Table of Contents
Q.1. What are the barriers to communication? How do we overcome these barriers? (5+5=10)
Common Barriers to Effective Communication:
• The use of jargon. Over-complicated, unfamiliar and/or technical terms.
• Emotional barriers and taboos. Some people may find it difficult to express their emotions and some topics may be completely ‘off-limits’ or taboo. Taboo or difficult topics may include but are not limited to, politics, religion, disabilities (mental and physical), sexuality and sex, racism and any opinion that may be seen as unpopular.
• Lack of attention, interest, distractions, or irrelevance to the receiver. (See our page Barriers to Effective Listening for more information).
• Differences in perception and viewpoint.
• Physical disabilities such as hearing problems or speech difficulties.
• Physical barriers to non-verbal communication. Not being able to see the non-verbal cues, gestures, posture and general body language can make communication less effective. Phone calls, text messages and other communication methods that rely on technology are often less effective than face-to-face communication.
• Language differences and the difficulty in understanding unfamiliar accents.
• Expectations and prejudices which may lead to false assumptions or stereotype. People often hear what they expect to hear rather than what is actually said and jump to incorrect conclusions.
• Cultural differences. The norms of social interaction vary greatly in different cultures, as do the way in which emotions are expressed. For example, the concept of personal space varies between cultures and between different social settings.
Over Coming Barriers to Communication
Overcoming Physical Barriers
- • If you send a lot of email or digital messages, make sure you are surgical in your word choice.
- • Open-concept offices, face-to-face interaction
- • Video conferencing adoption
Overcoming Cultural Barriers
- • Determine whether a specific behaviour or attribute is a requirement of the job.
- • Identify whether or not you can reasonably accommodate the cultural difference.
- • Determine how best to accommodate the cultural difference.
- • Learn about other cultures.
- • Ask your employees for insight
Overcoming Language Barriers
- • Translate all relevant documents
- • Use an interpreter
- • Provide language classes
- • Use both telling and showing methods of training.
- • Use visual methods of communication
- • Use repetition.
- • Never raise your voice or over-enunciate your words
- • Use simpler words with fewer syllables.
- • Learn the basics of your employee’s language.
Overcoming Perceptual Barriers
- • The audience may make assumptions about you or the situation; perhaps you are new to the organisation, or the situation is a challenging one. To get your message past these barriers, provide evidence to support your claims and enhance your credibility.
- • It is equally important to be aware of one’s own nonverbal behaviours and be sensitive to how they may be perceived. For instance, maintaining eye contact when communicating indicates interest.
Overcoming Interpersonal Barriers
- • Use simple words to convey the message.
- • Learn the art of listening.
- • Keep composure while communicating.
- • Provide constructive criticism.
Overcoming Gender Barriers
- • Educate Team About Gender Bias
- • Create Safe “Identity Workspaces”
Q.2. Write short notes on any two: (2×5=10)
(a) Proxemics
Proxemics is the study of how humans use space when we’re communicating. How close we stand to someone, whether we touch them, and how comfortable we feel are all part of the study of proxemics.
In order to understand more about proxemics, we need to discuss different kinds of spaces. There are four kinds of distance that people generally use in communication. This can vary by place, and different cultures have different standards. These are known as realms of personal territory. Let’s talk about these now.
• Public space is the space that characterizes how close we sit or stand to someone, like a public figure or public speaker. So, if you are at an event listening to a professor give a lecture, you are probably about 12 – 25 feet away.
• Social space means we’re getting a little closer, about 4 – 12 feet away. This is the kind of space you’re probably in if you’re talking to a colleague or a customer at work.
• Personal space is even closer. In this case, you’re probably about 1 – 4 feet away from someone. This is reserved for talking to friends or family.
• Intimate space is for people who you are very close to. In this case, you’re probably less than a foot away and you might even be touching the other person. This is the space you’re in with a romantic partner, for example.
(b) Paralanguage
Paralanguage simply says – it’s not what you say but how you say it and is a big part of nonverbal communication. We use this nonverbal cue every day. Our tone of voice can reveal an underlying message.
Paralanguage is a component of meta-communication that may modify or nuance meaning, or convey emotion, such as prosody, pitch, volume, intonation etc. It is sometimes defined as relating to non phonemic properties only. Paralanguage may be expressed consciously or unconsciously.
The study of paralanguage is known as paralinguistics.
(c) Artifacts
Artifacts are forms of decorative ornamentation that are chosen to represent self-concept. They can include rings and tattoos, but may also include brand names and logos. From clothes to cars, watches, briefcases, purses, and even eyeglasses, what we choose to surround ourselves with communicates something about our sense of self. They may project gender, role or position, class or status, personality, and group membership or affiliation. Paying attention to a customer’s artifacts can give you a sense of the self they want to communicate, and may allow you to more accurately adapt your message to meet their needs.
Q.3. Define communication. Explain the characteristics of human communication. (5)
Communication is neither the transmission of a message nor the message itself. It is the mutual exchange of understanding, originating with the receiver.
In other words Communication is a process by which information is exchanged between individuals through a common system of symbols, signs, or behavior.
Humans communicate with each other in many different ways. Human communications differs from other animal communications because of its symbols, depth and variety. Even though there are many different languages and forms of communications, basic characteristics unite those methods of communications.
Individuality
The characteristics begin with the self or individuality. Everyone is capable of communicating with one another if they choose. You must take the initiative to begin communications with others. Communications between people can be colored by emotions, environment, culture and other factors. An example of this characteristic is the way an Englishman from a higher class communicates his anger, compared to the anger expressed by an Englishman who comes from a lower social class or group. Each persons’ ability and way of communicating begins internally.
Irreversible
Another basic characteristic of communications is its irreversibility. Once something is said, drawn or written, it cannot be taken back. Choosing the wrong words or communication method can harm a person emotionally. The communications can also be misinterpreted if the method of communications is not clear. The form or method of communication is important to this characteristic. Once communications is instigated, it is irreversible. It can be clarified later, but the damage is done once you communicate your thought.
Context
According to some experts, another basic characteristic of human communications is context or setting. Interpersonal, group, organizational and mass are the four settings where communication occurs. Interpersonal is communications between two people. Group communications exist between three or more individuals with a common goal or purpose. Organizational communications happens in an institution with a chain of command, common goals, and each person being communicated to has a specific task. Mass communication occurs through public media to a population.
Knowing the Characteristics
Knowing each of these basic characteristics helps you communicate better. Thinking before you speak, write or draw something allows the receiver to more effectively understand your meaning. Knowing in what context to communicate also allows you to communicate effectively with others. For example; communicating to steel workers in an organisational setting can be done effectively if you use terms they understand. Communicating the same information to a board of directors of that steel company is done differently, as is utilising different terms and methods.
OR Explain the importance of effective speech for hotel professionals. (5)
Communication is the most important and the most used of all skills in the hospitality and tourism industry. Managers spend the largest portion of their time in verbal or written communications with their employees or outside parties. Other staff member communicate among themselves , as well as their managers, frontline employees suppliers, and so on, to give and receive the information they need to perform their jobs.
Communication has been recognized as the means by which both and people and the organization survive. When human beings lack the ability to cope with life, the source of the problem is often a lack of appropriate information. Incomplete and unorganized information place a heavy strain on the ability of people to make sense out of their existence. Their performance of a job depends on having necessary information, having the skills to do a job depends on the quality of communication during the skills acquisition period.
Compelling communication skills are important in a hotel regardless of some staff members not being guest-facing. A few hotels spend considerable amount of money on training their staff to interact with the guests. Good communication skills are a learned art and not a natural skill so one should consider training to enhance staff skills. Excellent communication skills enhance guest experience as it conveys that you are listening to your guests, valuing their feedback and conveying clear messages. Apart from communicating with the guests, your staff ought to know how to write emails. Good communication skills will impress your guests which will further prove beneficial to your hotel business.
Q.4. What are the essential qualities of a good speaker? (5)
Essential Qualities of good speakers
1. Confidence
According to a study published by the University of Wolverhampton “A highly confident speaker is viewed as being more accurate, competent, credible, intelligent, knowledgeable, likeable, and believable than the less confident uncertain speaker.”
2. Passion
In order to really communicate to people through speech, you need to have passion for your subject. Without passion, your speech is meaningless. You need to exude a level of sincerity in your emotion when communicating with your audience if you want them to be moved by your presentation.
3. Be Yourself
You don’t have to be someone else on stage, all you have to do is just be yourself. Sometimes, no matter how much you believe in your message or how well you’ve rehearsed, if you don’t act like yourself in front of the group, your audience may view your speech as insincere or calculated.
4. Voice Modulations
If you want to be more engaging as a speaker, then avoid talking in a tone that seems too well rehearsed, but you still want to take the speed and inflexion of your delivery into account when you practice your speech.You can still use effective voice modulations while employing your natural voice.
5. Keep it Short and Sweet
The main purpose of delivering a speech is to attempt to get your point across, and that might not require a whole hour. You want to make sure that your presentation is easily digestible for those listening to you. If you can complete your speech in 15 minutes, do so, and leave any remaining time open for questions and comments.
This means that when you stand up in front of a crowd to present, you only have eight seconds to attract the audience’s attention. Additionally, if you’re presentation takes longer than 20 minutes then you need to break it up into smaller chunks with a maximum of 20 minutes per chunk of information.
6. Connect with your Audience
A speech is just like a conversation, which means you need to communicate your message to someone else. In this sense, there is no difference between talking to one person or a thousand.
The best ways to connect with your audience are;
- • Tell stories
- • Be aware of your target audience
- • Know the energy in the room
- • Be Willing to poke fun at yourself
- • Work on your non-verbal body language
7. Paint a Picture Through Storytelling
Storytelling is a powerful tool used by the best speakers. By employing context into your speech for your audience to connect with, you’re creating an easy to listen to the atmosphere in which you are not simply shoving information at them in the hopes that they’ll retain that information.
The best presentations don’t feel like presentations, they are simply stories told by people with interesting experiences.
8. Repetition
Repetition can help ensure your audience takes the main points away from your presentation. It promotes clarity and helps to encourage acceptance of an idea.
9. Don’t Just Practice, Practice, Practice
Have you ever heard someone say that they want to seem authentic on stage, so they didn’t practice their speech? Although it may seem contradictory, the more you practice a presentation, the more spontaneous it will actually sound!
Of course, you have to practice it the right way though.
Practicing will help to make you feel more confident, and appear more authentic, thus creating a better opportunity to connect with your audience. Which, in the end, is the ultimate goal of public speaking.
OR What do you understand by audience analysis? Explain its importance. (5)
Audience analysis is the process of gathering information about the people in your audience so that you can understand their needs, expectations, beliefs, values, attitudes, and likely opinions.
Audience analysis involves identifying the audience and adapting a speech to their interests, level of understanding, attitudes, and beliefs. Taking an audience-centred approach is important because a speaker’s effectiveness will be improved if the presentation is created and delivered in an appropriate manner. Identifying the audience through extensive research is often difficult, so audience adaptation often relies on the healthy use of imagination.
Importance of Audience Analysis:-
Benefits of Understanding Audiences
When you are speaking, you want listeners to understand and respond favourably to what you are saying. A key characteristic of public speaking situations is the unequal distribution of speaking time between speaker and audience. As an example, the speaker usually talks more while the audience listens, often without asking questions or responding to any feedback.
Audience-Centered Approach to Speaking
In public speaking, you are speaking to and for your audience; thus, understanding the audience is a major part of the speech-making process. In audience-centred speaking, getting to know your target audience is one of the most important tasks that you face. You want to learn about the major demographics of the audience, such as general age, gender, education, religion, and culture, as well as to what groups the audience members belong. Additionally, learning about the values, attitudes, and beliefs of the members of your audience will allow you to anticipate and plan your message.
Finding Common Ground by Taking Perspective
You want to analyze your audience prior to your speech so that during the speech you can create a link between you, the speaker, and the audience. You want to be able to figuratively step inside the minds of audience members to understand the world from their perspectives. Through this process, you can find common ground with your audience, which allows you to align your message with what the audience already knows or believes.
Gathering and Interpreting Information
Audience analysis involves gathering and interpreting information about the recipients of oral, written, or visual communication. You might also use a questionnaire or rating scale to collect data about the basic demographic information and opinions of your target audience. These examples do not form an all-inclusive list of methods to analyze your audience, but they can help you obtain a general understanding of how you can learn about your audience. After considering all the known factors, a profile of the intended audience can be created, allowing you to speak in a manner that is understood by the intended audience.
Practical Benefits for the Speaker
Understanding who makes up your target audience will allow you to carefully plan your message and adapt what you say to the level of understanding and background of the listeners. Two practical benefits of conducting an audience analysis are (1) to prevent you from saying the wrong thing, such as telling a joke which offends, and (2) to help you speak to your audience in a language they understand about things that interest them. Your speech will be more successful if you can create a message that informs and engages your audience.
Q.5. Explain the difficulties of listening. What can we do to improve listening skills? (5)
Common difficulties of Listening and how to improve listening skills:-
1) Distractions
The most obvious and probably the most significant barriers to listening in today’s world are various distractions. Sadly, many of us can’t seem to be part of a conversation without constantly glancing at our phone or laptop.
When you’re having a conversation with someone, it’s best to keep these distractions away and focus on the person in front of you.
2) Noise
Trying to communicate in loud environments is highly ineffective. Even if you can manage to communicate with a large amount of background noise, you won’t be able to understand much or have a good, meaningful discourse.
The issue of background noise is especially common during telephone conversations. For example, many people think they can tackle important conversations while they’re commuting. In most cases, however, the noise levels are too high for effective communication, not to mention the fact that it can cause strain to the person on the other end as well.
3) Interruptions
The fact that nothing good comes from interrupting someone while they’re speaking is one of those cardinal rules of communication we’re all taught as children. People are so eager to be heard that sometimes they interrupt conversations to state their own opinion.
However, not only is it considered rude, but it’s also one of the biggest barriers to effective listening. To avoid making this mistake, try to wait until the other person has finished talking before saying your own ideas out loud.
4) Prejudice
Prejudice can cloud your judgement and make you turn a blind eye towards valuable information or good people. When you live and work in a multicultural environment, it’s vital to leave all your prejudices behind when you’re communicating with others.
For example, if you assume a person is unintelligent (or even less intelligent than you) because of the country of his origin, you’re blinding yourself. You need to give everyone the benefit of doubt and listen to what they have to say.
5) Lack of Interest
Often times, we find ourselves trapped in a conversation that simply can’t hold our interest. In such cases, we’ll be tempted to drift off in our own thoughts or focus on something else – which, unfortunately, can be a barrier to listening.
If the discussion isn’t important, steer the conversation to a different direction. If it is important, however, try to focus on the relevant points and note them down.
OR Proper grooming is of great importance in hotel industry. Explain. (5)
While we may all know not to judge a book by its cover, there are a few instances where presentation really does matter. In the hotel industry, polished presentation is vital to success. Everything about your property will be evaluated through photographs and reviews before a guest even decides to purchase a room. If your rooms look out of date, your lobby is dirty or your restaurant looks cramped, guests will make an initial judgment about your property that will not be in your favor. The same applies to the hotel staff too. They must look professional and presentable because they are an integral part of the property.
How you look, dress & present yourself speaks volumes about your approach towards guests. It is important to understand, that no matter what your job role, you’re the face of your organisation. The act of grooming is to make yourself &, as an extension, the organisation presentable.
Being hospitality professional is a challenge as grooming in hotel industry is an essential skill one needs to hone. The importance of grooming in hospitality industry lies in the fact that it is more than a profession; it is a lifestyle that requires personality, charm, enthusiasm, a caring attitude and pride. It is a demanding job that requires not only skills but also a personal commitment a lifestyle change. The elements of image excellence do not stop at clothing and grooming in the hotel industry. A positive first impression goes beyond how we look (appearance) and what we do (body language) to the way we communicate and serve others.
Therefore, regardless of your position in the organization whether you serve guests directly or serve those who serve the guests, you are in the business of customer satisfaction. The importance of grooming in hospitality industry cannot be ignored. Hence, making the first impression the nest and lasting impression will assure the excellence that you and your company promise and provide.
Q.6. Explain the importance of telephone skills for front office personnel. (5)
Effective telephone communication is vital to the success of any business. Interacting with customers can be a frustrating experience if you don’t know the proper telephone etiquette. With a smile on your voice and the right techniques, however, these interactions can be enjoyable and profitable. Learning these skills is easy when you know why they are important.
The telephone is a primary communication link in today’s business world. To be successful, you must be able to communicate effectively by telephone. The telephone can be the first or only communication you have with a customer or business contact. As a result, good telephone skills are essential at every level of an organization.
Telephonic skills need to be developed because of some inevitable reasons:
- 1. They are essential in enabling the employee to develop a customer calling or ‘customer first’ attitude.
- 2. To develop the service effectively & consistently.
- 3. To learn telephonic etiquettes.
- 4. To handle customers on phone effectively.
- 5. To handle difficult customer (such as rude, aggressive or angry) over the phone.
- 6. To handle customer complete proficiently.
- 7. To retain customers by diffusing customer conflict quickly & efficiently
Q.7. Discuss the importance of Non-verbal communication. (5)
Interpersonal communication is much more than the explicit meaning of words, the information or message conveyed. It also includes implicit messages, whether intentional or not, which are expressed through non-verbal behaviours.
Importance of non-verbal communication
Firstly, we can say that non-verbal communication is important in expressing our emotions. Emotions such as happy, satisfied, confident, surprised, eager, tired, stressed, sad etc. These are almost all expressed through different body gestures and face. We are able to understand each other up on judging each other’s expression.
Secondly, it plays a vital role in communicating interpersonal relationships. Through interpersonal communication, we can establish trust in relationships and help determine a person’s fidelity. And these are possible only through using verbal and non-verbal communication mode. Interpersonal communication includes communications that occur with our words and through our tone of voice, posture and facial expressions. It is also found by many researchers that non-verbal interpersonal communication like body language may communicate 93 percent of our attitudes and beliefs.
Thirdly, non-verbal communication is the main supporter of verbal interaction. Infect they supplement each other and give full meaning. Because non-verbal communication can repeat the spoken message: contradict the message that individual is trying to convey; emphasize the message, substitute or complement meaning to make it understand clearly.
Fourthly, non-verbal communication also reflects individual’s personality. “Personality is the entire mental organization of a human being at any stage of his development. It embraces every phase of human character: intellect, temperament, skill, morality, and every attitude that has been built up in the course of one’s life.”. So according to the above definition personality concerns the most vital, obvious parts of an individual’s psychological life: it concerns whether a person is sad or happy, lethargic or active, brainy or tedious. And these are all aspects of non-verbal communication because we are able to define person’s personality through judging their facially expressed emotions and behaviours. For example, my friend wouldn’t tell all his personality orally. However, more than that, I will come to know his detail personality upon judging his daily behaviours and emotional expression. Therefore, this shows that nonverbal communication speaks more than verbal communication in our life.
Lastly, nonverbal communication plays a greater role in performing rituals such as greetings and goodbyes. The smile we smile as soon as we see someone we recognize from distant itself tells a lot about the importance of non-verbal communication. Similarly, waving our hand indicating goodbye is another example of non-verbal communication. None the less, nodding or shaking our head indicates accepting or refusing when others tell something or offer something.
Q.8. Make sentences to bring out the meaning of the following: (5×1=5)
(a) Aloud/Allowed
Please read the following sentences aloud.
The Others cannot be allowed into your world.
(b) Beat/Beet
You think I’ll beat you eventually?
Sugar beet is extensively grown to supply the sugar factories.
(c) Career/Carrier
You know how important my career is to me.
This road serves as a carrier for the northern coal producing districts.
(d) Great/Grate
You’re doing a great job.
Grate some nutmeg on top of the pudding.
(e) Straight/Strait
Draw a straight line across the top of the page.
The oil terminal is in the narrow strait that separates the island from the mainland.