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Business Communications

What is communication?

Our starting point is to ask what communication is.

At its most basic, communication is the transfer of information.

Consider this statement.

A friend sends you a text which reads:

Hi, can u mt me at 6 by the cafe on Nelson rd? txt me back to let me no.

What does your friend want?

If you have been able to interpret the message and can state the two things your friend wants you to do, then the pair of you have engaged in successful communication.

This tells us something important about communication:

  1. Communication must involve two parties
  2. Communication is about a transfer of information
    However, if you understand what your friend wants but you don't text back, the communication has not been entirely successful. This leads us to identifying our third important point about communication.
  3. Communication involves some action on the party receiving the information

Your friend will not know whether the communication has been successful until you text him or her back and tell them whether you can meet them at 6 at the stated place or not. If you don't, they might not know whether you want to meet them, or whether you do, but the time or place is inconvenient (or both), or even whether you have received the text in the first place.

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