The effectiveness of business information Essay Example for Free

The effectiveness of business information Essay Evaluate the effectiveness of business information and its communication as key contributors to the success of an organisation In order to grow and expand, a business needs to a good communication and information management that will help them apply their different strategies and reach their goals and objectives more efficiently. Tesco is big business that has excellent communication and information management system within their organisation. They use information and communication method efficiently in the way they operate and that is why they are one of the biggest retailers in the UK. Methods of written communication Letter Tesco uses letters as a form of written communication, to get in contact with various types of people who include staff members from the other stores, customers or staffs who are unable to attend work for health issues. An advantage of using letters is that they can easily reach and communicate with their customers about financial issues or bills. A disadvantage of using letter is that the letter might not get delivered to the specific place you want it or on time, this could cause problems. Another disadvantage of using a letter is that it might get lost in the post and never get in to the destination. Reports Tesco use reports as a form of written information to communicate with between staff members within the company. The advantage of them using reports is that they record and show information of what happened during an entire week or month in a store for example. A report often contains information, sales figures and bar graphs to show the overall performance of something. Tesco use report to convey information about how they performed annually every year to show people their profit/sales etc. A disadvantage of using reports is that writing involves gathering a lot of data sometimes and they are quite time consuming. It would take a lot of time to produce reports because you have to record every that has occurred and sometimes doesn’t provide the full information it is hard to acquire all information and note them down. Newspapers Notices Tesco use notices as a form of reminder of tasks that needs to be completed during the day, in a week or sometimes in the near future. An advantage of using notes it that it can help save time as well as reminding member of staffs efficiently and tell their employees/staff on upcoming events/activities The disadvantage of notices is that it can create a waste of paper and a mess when they are too many notes accumulating in one place all at once. For when the all the notes from the past days and future are all stacked in one place. Leaflets Tesco mostly use leaflets communicate to their customers by informing them and keeping up to date about what changes within Tesco. For example, they could use leaflets to inform customers about offers, competition, sales, special deals and bundles. Another advantage of Tesco using leaflets is that they can inform customers any new products or services they bring out. A disadvantage of Tesco using leaflets is that their customers might misunderstand the information they convey. Another disadvantage of using leaflets is that Tesco will have to spend time and quite a lot of money to design and make leaflets. Emails Tesco use E-mails to contact customers as well as other employees with the company. An advantage of this written communication method is that Tesco can contact the person whoever they want to contact efficiently knowing that the person they are trying to reach will receive the message. They can also use is as a way to keep in contact with their customers and update them about things like special offers and promotions to avoid losing them. The disadvantage of Tesco using E-mails is that some people don’t use their E-mail regularly and therefore won’t be able to respond to the message that has been sent to them on time. Another disadvantage to of using E-mails is that some customers will see Tesco messages and offers as a sort of spam which could be inconvenient sometime. Magazines Magazines are also another way for Tesco to communicate information to their customers such as promotional information about offers, deals, bundles and others. They can also use magazines to convey information about the latest product and services they bring out. An advantage of using magazines as written information is that it allows them to reach their customers easily and efficiently regularly. Another advantage of magazine is the cost of it, it is cheaper for Tesco to publish and communicate information through magazine than do it on TV and radio adverts. A disadvantage of Tesco using magazines as a written communication tool is that they may not reach all customers that way because not all customers like to read magazines. Methods of non-written communication TV Tesco use television as a method of on-screen information to advertise new products or services to their customers. The advantage of Tesco using television as a way of communication is that they can easily reach they target group through such technology since everyone own and watches the TV nowadays. The disadvantage of Tesco using television as a method of communication is that they will have to spend a lot of money for advertisements to be shown on TV for an adequate amount of time so that their target group can easily perceive it. Presentations Tesco uses presentation as a tool for verbal to share information about carious things concerning the company, their competitors, their plans and strategies for the future and the market they operate in. During these presentations, specific strategies to reach future goals are discussed and established. Plans to overcome competition and threats are discussed as well as ideas for future promotions are discussed. A disadvantage of presentation is that not all the staffs working at Tesco will take part to the presentation. This could pose problems because staffs who haven’t attended the presentation will be uninformed and therefore won’t be aware of the changes being made. Radio Tesco uses Radio as a tool for verbal communication to share information to their customers about things like offers and promotions. The advantage is that they are more likely to reach their target groups by doing so. The disadvantage of using radio is it might not be clear when you try contact someone and also you may contact the wrong person this is because radio had different channels. Face to face Tesco uses verbal information like face to face conversation because it allows them to communicate important information easily with each other within the company. Using face to face communication is the best way of communication Tesco can use to communicate verbally because there is less scope for miss-understanding in it. They also use face to face communication to communicate information with their customer personally to which they will obtain instant reply. One disadvantage of this non-written method of communication is that people don’t always get the time to meet and discuss thing face to face. It would also cost a lot of money for people from different place of work to meet and have face to face communication. Telephone Tesco uses Verbal information on the telephone to contact their members of staffs when there is a problem or it can be to check and clarify something for example. The advantage of using telephone for verbal communication is that staffs and colleges at the company can get in contact with each other when they are outside of work. Another advantage of using telephone for verbal communication is that customers can contact them for enquiries about products or complaints. One disadvantage of using telephone as a verbal communication tool that when the customer calls, the employee answering to the phone might not be trained to answer the phone, this could create complications between the company and the customer Video conference Tesco use videoconferencing as a tool of verbal communication to contact members of staffs from other stores across the country or even in different countries. The advantage of this is that they will be able to reach the colleges they are trying to join easily and without having to pay much which will save them the coast of travel. The disadvantage of this method is that when they contact other stores in other countries, there may be some connection problem which will cause understanding problems for both groups trying to communicate. Voicemail Tesco uses voicemails as a way of communication because they are another way to get in contact with other within the company when the phone can’t be answered or when the person being contacted is absent for example. Tesco use voicemail as a communication tool to contact their customers or even other staffs within the company. They use voicemails to contact customers when they need to remind them about their product deliveries for example or even to arrange a date to pick up an item for return. The disadvantage of voice mail at Tesco is that the voicemail system might have a failure and delete the voicemails or might just auto delete itself if the message left has been left untouched for too long. Audience requirements Age and Attention span Tesco in stores for example do have age restrictions on products targeted to mature or older audience. The y also require an id to purchase things like alcohol and cigarettes. The advantage of this is that it allows taco to protect minors from purchase adult materials. Gender and Ethnicity Gender and ethnicity is about representing people from all background when and all ethnicity with both gender equally when targeting an audience for products or services. When aiming advert at an audience, the audience is more likely to respond well if they feel included and connected to the message the business is trying to pass on. This is an effective method of communication for Tesco because when they produce adverts for their new products, they make sure the advert represents a balanced cross-section of their audience. This in turn helps them reach and attract more people from the target audience regardless of their gender or race. Special needs and Accessibility The advantage of Tesco adapting their communication to special needs and accessibility is that it helps anyone from the target audience to efficiently perceive the information being communicated by Tesco. This in return encourage a great response from the audience to communication being shared. Reading ability This is communicating information in a way that everyone can read and understand the information being communicated to the audience. The advantages of Tesco using simple language to communicate with their audience is that they can easily and efficiently reach them the audience and obtain good response in exchange. The disadvantage of Tesco using simple language is that more sophisticated and educated audience would expect information to be communicated through more technical language and terms. Legibility This refers to the material that makes the business information being communicated to audience easier to read and to properly understand the information being communicated to them. An advantage for Tesco using this method is that the will be in a better position attract customers with the information they communicate to them. Interests This is about grabbing the attention of the audience to which the information of the business is being communicated to. This can be achieved by the business through getting straight to the point of what they want to say so that they can keep their audience attention. The advantage of this method for Tesco is that they can easily attract the interests of their audiences when they are communicating information. A disadvantage of this method is that the business might need more effort to try and grab the interests of audiences straight away because it is not always easy to win the attention of people quickly. Distraction avoidance This method is about minimising distraction during a verbal presentation to an audience. To do so, before giving a presentation, you can ask the audience to switch their mobile phones off so that it doesn’t distract during the presentation if someone tries to call. Industry related experience and knowledge This a about know the audience to which to you are talking to when addressing an audience for your presentation. This is important to know because when you are talking to an experienced audience they will not need too much explanation whereas if you’re talking to people with no experience, you will have to explain the information you are communicating or they will be confused. An advantage of his is that it will help save tame and allow to prepare before the presentation as to how much explanation you will need to do during your presentation. Communication skills Formal /informal Formal /informal information refers to the format in which the information communicated within the business is in. When communicating information to audiences such as customers or even for business reports, information is communicated in formally and uses professional and technical language. Between staffs at Tesco, information is mostly communicated informal. An advantage of communicating information formally / informally is that share information efficiently to different types of audiences. Verbal/non-verbal Most information is often communicated verbally or non-verbally, verbal communication usually involves the voice and non-verbal information doesn’t. The most common for of b=verbal communication is phone, face to face, presentation, meetings, video conferencing etc Non verbal information is usually done through paper, screen or emails. An advantage of verbal communication is that it is always clear and cannot be misunderstood by any audience. A disadvantage of verbal communication is that it might coast money for it to be possible sometimes, for example when people from different places of the organisation need to meet and discuss about the business. Listening understanding Listening is mostly bout hearing and understanding the information and message that is being communicated to you. The advantage of listening to information and messages is that it allows people to understand. Seeking Clarification Seeing clarification is about making sure you fully understand the information that is being communicated to you. To do so, you can ask question and ask for more explanation if you are not sure. The advantage of seeking clarification is that it helps understand information properly which makes it to easily put t in practices later on. A disadvantage of that is that it can sometime be a waste of time going and over some information. Another one is that it can be tiring sometimes. Responsiveness Responsiveness is about making sure that the audience to whom you are communicating fully understand the message you are communicating to them. As a communicator if you feel that your audience does not understand your message, you need to respond by giving them more detailed information. An advantage of this method is that it helps audience to understand the message you are giving them which will lead to a successful communication. Eye contact Facial expressiveness Facial expressiveness is about the impression you face is giving to the audience to which you are communication information. The advantage of having a good face expression when communicating information is that it helps convince your audience. A disadvantage of not having the right face expression is that it can mislead the audient to which you communicate information even if you don’t intend to. Body language When presenting information, body language can help understand the message you are trying to communicate by giving away your thoughts and feelings. An advantage of using body language is that it allows information to be communicated and understood easily and efficiently. A disadvantage of body langue is that it may be misleading sometime. Use of appropriate professional language Formal and informal communication needs to be shared through different ways to be efficient sometimes. The advantages of Tesco using simple language to communicate with their audience is that they can easily and efficiently reach them the audience and obtain good response in exchange. The disadvantage of Tesco using simple language is that more sophisticated and educated audience would expect information to be communicated through more technical language and terms. Ability to adapt communication techniques to audience requirements This is about finding the right method to use when presenting information so that your audience will be suited to and to which they can easily connect. This is due to the fact that not all communication techniques will suit all audiences. An advantage of choosing a suitable communication method for your audience is that it will help you communicate successfully. A Disadvantage of this is that by choosing the wrong communicating method for your audience could lead them to be disinterested or misunderstand your message. Presentational skills Presentational skills refer to the things you can do in order to enhance the presentation you will be giving to your audience. Preparation and notes could help structure and improve presentation. An advantage of presentational skills is that they enhance the information being shared to audience in an efficient way. Ability to invite Commitment to shared goals This is about adding information and interests that will help persuade and convince the audience. To make sure this approach is done successfully, you need to make sure you clearly articulate arguments you make, demonstrate your information honestly and to be ready to answer any questions.