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Article: Company As A Conversation
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We have become so consumed by our responsibility to succeed and overcome the problems that confront us that we seldom step back to see the root cause of the challenges we face. While it is important to take action, if the tools we use merely address the problem on the level of its expression, we never resolve it. If we truly want to resolve the challenges and breakdowns we encounter, we will need to view problems on the level of cause and take the battle there.
To see the problems and challenges that confront us on the level of cause, we will need a new model of understanding. When we talk about companies and the art of doing business we most commonly use financial, behavioral, systems or process model to map cause and effect. What is missing from this is a way to accurately map each participant's impact on the company, which makes it difficult to observe cause and effect on the level of the individual.
However, seeing a company through a communications model offers insight into a participant's role in the company. Due to the fact that the communications process can be mapped onto each person's behavior, we can locate its cause and effect throughout the expression of the company.
• Companies are evolving conversations about customer satisfaction
• Customers include the consumer and everyone in the supply chain, from investor to end user
• Any dissatisfied customer is evidence that the conversation has broken down
• Breakdowns take place in conversations for relatedness, possibilities and committment
• Conversations fall apart at the point of listening, whether active, passive or undirected
• Discord is evidence that the energy to transform the breakdown is already present
• Breakdowns become breakthroughs by attending to the phases of conversation and listening
• Companies experience obstacles in direct proportion to their ability to communicate correctly
• Leaders maintain an environment where correct communications is understood and practiced