The search for new measures in organisational communication: A systematic literature review

Abstract

Purpose of the study: Communication is a central pillar in organisation, yet little genuine communication takes place in the organisation. The purpose of the paper is to craft communication model that promotes routine information availability and accessibility by simplifying the approach to organisational communication through the leadership level, functional level and operational level. Methodology: The study applied systematic literature review (SLR) or systematic research synthesis (SRS) as the approach to gather data, analyse to address the research query. The study method embraces the definition of SLR by Rousseau et al. (2008). The conditions for literature search electronically was done through multiple journal sites. The gathered published material dated between 1961-2018. Main Findings: The paper put forward three propositions to establish the argument for organisational communication. The findings show that there is no definitive agreement what constitute organisational communication as it is given many names like internal communication, employee communication, corporate communication etc. There is total lack of structural approach to organisational communication. Applications of this study: The paper refocuses organisational communication towards a three-tier approach and challenges leadership to communicate in tandem with managerial roles as purported by Mintzberg in order to give prominence to organisational communication. Novelty/Originality of this study: The paper introduces three new dimensions as measures of organisational communication with a new perspective on leadership communication, where Mintzberg’s managerial roles were used as reference for leadership communication responsibility which is missing in today’s organisation. The new measures of organisational communication are leadership level, functional and operational level.