Barriers of Business Communication

 

Barriers to Communication

The factors that hinder or make it difficult to interpret messages as intended are called communication barriers. We may misunderstand while reading, listening, or looking at something. Anything that filters, blocks, or distorts the message during the process of ‘encoding-sending-decoding’ is called a communication barrier.  There are four main types of barriers to communication as mentioned below:

A.         Physical or Environmental Barriers: The physical or environmental barriers are caused by time, place, space, and noise in the communication.

B.          Language or Semantic Barriers: Even if we communicate using a shared language at times, getting the right message to the audience poses/creates difficulty due to words, structure, context, and tone. Moreover, a word has multiple meanings so it must be interpreted as the intended meaning (Semantic barrier).

C.          Cultural Barrier: People interpret messages based on their culture-specific beliefs, values, and attitudes. Cultural differences can affect communication significantly. The term ‘Hugging’ is specific in one culture whereas it is not accepted in another culture.

D.         Psychological and Perceptual Barriers: Emotions, anger, aggrieved, happiness, and sadness are our feelings that may divert the message into another aspect that creates misunderstanding in communication. Next, the perception of the subject matter can be a barrier to communication. 

Minimizing barriers of communication

a.      Make sure that your message is relevant and purposeful

b.     Send a clear, concise, and complete message

c.      Understand who you are communicating with

d.     Maintain appropriate tone, style, and overall courtesy 

e.      Select an appropriate channel or medium

f.       Ask for and provide feedback

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