Importance Of Effective Non-Verbal Communication In The Workplace

Types of communication-

To converse with someone and to make them know what you think about something is very important. It is necessary to make other people know what you are thinking about and to even know what other people think about (Essay Writing and Dwyer 2013). Hence, communication is something which is essential for people to survive at any place. Communication stands for transfer of thoughts from one person to another. It means transferring and sharing of thoughts, ideas, talks, etc. through a verbal or non-verbal way. Communicating your ideas is necessary because it helps in giving clarity of thought and also takes proper decisions about something.

In a workplace, people have different motives of working and even have different aims and ways of working and achieving something. Hence, communicating your thought process, i.e. what you expect, what you like, what you do not like, how would you want something to be done or achieved, etc. is essential thing for the harmony of people working in the organization and to achieve targets which are set by the people. Proper communication leads to proper decision making and leads to taking proper decisions.

There are different ways in people can communicate with each other. On a broader level, the communication types may be divided under two categories namely the verbal way of communicating and the non-verbal way of communication. The verbal communication includes communicating with the help of words, noises, speech, etc. It includes exchange of words or other things which actually make the other people hear and understand directly what the other person mean. Verbal communication is a direct way of talking with other people (Goodall & Goodall 2009). The other way in the non-verbal way. Under this the people do not use any kind of words, or symbols or anything in way of talking which may communicate what the other person means or wants to convey to the other people. It includes the actions, the other indirect methods which may give look of communication but does not include any kind of transmission of words. The non-verbal way of communication is an indirect way of communication and is not often used for communication (GoodTherapy 2015).

The different ways in which people can communicate using verbal or non-verbal form of communication can be described in the following ways-

Verbal communication is done through-

• Calling people for meeting
• Giving out speeches
• Listening to the grievances of the other people.
• Telling your problems and issues to the people working in an organization.
• Putting across your needs and desires in front of the seniors and the colleagues.
• Congratulating person on his face(Ekman 2009)

Under the non-verbal way of communication, the people use the following ways through which they try to put across what they mean and what they want to convey. Hence, the ways of non-verbal communication are-

• Congratulating by patting the shoulder of other person.
• Nodding your head in agree or refusal
• Giving expressions of anger or of things being fine.
• Handshake, patting on shoulder, etc. r images to transfer your thoughts.
• Using simple presentations of videos (Sutton 2000)
• Facial expressions.
• Gestures and postures(Graham 2015)
• Hand movements

Hence, the above mentioned ways are the certain ways in which the people communicate in the non-verbal way without speaking up what they actually want or want to say. 

Communication is an essential thing without which nobody can work or live. The reasons or the need for which the communication between people in an organization or any other place is necessary because of the following ways-

• With help of communication one can share his thoughts with the people of the organization.
• Through it one can make the other person know his ideas, his problems, his likes and dislike and even make the other person aware about his aim.
• With the help of communication one can make the other person know what he desires and how the things can be done or achieved(Kelly 2001)
• Communication helps in making the person know his thought process to everyone present around him and how and why he does certain things.
• Without communication people might interpret different things but communicating your ideas and thoughts helps not to create tiffs between people working in the same organization.

Non-verbal form of communication is not actually one of the best ways to communicate with anyone but it comes out to be naturally. There are various advantages and disadvantages of adopting non-verbal way of communication to make people know your thoughts (Bella 2000).

Advantages of Non-Verbal Communication

It is said that the actions speak louder than the words. Hence, the non-verbal way of communication may have many good affects and the various advantages of non-verbal communication are-

• It acts as a complement to the other people and even gives a personal touch. Like patting the shoulder of person to congratulate him gives him a physical touch that is of personal nature.
• Videos, images etc. also are part of non-verbal way of communication and it adds to the memory of the people because this stays in the memory of the people(Wang 2009).
• Non-verbal communication can be understood by all the people who are not able to understand the meeting details through messages or mails.
• This helps in displaying a quick response to the topic. The expressions received after transmission of the message, helps in getting a quick response to what you have done or planned to do. Moreover the expression of the person gives out a lot of the details.
• It is quick and the receiving [arty gets the immediate response or message through the non-verbal method.

But using non-vernal method of communication may prove to be dangerous. There are various disadvantages which this form of communication carries with itself. The various disadvantages of non-verbal way of communication are-

• People may understand something entirely different from what you meant or are trying to say.
• The message can be interpreted in totally different way and the wrong inferences can be deduced from it.
• It is hard to understand what the other person meant through his expressions, facial expression, gestures, etc.
• This can be termed as a vague and imprecise way of communication as not speaking up what you wish can be taken as a vague way of telling the other person what you make out of something.
• It is difficult to understand what the other person meant through his behavior. All the people may deduce different things from one particular thing and the whole meaning of a message can change.
• The non-verbal way of communication is taken as a non-formal way of communication. There is not touch of power and it gives out an expression and touch of no hierarchy or proper channel of communication.
• The non-verbal way of communication shows a very ambiguous way of communicating your thoughts and ideas.
• This communication method can be used for very short and quick messages. If the long messages and ideas need to be communicated, one cannot use this form of communication.
• Distortion of message in non-verbal communication process can be done easily as even different people may interpret different things from a particular expression.

Conclusion:

Hence, using non-verbal way of communication may prove to be both advantageous and disadvantageous at a workplace. Where at one side it is important to strike an effective non-verbal way of communicating with the people at the workplace but at certain level, the ambiguity and the uncertainty involved in this kind of communication does not prove it to be an effective of communication method which can be used at a workplace.

A workplace is an area where people need to be clear about their thoughts and even about the thoughts of the other people. The seniors need to properly make the other people know what are the aims and targets of the company and how they wish to achieve the set targets. The juniors clearly need to mention their needs and what they desire from the company. All the plans regarding the growth, the expansion and even the rules and regulations and the policies of the company need to be communicated in a good and effective way.The transmission of such important things through channel of non-verbal communication is somewhere impossible and even if people are able to make other people know about their ideas in some non-verbal way. It is not certain that the other person has interpreted your idea in the same way in which you have thought it to be accepted.

Hence, as the workplace requires clarity of thoughts and there is no scope of any kind of doubt or misunderstanding so that everything achieved in a systematic way and a set path way, the non-verbal way of communication may not prove to be of much help. In a workplace the people can be congratulated or ridiculed for their work through certain non-verbal communicative ways, but when it comes to making other people know the rules and policies of the company, the verbal communicative methods are used. Hence, it is important to strike a balance between both forms of communication methods in a workplace.  

Anderson, P 2008, Nonverbal Communication: Forms and Functions.

Bella, P 2000, ‘Nonverbal behavior and self-presentation.’, Psychological Bulletin, March 2000, pp. 203-243.

Ekman, P 2009, ‘The Repertoire of Nonverbal Behavior: Categories, Origins, Usage, and Coding’, Journal of the International Association for Semiotic , pp. 1-49.

Essay Writing and Dwyer, J. 2013, Communication for Business and the Professions, Strategies and Skills, Pearson Education, Australia.

Guerrero, L 2006, Nonverbal Communication in Close Relationships, Laurence Erlbaum Associates publisher, New Jersey.

Kelly, J 2001, ‘Mood and Emotions in Small Groups and Work Teams’, Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes, vol 86, no. 1, pp. 99-130.

Sutton, R 2000, ‘Expression of Emotion as Part of the Work Role’, Journal of International communication, vol 12, pp. 23-37.