1. Organizational Communication Notes from Stohl book… Looks at organizations as networks Why a network metaphor?

2. Aims of Stohl Book Provides link between interpersonal and organizational communication …blurring boundaries between home and work, family and work, friendships and work …globalization …diasporic communities

3. Stohl Aims.. Provides link for understanding intimate relationship between experiences in and outside the workplace …understand behavior as social process …cultural attitudes

4. Stohl aims… Provides link between contemporary organizational events and communication concepts …how have social problems/issues been integrated into organizational culture? E.g., extended health plans….employee support programs….fun stuff…

5. Stohl Aims Provides link for understanding relationship amongst communication processes and potential empowerment of individuals …foundation of all social life is communication in its many forms

6. Connectedness Organizational communication is defined as the collective and interactive process of interpreting and generating messages …need to understand the different linkages, or networks that people form in both their work and personal live(s)

7. Myth of ‘Separate Worlds’ Increasingly, a blurring between work and personal life Often, work is ‘redomesticated’ Telework and telecommuting facilitated by ICTs More ‘consultants’ No gold watch for 25 years

8. Organizations are Changing… Changing demographics Stresses Global competitiveness Dot.com flop New Economy? Lifelong learning-continuing education

9. Organizational Metaphors How do we see our work environment? A family? A prison? Purgatory? Theorist Gareth Morgan: machines, living systems, cultures, political systems, instruments of domination New metaphors: flexible, virtual

10. Network Metaphor Emphasizes connectedness in its various manifestations Looks at affiliations – both formal and informal Networks are centralized and decentralized Networks are flexible Networks both stimulate & constrain innovation

11. Networks are… stable and ever changing powerful organizational structures constituted and reconstituted through interpersonal communication

12. Network Perspective Connectedness in Action… Ever-changing networks of interpersonal associations A tapestry of communication relationships My example: AOIR

13. In a network perspective… Communication is interactive Built upon associations, allegiances, affiliations ORGANIZATIONS ARE IDENTIFIABLE SOCIAL SYSTEMS OF INTERACTING INDIVIDUALS PURSUING MULTIPLE OBJECTIVES THROUGH COORDINATED ACTS & RELATIONSHIPS

14. Multiple Contexts Indirect Direct contexts ORGANIZATIONAL COMMUNICATION IS THE COLLECTIVE INTERACTIVE PROCESS OF GENERATING & INTERPRETING MESSAGES

15. Networks are Diverse Formal Informal Short-lived Long-lived

16. Network Boundaries Look at contextually And, many different contexts Permeable Never stable

17. 4 ways of looking at networks Personal Group Organizational Inter-organizational There are many linkages and overlaps

18. We have multiple roles In various contexts, we adopt multiple personas Sherry Turkle Boundary spanners

19. Interconnectedness Weak ties Strong ties

20. So….how can we think of organizational communication? We need to look at the linkages across various domains: Social Political Economic And also how they’re being changed and transformed because of communication and information technologies