consideration should be given to the method of transmitting the language and tone of the message, then the attribute of both the message sender and the receiver. The right approach produced by communication is more positive reaction and a better response to the message.

1.3       BASIC RULES OF EFFECTIVE COMMUNICATION TO SECRETARIES FUNCTION
In order to make selected means of communication effective, the following rules must be observed:  
a.         The importance party in the communication is the recipient, and not the communicator or the originator of the message. It is what the recipient thinks that matters, therefore, you must used words that can be easily understood by your recipient to avoid communication breakdown.
b.         The correct form of communication must be used. A memorandum is appropriate to draw the attention of others to small points that have reasons.
c.         The timing of affect the response. Thus, matter must be raised at a very wrong time especially when your boss is in annoyance, so that he may not transfer the aggression to you.

1.4       BARRIERS TO EFFECTIVE COMMUNICATION
There are numerous barriers to effective communication and some of the most important ones are discussed here.
a.         Emotional Reaction: Fear and other emotional reaction such as anger, defensiveness, loved, hatred can influence the communication message, how we understand other’s message and how news are passed on, which is almost certain to upset the recipient.
b.         Verbal Difficulties:  These are frequent source of confusion and misunderstanding. These arise due to share lack of fluency on the part of the sender, or because of jargon, specific application of word in technical and professional (contexts), or perhaps because of pitching the message at too high a level of understanding. In terms of written word, barriers are usually connected with long-wideness, i.e. a failure to strike the point and be concise.
c.         Physical Condition:  Interpretation occurs all too often while communicating. Anything that interferes with sender messages are distractions and noisy environment. In organisation, these form the major cause of breakdown in communication.      
d.         Prejudice: It is also an important of communication barriers. A communicator may not succeed in communicating, if he is not audible enough for his audience to grasp whatever information he is passing across to them. Likewise, unattractiveness, that is, when the receiver is not paying adequate attention on the message being given affects communication.
e.         Badly expressed message:  Meaningful groups of family words work together to form meaningful sentences. The writer should ask himself how will does the word stick together? Does it progress in logical pattern? A confused, careless or disorderly writer puts the burden on the reader to re-organize the materials but this not always the case, as most reader will pass it by, as a helpless message.   
f.          Over Communication: For much of information may be transmitted to a listener at one time so that, he cannot absorb it in an organized fashion. As a result, the entire message being conveyed may be a failure.

1.5       SOLUTION TO COMMUNICATION PROBLEMS    
There are certain factors that make communication in effectiveness and in order to achieve effective communication which is the main reason for communicating certain things, the underlisted must be put into consideration. As message ought to be will prepared, will written and attracting presented, to promote better understanding, the encoder should think through the idea before saying or written it.
Clarity of the ideas must ensure that each message:
i.          Has specific purpose
ii.         Provide all necessary information and
iii.       It is organized in a logical way to ensure clear and specific rather than vague, confusing communication.

The communication should consider the use of T”C”S”, the following ought to be observed.
i.          Clarity: Communication either written or oral must be clear and unambiguous, for the reader to read the correct meaning.
ii.         Consciousness: The communicator should come to the point at once, should pin-point the importance the importance features of the matter being discussed.
iii.       Correctness:  All necessary detail must be correct.
iv.        Consistency: Some part of the write-up must not contradict the other part. Therefore, there must be coherence in the write-up.
v.         Complete:  Every information that need to appear must be fully discussed.
vi.        Courtesy:  The tone of expression of any form of communication must be polite and considerate.
vii.      Concreteness:  Misrepresentation, breach of trust and libel must be avoided. It is unwise to write confidently about thing you are not sure of.

During communication, the language used must be related to the knowledge  and intellectual ability of the recipients since the value of communication will be related if it exhibit verbosity and lack of objectivity. Physical barriers in the office can affect the easy flow of communication. Sitting arrangement in the office should be properly planned to facilitate better communication flow.
Organisation head endeavour create permissive atmosphere in the flow of subordinate to participate in management activities. This will lead to co-ordination, increase in moral, and achievements of organizational goals.   

1.6       BACKGROUND OF THE CASE STUDY        
The Polytechnic, Ibadan was established in 1970, as a successor to the Erstwhile Technical College, Ibadan. This come into effect by the amendment to the principal Edict of the Polytechnic, which came into force on 17th March, 1971. The Polytechnic, Ibadan has been headed by different Rectors.
The Polytechnic, Ibadan has four satellite campuses. They took off during 1981/82 session and were sited at Eruwa, Saki, Iree and Esa-Oke. Each of the campuses is headed by Director who is responsible to the Rector for the administration of the campus. However, with the creation of Osun State in 1991, the campuses at Iree and Esa-Oke had become the properties of Osun State Government.
Since 1975/76 academic session, The Polytechnic, Ibadan has been operating the faculties namely: Business and Communication Studies, Environmental Studies, Management and Financial Studies, Engineering and Science which run National Diploma and Higher National Diploma programme respectively.
Eruwa campus was sited at the headquarter of Ibarapa East Local Government of Oyo State that is, Eruwa. The campus was finally known as Eruwa satellite until 1991, when it was re-named Adeseun Ogundoyin to honour Chief Adeseun Ogundoyin after his death for what he had contributed to the development of the campus in particular, education in general.
The campus runs National Diploma courses in the following areas: Arts and Design, Business Studies, Mass Communication, Engineering, Computer Science and Maths and Statistics.

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Item Type: Project Material  |  Size: 42 pages  |  Chapters: 1-5
Format: MS Word  |  Delivery: Within 30Mins.
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