Adapting Your Message to Your Audience Module Two McGraw-Hill/Irwin Copyright © 2014 by The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved.

Learning Objectives LO 2-1 Understand expectations from your organization. LO 2-2 Define audiences for messages. LO 2-3 Apply strategies for audience analysis with PAIBOC. LO 2-4 Apply strategies for individual and group audience analyses. 2-2

Learning Objectives LO 2-5 Apply strategies for audience needs analysis. LO 2-6 Adapt messages for audiences. LO 2-7 Choose channels for audiences.

Understanding What Your Organization Wants Succeeding in an organization depends first on understanding what “counts” at your organization. Ask your boss, “What parts of my job are most important? What’s the biggest thing I could do to improve my work?” The initial audience first sees your message and routes it to others. A gatekeeper is someone who can stop your message from getting to the primary audience and may be the initial audience. Secondary audiences may be asked to comment on your message or implement its ideas once they are approved. Watchdog audiences have no power to stop a message or act directly on it but have political, social, or economic power. 4

Understanding What Your Organization Wants Listen to the stories colleagues tell about people who have succeeded and those who have failed. Observe. See who is praised, who is promoted

Kinds of Audiences Initial Audience Gatekeeper Primary Audience Secondary Audience Watchdog Audience The initial audience first sees your message and routes it to others. A gatekeeper is someone who can stop your message from getting to the primary audience and may be the initial audience. Secondary audiences may be asked to comment on your message or implement its ideas once they are approved. Watchdog audiences have no power to stop a message or act directly on it but have political, social, or economic power.

Who Is My Audience? Primary audience Secondary audience decides whether to accept your recommendations or will act on the basis of your message Secondary audience may be asked to comment on your message or to implement your ideas after they’ve been approved

Who Is My Audience? Initial audience Gatekeeper receives the message first and routes it to other audiences. Gatekeeper has the power to stop your message before it gets to the primary audience.

Who Is My Audience? Watchdog audience pays close attention to the transaction between you and the primary audience and may base future actions on its evaluation of your message

The Audiences for a Marketing Plan

The Audiences for a Consulting Report

PAIBOC P What are your purposes in writing? A Who is (are) your audiences? I What information must your message include? Your purposes come from you and your organization. Your audience determines how you achieve those purposes, but not what the purposes are.

PAIBOC B What reasons or reader benefits can you use to support your position? O What objections can you expect your reader(s) to have? C How will the context affect reader response?

A Model of Two-Person Communication with Feedback Figure 2.3

The Communication Process Perception Interpretation Choice/ Selection Encoding/ Decoding Channel Noise To communicate, a person must first perceive a stimulus and then interpret what has been perceived. The person then chooses the information he or she wishes to send and puts it into a form for the audience. That action is called encoding. The message is transmitted through a channel, such as a memo, a phone call, or an e-mail message. The audience receives the message and decodes, or makes sense, of it. At any stage of the process, noise may interfere with communication. Noise can be physical, such as illegible handwriting, or psychological, such as the audience disliking the speaker.

What do I need to know about my audience(s)? Empathy Knowledge Demographic Factors Values and Beliefs Personality Past Behavior There is no “one size fits all” approach to analyzing audiences, but key factors are important. Empathy is the ability to put yourself in someone else’s shoes and to feel with that person. Even people in your own organization won’t share all of your knowledge, so anticipate what audiences will need to know. Demographic factors include such measurable features as age, race, income, and educational level. Values and beliefs, or psychographics, include habits, hobbies, and lifestyles. The Myers-Briggs Type Indicator is one of several popular assessments to gauge personality. Studying how audiences have behaved in the past may suggest how they will react in the future.

What do I need to know about my audience(s)? Empathy the ability to put yourself in someone else’s shoes, to feel with that person requires not being self-centered

What do I need to know about my audience(s)? Demographic characteristics measurable features that can be counted objectively age, sex, race, religion, education level, income, and so on.

What do I need to know about my audience(s)? Personality – Myers-Briggs Type Indicator Extraversion-Inversion Sensing-Intuition Thinking-Feeling Judging-Perceiving

What do I need to know about my audience(s)? Psychographic characteristics qualitative rather than quantitative: values, beliefs, goals, and lifestyles. Values and Lifestyles (VALS) Strivers, Innovators, Thinkers, Believers, Achievers, Experiencers, Makers, and Survivors

Analyzing People in Organizations Discourse community a group of people who share assumptions about what channels, formats, and styles to use, what topics to discuss and how to discuss them, and what constitutes evidence Your reader’s reaction is affected by his or her personal preferences as well as by the discourse communities to which he or she belongs. Each person is a member of several discourse communities, which may or may not overlap.

Analyzing People in Organizations An organization’s culture is its values, attitudes, and philosophies

Analyzing People in Organizations Norms of behavior in an organization are revealed: Verbally through the organization’s myths, stories, and heroes. Nonverbally through the allocation of space, money, and power. Two companies in the same field may have completely different organizational cultures, and organizations may even have subcultures. Observe your own organizational culture to understand how to analyze others. Look for how people behave and dress, what the organization values, and why some people are considered heroes.

Now that I have my analysis, what do I do with it? Strategy Organization Word Choice Document Design Photographs and Visuals Adapt your message carefully to the needs of your audience. For instance, a good strategy is to make action on the message as easy as possible and to protect the reader’s ego. Messages should be organized to help the reader understand the message immediately. Choose words your audience will know, and avoid words that sound negative, defensive, or arrogant. Good design in business writing uses lists, headings, and a mix of paragraph lengths to create white space. Photographs and visuals, if any, should be bias free and more than simply decorative.

What if my audiences have different needs? To reach, focus on: Content and choice of details. Organization. Level of formality. Use of technical terms and theory. When you write to multiple audiences, use the primary audience and the gatekeeper to determine the level of detail, organization, level of formality, and use of technical terms and theory.

How do I reach my audience(s)? Channels vary according to Speed. Accuracy of transmission. Cost. Number of messages carried. Number of people reached. Efficiency. Ability to promote goodwill. Paper messages are more formal than e-mail messages, and many spoken messages are followed up with written ones.

How do I reach my audience(s)? Written messages make it easier to: Present many specific details. Present extensive or complex financial data. Minimize undesirable emotions. Paper messages are more formal than e-mail messages, and many spoken messages are followed up with written ones.

How do I reach my audience(s)? Oral messages make it easier to: Answer questions, resolve conflicts, and build consensus. Use emotion to persuade. Get immediate action or response. Focus the reader’s attention. Modify a proposal unacceptable in its original form. Oral messages are common in business, but scheduled meetings and oral presentations are more formal than chats in the hall or a phone call.

How do I reach my audience(s)? Adapt the message to the audience. Show the audience how it will benefit from the idea, policy, service, or product. Overcome any objections the audience may have. Even when everyone in the organization has access to the same channels, different discourse communities may prefer different ones. Choose the written or oral channel that best serves your audience.

How do I reach my audience(s)? Use you-attitude and positive emphasis. Use visuals to clarify or emphasize material. Specify what the audience should do.