What is ethical communication?
Ethics is the study of values and morals of what is right and wrong (Sage 2009). To be an ethical communicator means to practice being truthful, honest and accurate in communications. Ethical communication entails the accepting and understanding of three key elements: "What one hopes to achieve through the communication (the ends), how one chooses to communicate (the means), and the “real-world” outcomes (the consequences) of communication are particularly important features of ethical communication" (Sage 2009).
Ethical Communication Versus Effective Communication
Ethical and effective communications are not the same, however, can be occur at the same time when communication is prompt and accurate.
Ethical communication can be effective, effective communication does not need to be ethical.
Ethical communication can be effective, effective communication does not need to be ethical.
Ethical Communication
What makes something ethical communication?
To be an ethical communicator in this age means you are accurate, truthful and honest. Principles within ethical communication are autonomy, nonmaleficence, beneficence, justice and fidelity (Sundrud 2014). (Please see above for further definition of ethical communication) How is this different from effective communication? - Rooted in values and morals - Specific to cultural differences, varies depending on culture - Is lawful and therefore not illegal (example, insider trading). Effective communication does not need to be legal as long as the message's point is received Examples of ethical communication: I work at a company that tries to become affiliated, or in a relationship, with as many online merchants as possible. This means we work with a variety of merchants in different industries. One such industry we were working with, which is an industry that is known to make a lot of money, is adult websites. These webpages on our site outlinking to the adult websites caused some morally wrong issues as the coupon content that would come through was not appropriate for all audiences using our site. In addition, we did not want kids accidentally getting to these adult websites through our business. In an effort to clean up our website my boss communicated to me and the team to take down these sites as soon as possible. This example is ethical communication because we were told via e-mail to ensure these unethical (as we culturally defined morals and values) merchant pages be removed immediately from our website. This situation could be improved upon given what I now know by a more honest approach to the adult sites issue. We should be removing these sites as we do not believe in them, not because of usability for our customers only. In addition, the accurate information on what needed to be removed from the website should have been communicated to the several persons and teams involved in the site, not just our team. This would ensure that no new adult content store pages were added simultaneously as the clean up initiative was occurring. |
Effective Communication
What makes something effective communication?
To be an effective communicator means a receiver understands a message that the sender was intending to send. (Business Dictionary 2014) This communication is clear and easily understood Llivestrong.com 2014). There is also a non-verbal component to strong effective communication (Livestrong.com 2014). How is this different from ethical communication? - there are no values or morals necessarily used in effective communication - there is a non-verbal component to creating effective communication when communicating face-to-face Example of effective communication: I currently work in an internet company that requires a lot of digital communication - email and chat are constantly a means to communicate with people I sit right next to at the office and those clients that may live in other states. In one case, I was communicating with an inside sales representative at my company to relay to the merchant they were sending us tracking links that caused errors when outclicked. The overall issue would require additional time spent on the merchant's end to create the links we needed. To effectively communicate how their increase of time in creating the links would be beneficial, I needed to understand why there were tracking issues in the first place. Then, what links would work and I needed to compose an e-mail addressing how essential it was to get these links for customer usability. In order to do this I had to reach out internally, do research on my own and then compose an email that would make sense to the sales representative's limited tracking link knowledge and have enough information for the merchant to understand the new tracking links we would need. The information was proven to be effective as I was able to orchestrate the change necessary to ensure my company received the commissions on the referral through the correct tracking link. This situation could be improved upon given what I now know by meeting with the sales representative and explaining the links prior to sending the email. I should have asked all the information be presented to the merchant as I spent a lot of time researching the issue in order to create an effective way of convincing the merchant to send over what we need. In addition, the email could have been more clear and passed along at an earlier time before the tracking error arose. |
Sources:
2007. "Ethical Communication". Communication at Work. Accessed October 11, 2014. http://communication.atwork-network.com/2007/08/08/ethical-communication.
2009. "Ethical and Unethical Communication". 21st Century Communication: A Reference Handbook. Sage Publications. Accessed October 9, 2014. http://www.sagepub.com/edwards/study/materials/reference/77593_1.1ref.pdf.
2014. "Effective Communication". BusinessDictionary.com. Accessed October 11, 2014. http://www.businessdictionary.com/definition/effective-communication.html.
2014. "IABC Code of Ethics for Professional Communicators". IABC International Association of Business Communicators. Accessed October 10, 2014. http://www.iabc.com/about/code.htm.
Sundrud, Nolan. 2014. Ethics lecture from COMM 4020. University of Denver.
White, Heather. 2014. "Examples of Effective Communication Skils". Livestrong.com. Accessed October 9, 2014. http://www.livestrong.com/article/82418-examples-effective-communication-skills.
2007. "Ethical Communication". Communication at Work. Accessed October 11, 2014. http://communication.atwork-network.com/2007/08/08/ethical-communication.
2009. "Ethical and Unethical Communication". 21st Century Communication: A Reference Handbook. Sage Publications. Accessed October 9, 2014. http://www.sagepub.com/edwards/study/materials/reference/77593_1.1ref.pdf.
2014. "Effective Communication". BusinessDictionary.com. Accessed October 11, 2014. http://www.businessdictionary.com/definition/effective-communication.html.
2014. "IABC Code of Ethics for Professional Communicators". IABC International Association of Business Communicators. Accessed October 10, 2014. http://www.iabc.com/about/code.htm.
Sundrud, Nolan. 2014. Ethics lecture from COMM 4020. University of Denver.
White, Heather. 2014. "Examples of Effective Communication Skils". Livestrong.com. Accessed October 9, 2014. http://www.livestrong.com/article/82418-examples-effective-communication-skills.