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Essay about Critical Theory of Communication in Organizations

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Critical Theory of Communication in Organizations

The critical theory of communication developed by Stanley Deetz was designed to explore ways to insure the organizations’ health while increasing the representation of diverse human interests. He does this first by showing that corporations have become political as well as economic institutions. Deetz then employs advances in communication theory to point out how communication practices within a corporation can distort decision making. Finally, he outlines how workplaces can become more productive and democratic through communication reforms.

Humanists feel that meanings are in people not words. Deetz accepts this but goes another step and wants to know whose meanings are …show more content…

Managers in the corporate world are driven by one thing: money. But what else makes people work? They are driven to deal with conflict and not to “openly discuss” it. They are coerced to be able to run things smoothly. This makes things seem like managers only care about how the company is ran rather than ethics and personal feelings. The terms “company policy” and “just doing my job” are ways to explain this criteria.
For example, in the movie, Roger and Me, the deputy who is ordered to go around to people’s houses and inform them that they are being evicted from their home, describes his doings as “just doing my job”. He avoids conflict in that he gives a reason for what he has to do, whether it is unethical or if it hurts other peoples feelings. Deetz does say that most corporate success is not an effect of managerial control. Control is costly and creates resentment of workers.

This first criteria Deetz discusses is probably the way many organizations are dealt with. However, in the current world that we live in, topics such as sexual harassment and sexism can no longer be taken lightly, or should I say can they be included in “company policy”. Many more companies today are using human resource models of managerialism rather that the traditional model that has been the only form of controlling a company up until the last half of the

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