Page 26 - Effective Communication Soft Skills Strategies For Success by Nitin Bhatnagar, Mamta Bhatnagar

Project Name: Manual for Soft Skills
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among people, two requirements must be met: (1) a symbolic system must
be shared by the people involved (we need to speak the same language or
jargon or dialects) and (2) the associations between the symbols and their
referents must be shared.
—M.T. Myers and G.E. Myers
The question to be asked of any administrative process is: How does it influ-
ence the decisions of the individuals without communication, the answer
must always be: It does not influence them at all.
—Simon
It can be seen that each of the definitions of communication seems to be
self-sufficient. Though there is no consensus on a singular, categorical, and
comprehensive definition of communication, it is evident that there is an
overlap of constructs. Transmission and interchange of cognitions, emotions
and feelings, and process of listening and understanding are the two integral
and key components of the definition of communication.

DIMENSIONS OF COMMUNICATION

Communication has four broad dimensions namely intrapersonal, interper-
sonal, group, and mass communication. Each of these dimensions contributes
to the process of developing good communication skills. The role of these
dimensions in the educational setting cannot be underscored. Let us briefly
examine these dimensions.

Intrapersonal Communication

It is very interesting to know what goes on in the minds of people as they
think, feel, value, react, imagine, and so on. The statement ‘we commu-
nicate to ourselves’ may sound silly. However, it cannot be neglected as
a fact. Language is nothing but sub-vocal speech. Communication is an
ongoing and unending process, and it continuously takes place within us
irrespective of whether we do or do not have an audience before us. This
dimension is termed as ‘intrapersonal’ and has been the subject of psycho-
logical and cognitive studies, which attempt to learn how people respond
to information and how they make decisions or store and retrieve data in
their brains. It has also examined how bias, love, hatred, or even apathy can
affect human interaction.
In developing a theory of meaning, Vernon Cronen and others write
about what they call ‘coordinated management of meaning’, which necessarily
starts inside people symbol-processing centres- interpersonally. ‘The locus of
meaning is intrapersonal, while the locus of action is interpersonal.’ It is not
possible to study one without the other.

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