8.5 Key Takeaways, Knowledge Check and Key Terms
Key Takeaways
In this chapter, we learned that:
- Motivation describes a generated drive that propels people to achieve goals or pursue particular courses of action.
- Hierarchy-of-needs theory proposes that we’re motivated by five unmet needs— physiological, safety, social, esteem, and self-actualization— and must satisfy lower-level needs before we seek to satisfy higher-level needs.
- Equity theory focuses on our perceptions of how fairly we’re treated relative to others. This theory proposes that employees create rewards ratios that they compare to those of others and will be less motivated when they perceive an imbalance in treatment.
- Confirming messages include recognition, acknowledgement and endorsement. They all provide affirmation and help foster a positive communication climate.
- Disconfirming messages include impervious messages, interrupting, irrelevant, tangential, impersonal, ambiguous, and incongruous responses. Disconfirming messages provide the relational message that people are not respected or valued and contribute to a negative communication climate.
- Gibb provides six characteristics of supportive and defensive communication climates.
- Empathy is an important ability for our interpersonal relationships. It has three components: cognitive, affective, and compassionate.
- Communication styles can be described on a continuum from passive to assertive to aggressive.
- Using “I” statements, selective inattention and withdrawal are all strategies that we can use to assert our boundaries with others.
- There’s six steps in the assertion process. We should try to assert boundaries when in person (compared to over other channels) and should avoid asserting when we are hungry, angry, alone or tired (HALT).
- An important part of asserting our needs includes framing the situation and if needed, refocusing the conversation using reframing.
- When our substantive, process, relationship or face goals are threatened or impeded, it can cause conflict.
- In the SCARF model of conflict, we can understand conflict in terms of our need for status, certainty, autonomy, relatedness and fairness.
Knowledge Check
Review your understanding of this chapter’s key concepts by taking the interactive quiz below.
Key Terms
Key terms from this chapter include:
- Aggressive communicators
- Assertive communicators
- Empathy
- Employee empowerment
- Equity theory
- Face Goals
- Framing
- I statements
- Job enlargement
- Job enrichment
- Motivation
- Outcome fairness
- Passive communicators
- Process Goals
- Relationship Goals
- Reframing
- SCARF model
- Substantive Goals
- The five domains of human social experiences
- You statements
Aggressive communicators will come across as standing up for their rights while possibly violating the rights of others. This person tends to communicate in a way that tells others they don’t matter or their feelings don’t matter. See Section 8.3 Asserting Your Needs
Assertive communicators respect their rights and the rights of others when communicating. This person tends to be direct but not insulting or offensive. The assertive communicator stands up for his or her own rights but makes sure the rights of others aren’t affected. See Section 8.3 Asserting Your Needs
Empathy is often commonly defined as "putting yourself in someone else's shoes". Empathy consists of three components: cognitive, affective, and compassionate. The cognitive component involves thinking about the world from someone else's point of view. The affective component involves feeling the emotions of others. The compassionate component of empathy refers to having a genuine concern for their wellbeing. See Section 8.2 Meeting Needs Through Communication Climate
Employee empowerment involves management allowing us to make decisions and act upon those decisions, with the support of the organization. See Section 8.1 Theories of Motivation
Equity theory, which focuses on our perceptions of how fairly we’re treated relative to others. Applied to the work environment, this theory proposes that employees analyze their contributions or job inputs (hours worked, education, experience, work performance) and their rewards or job outcomes (salary, bonus, promotion, recognition). Then they create a contributions/rewards ratio and compare it to those of other people. See Section 8.1 Theories of Motivation
Face Goals – How one’s self-image is perceived in a social setting. See Section 8.4 Understanding Goals in Conflict and The Scarf Model
Framing, in communication, is essentially the act of intentionally setting the stage for the conversation you want to have. See Section 8.3 Asserting Your Needs
I statements are an assertive way to express your experiences and tries to minimize defensive reactions of the receiver. Often an I statement consists of three parts: a nonjudgemental description of someone's behaviour; a specific feeling; and how someone's behaviour directly impacts you. See Section 8.3 Asserting Your Needs
Job enlargement is defined as the adding of new challenges or responsibilities to a current job, can create job satisfaction. Assigning us to a special project or task is an example of job enlargement. See Section 8.1 Theories of Motivation
means to enhance a job by adding more meaningful tasks to make our work more rewarding. See Section 8.1 Theories of Motivation
Motivation refers to an internally generated drive to achieve a goal or follow a particular course of action. See Section 8.1 Theories of Motivation
Outcome fairness refers to the judgment that we make with respect to the outcomes we receive versus the outcomes received by others with whom we associate with at work. When assessing whether an outcome is fair, individuals often look at consistency, bias suppression, information accuracy, correctability, representativeness and ethicality. See Section 8.1 Theories of Motivation
Passive communicators tend to put the rights of others before their own. Passive communicators tend to be apologetic or sound tentative when they speak. They do not speak up if they feel like they are being wronged. See Section 8.3 Asserting Your Needs
Process Goals – how events or processes unfold, how decisions are made, and how communication takes place. See Section 8.4 Understanding Goals in Conflict and The Scarf Model
Relationship Goals – How people relate to one another. See Section 8.4 Understanding Goals in Conflict and The Scarf Model
Reframing is taking a conversation and bringing it back to the topic at hand if things get off track. See Section 8.3 Asserting Your Needs
SCARF model is a model of social experience by Rock et al. that identifies five domains of human experience: status, certainty, autonomy, relatedness, and fairness. Threats to one or more of these domains may result in conflict. See Section 8.4 Understanding Goals in Conflict and The Scarf Model
Substantive Goals – our ability to secure tangible resources and/or something measurable and visible that we desire. See Section 8.4 Understanding Goals in Conflict and The Scarf Model
Supportive communication climate is defined as an environmental where the overall tone of the relationship is warm and supportive. Communication behaviours in this climate are less likely to elicit defensiveness. Supportive behaviours include description, straightforwardness, collaboration, empathy, equality and flexibility. See Section 8.2 Meeting Needs Through Communication Climate
Sympathy is feeling bad for someone; to pity them or their situation. Unlike empathy, an individual who expresses sympathy is not engage in the cognitive component of empathy - they are just considering the situation from their own worldview. Individuals who are expressing sympathy also fail to exhibit the affective or compassionate aspects of empathy. See Section 8.2 Meeting Needs Through Communication Climate
The five domains of human social experiences. David Rock and his team found that there are 5 areas of our brains that light up (via brain scan technology) during our social experiences. See Section 8.4 Understanding Goals in Conflict and The Scarf Model
You statements tend to place blame on the other person and may evoke defensiveness compared to using I statements. See Section 8.3 Asserting Your Needs
