Managing Communication, Knowledge and Information - Assignment Example

Managing Communication, Knowledge and Information Table of Contents Learning outcome 3 3 Overview of the Company 3 Communication 3 Learning outcome3.2 5 Barriers in the Communication Process 5 Learning outcome 3.3 6 Learning outcome 3.4 7 Learning Outcome 4 8 Introduction 8 4.1 Existing Approaches to Information systems 9 4.2 Improvement in the Information systems 9 4.3 Classification of Information System 10 Reference List 13 Learning outcome 3.1 Overview of the Company The enterprise fashion and style is a boutique for luxury brands of clothes and accessories for men and women. It was established in 2001 by Nurgul Kenzhegaliyeva in the city of Atyrau in the western part of Kazakhstan. The store is situated over a plot of area 700 m2 in main Satpaeyev Street in Atyrau city next to Renaissance Hotel, and biggest Shopping Mall “Atyrau”. It was the first designer boutique established in the city which represented mostly Italian brands and introduced latest trends in the men’s and women’s fashion and new season trends. It started selling brands such as Corneliani, Brioni, GF Ferre, Versace Jeans Couture and others. The boutique has about 45 employees and is renovated fully in the year 2013. In 2010 Fashion Style signed agreement with luxury brands Canali for men’s fashion and with Max Mara for women’s Fashion with exclusive rights to sell them in Atyrau city. The company spreads awareness about its brand among the people by setting up street billboards and taking advantage of the print media to pursue its promotional activities. Communication Communication is defines as the exchange of flow of information between individuals or groups or between individuals within a group. It involves the creation of meaning and the exchange of symbols. The possible ways of communication includes speech, writing, images and audible signal. In organizations, speech includes face to face exchanges, short talk, oral report and briefing. Written communication in organizations includes annual reports, policy manuals, circulars, newsletters and notices. Organizational communication explains the flow of messages within an organization (Fielding, 2006). Effective communication is crucial in implementing the strategy of organizations. Communication can be of two types-formal and informal. Formal communication involves the process of sharing official information with individuals who need to have the necessary information through the prescribed patterns described in the organizational chart. Formal communication involves downward communication, upward communication and horizontal communication. Downward communication includes instructions, orders, directions and feedback and upward communication involves the data required to complete projects, status reports, new ideas and suggestions for improvement. Horizontal communication comprises of coordination and cooperation (Hitt, Miller and Colella, 2006). Informal information is the sharing of information without the imposition of any formally imposed obligations and restrictions. It arises from social situations, incidental meetings and spontaneous gatherings. Communication takes place through the different levels of strategic, tactical and operational communication. In strategic communication, the level of decision is based on the opportunities that the top management of the organizations predicts in long term planning for five or more years. This planning involves investment, diversification and expansion. This includes the decisions taken for the financial wellbeing of the organization, improving the brand image among the consumers and future performance of the company (Goetsch and Davis, 2014). Tactical decisions depend on the availability of resources to meet the overall objectives of the strategic decision makers. The role of the tactical decision makers is to divide strategic information into stages of actions. Tactical decisions are focused more on the allocation of resources and involve less risk than the strategic decisions. Tactical communication emphasises on the internal control of the main functional area (Jensen, 2013). Operational decisions are taken mostly taken under the clearly defined rules and limited by available resources. These decisions are taken using daily updates about the quality and level of performance of machineries and the consumption of materials without waste. Though the operational staff of the organizations is not generally involved in managerial decision-making processes, organizations depend highly on their performance. Thus the different types of decision-making indicate that information travels from strategic to operational level through the tactical stage (Griffin, 2013). Fashion Style communicates through the mode of speech by holding one to one meeting and group discussions. It also communicates important information by and intranet operating in the store. The six elements involved in the communication process are sender, receiver, message, noise, barriers and feedback. The sender conceives and encodes the message and selects the medium of communication. The receiver decodes and interprets the message and then provides feedback. Learning outcome 3.2 Barriers in the Communication Process There are many barriers in the communication process within the organizational framework of the Fashion Style. The managers of the store fail to realize the specific needs of the operational members. They do not give adequate attention to the feedback given to the management by the employees. Though the employees are not adequately informed about the trend of clothes and accessories, they assume that they possess sufficient information to operate the store efficiently. The barriers to communication can be classified as follows: Sender barrier: The store want to introduce new brands and offer innovative services to its customers but the management of the store fails to communicate to the employees the theme and what the management actually aims to achieve. Encoding barrier: The manager at the store does not understand the language of the employees as he does not belong to the same nation and is hired solely for its expertise in the field of fashion. Thus the employees cannot convey their grievances regarding the problems faced by them while interacting with the customers. Medium Barrier: The store does not have an intranet installed in their communication system and they need to communicate information by meeting face to face or through others. This leads to inefficient utilization of time and transfer of incorrect information. Feedback barrier: Most of the employees in the store do not communicate freely with the mangers and thus the management could not understand whether the employees have understood the instructions or not. Learning outcome 3.3 The sender barrier can be reduced by transferring the message of the new marketing plans of the management by conducting workshops on the latest fashion trends in men’s and women’s clothes and accessories and by giving a presentation of how to convey the new services launched by the store to the customers so that they get interested in availing those services. The management must comprise of individuals who can forward the necessary messages to the employees in a language that they understand. The mangers must also give attention to the problems faced by employees in the store while giving instructions to carry on their responsibilities. The medium barrier can be removed by setting up an intranet in the store so that employees at the selling and billing counters can communicate information swiftly and correctly (Newstrom and Davis, 1986). Learning outcome 3.4 Development Objectives Improvements required Activities Target Resources Priority Set a clear vision for the company To make the employees understand the vision of the company and act accordingly Encourage employees to participate in the decision making process Become the only store in the city with the latest fashion trends The employees are the key resources that the company should depend upon to achieve its target Needs of the employees Maintain a database Necessary training to be imparted Update the information about the different financial variables. To use the data for future planning Presence of modern communication systems To derive information from the collected data Collect feedback from employees Required to improve the medium of communication Conduct weekly meeting with the employees To improve the performance of the store Comments provided by customers on the services offered to them Customer satisfaction Highly skilled employees Give adequate training to the employees To conduct effective training and skill development programs To deliver superior customer service Presence of managers who specialized in the field of fashion. To improve customer service. Learning Outcome 4 Introduction An information system is defined as a system of associated elements that collect and process data and disseminate information along with providing a feedback mechanism to meet a specific objective. Information system can be classified into open and close systems as well as formal and informal system. Open information system is defined as the one which allows its users to manipulate, contribute, edit, use and reuse the actual programming of the system. In other words, it allows its users to alter or create the actual content of the system. Close information systems refer to the systems which allow its users to alter its actual contents at a minimal level. Formal Information systems are designed to meet the needs of the organizations which are represented by the organizational charts. These charts present an outline of the positions and their relationships to the authority concerned with the pattern of communication and flow of work. Informal information systems are developed to meet the needs of the employees within an organization and fulfill vocational needs. They also offer solution to the problems faced by employees at the work place. They also transfer information upwards through indirect channels. Information system is a combination of the people, process, hardware and software that collects, disseminates and transforms information. Fashion Style has implemented several information systems in order to improve the performance of the organization. The company has a pay roll and a transaction system and both are close information systems as the operators of the systems cannot alter their contents. The company also collects data on the performance of the employees in order to evaluate their efficiency and to provide them with rewards for exceptional performance. The store is also equipped with open information systems to store and process data on customer service in order to derive information useful in planning the future strategies. 4.1 Existing Approaches to Information systems The store of the Fashion Style comprises of many functional departments like the research and development department, production, marketing and the accounting and finance departments. In this store, the various departments are very closely associated. Collection of data on various issues is equally important for all the departments. All the departments coordinate among themselves to collect the required information to publish annul reports and amylase and forecast future turnover and expansion plans for the company. 4.2 Improvement in the Information systems Collection of data: Fashion Style must implement effective systems of data collection to facilitate effective data collection and coordinate the transfer of data among the various departments. This helps to derive useful information from accurate data and use them in the future business plans to improve the profitability of the company and also cater to the needs of its customers in the better way. Formatting: The data needs to be formatted efficiently in order to gather useful information from the raw data. Thus the company must hire expert analyst or train its existing employees to manage the data collected. Storage: Data must be stored in efficient and reusable systems which provide safety and security features. Also, data should be regularly maintained and updated for effective usage. Circulation of data: The company must implement systems such as the intranet to disseminate useful and necessary data to the employees and the different departments in an efficient manner. 4.3 Classification of Information System The possible ways in which an organization can improve the access to systems of information and knowledge is by implement in the following systems within the organizational framework: Management information system Management information systems provide relevant information useful for effective decision-making by managers. They help in maintaining routine data for making routine decisions and also improve the operational efficiency of the business by integrating various functional areas. It is computer based system that provides flexible and speedy access to accurate data. It comprises the latest technologies in the modern world and is implemented in enterprises to help managers in their significant task of decision making (Lucey, 2005; Laudon and Laudon, 1995). Enterprise resource planning system Enterprise resource planning (ERP) refer to a system of integrated programs that can control the whole set of business operations. It includes the coordination of planning, management of the inventory, production and ordering processes. The company can implement the EPR software to manage the business and automate various back office functions associated with technology, human resources and services. The ERP software will facilitate the operations of the company as it integrates all aspects of an operation including development, sales and marketing, product planning and manufacturing. Generally, enterprise software planning are designed for the business planning of large enterprises, but Fashion Style can implement the small business ERP applications which are lightweight business management software solution developed specifically to facilitate small businesses. Fashion Style must implement the enterprise resource planning software which also allows some degree of synchronized reporting and automation. This is because employees face a lot of difficulties in maintaining separate databases and spreadsheets that have to merge manually for annual reports. This system helps the order management systems to process orders more quickly and accurately and also helps the finance department to maintain financial records smoothly. The software also assists the employees to understand the performance of key business variables in a better way (Grabski, Leech and Sangster, 2009). Information and Knowledge management strategy Knowledge and information management strategy facilitates an enterprise by improving its internal data and to create mechanisms to benefit from expertise and knowledge existing among the employees. It also helps in the enhancing the quality of information management in the enterprise. The information and knowledge strategy focuses on the method of managing information and data, assessment of immediate difficulties and short comings that are perceived, the degree to which information is shared with others. This helps the enterprise to in the developing future plans for the company in the areas of finance and marketing and also human resource as knowledge management is the process of capturing, distributing and effectively utilizing knowledge (Earl, 2001). Reference List Earl, M., 2001. Knowledge management strategies: Toward taxonomy. Journal of management information systems, 18(1), 215-233. Fielding, M., 2006. Effective communication in organisations. Cape Town: Juta and Company Ltd. Goetsch, D. L. and Davis, S. B., 2014. Quality management for organizational excellence. London: Pearson. Grabski, S., Leech, S. and Sangster, A., 2009. Management accounting in enterprise resource planning systems. Oxford: Butterworth-Heinemann. Griffin, R., 2013. Fundamentals of management. Boston: Cengage Learning. Hitt, M. A., Miller, C. C. and Colella, A., 2006. Organizational behaviour: A strategic approach. New Jersey: John Wiley & Sons. Jensen, J. V., 2013. Ethical issues in the communication process. London: Routledge. Laudon, K. C. and Laudon, J. P., 1995. Management information systems: organization and technology. New Jersey: Prentice-Hall. Lucey, T., 2005. Management information systems. Boston: Cengage Learning. Newstrom, J. W. and Davis, K., 1986. Human behavior at work. New York. McGraw-Hill. Read More