InfoTrac Web: Expanded Academic ASAP.
AB Compliance-gaining theory has the potential for improving the
analysis of management communication through memoranda. The conventional method of analyzing memoranda is the bad news formula, which is based on sales principles. This method searches for buffers, reasons, implied
refusal and other language cues in analyzing the contents of memoranda. However, compliance-gaining theory adds strength to textual analysis by
explicating the interpersonal relationships underlying the message production process. Analysis of several management memos written to subordinates reveals that their compliance-gaining features yield further insight into the power structure, verbal strategies and negotiating process involved in the communication.
AL Trade
AT Rereading bad news: compliance-gaining features in management memos.
AU Carol David
AU Margaret Ann Baker
CT The Journal of Business Communication
DE Memorandums_Research
DE Business writing_Psychological aspects
DE Compliance (Psychology)_Psychological aspects
DP Oct 1994 v31 n4 p267(24)
IS n4
LW p267(24)
ND 20050808
PB Association for Business Communication
PT Magazine/Journal
PT Refereed
RM COPYRIGHT 2005 Gale Group
SN 0021-9436
SU Memorandums_Research
SU Business writing_Psychological aspects
SU Compliance_Psychological aspects
SU Research
SU Psychological aspects
VO v31
ZZ
Source: The Journal of Business Communication, Oct 1994 v31 n4
p267(24).
Title: Rereading bad news: compliance-gaining features in
management memos.
Author: Carol David and Margaret Ann Baker
Abstract: Compliance-gaining theory has the potential for improving
the analysis of management communication through memoranda. The conventional method of analyzing memoranda is the bad news formula, which is based on sales principles. This method searches for buffers, reasons, implied refusal and other language cues in analyzing the contents of memoranda. However, compliance-gaining theory adds strength to textual analysis by explicating the interpersonal relationships underlying the message production process. Analysis of several management memos written to subordinates reveals that their compliance-gaining features yield further insight into the power structure, verbal strategies and negotiating process involved in the communication.
Subjects: Memorandums - Research
Business writing - Psychological aspects
Compliance - Psychological aspects
Electronic Collection: A16359678
RN: A16359678
Full Text COPYRIGHT Association for Business Communication 1994
Methods of conveying bad news have received surprisingly little
attention considering their broad application in the business world. Widely accepted is advice offered by textbooks for delivering written bad news: an indirect organizational pattern, including buffer, reasons, implied refusal, and positive ending. Because the bad news formula originated in the pedagogy for consumer sales writing (Adair, 1986), its usefulness for analyzing in-house communication may be limited. Managers must frequently announce inconvenient changes that convey "bad news" to employees, and the writing choices for these messages may be different from those used with customers outside of the organization.
In this study we show how compliance-gaining theory can help to explain
some of the content and style of two kinds of memos that deliver bad news
from managers to subordinates. In the first section of the paper we review
pertinent research on bad news, most of which has dealt with the
organizational patterns and tone of bad news messages. Then we present
findings from research on compliance-gaining theory which identify some
of the message and contextual features that might influence the writing choices made in bad news memos. In the second section we apply the compliance-gaining principles to two kinds of real-world memos, reminders and announcements of changes, to exemplify how the features elucidate the texts. Finally, we assess the contribution of compliance gaining in analyzing the memos.
RESEARCH ON BAD NEWS
Research on the bad news formula typically has examined the placement of
the bad news in letters and the letters' tone. Judgments about the efficacy
of an indirect organizational pattern have been mixed. Jablin and Krone (1984) looked at the organization and content of employment rejection letters sent to college students and found that the principles described by the bad news formula, an indirect organization with some form of explanation, were seen by recipients as clear and personal. Brown (1993), reviewing 500 employment rejection letters, recommended a personal, humane tone but rejected flattery or ambiguity in attaining it.
Many researchers have preferred directness in presenting bad news.
Salerno (1988), in a study of his own job rejection letters, ruled against
buffers, judging them either "insincere or merely ritualistic", and Brent (1985) reported that readers, especially business readers, find the indirect arrangement transparent and manipulative. Limaye (1988) also found that over half of editors rejecting journal articles, eschewing conventional advice, placed the bad news in the first paragraph. Furthermore, he found no significant relationship between the placement and the recipients' perceptions of the sender. Other researchers such as Suchan and Dulek (1988) have objected to the bad news formula because it fails to recognize the complexity of the audience and context of a message. In general, researchers have agreed that achieving a personal tone is important in conveying bad news, but the organizational pattern of the message is not essential in attaining the tone.
Another method of analysis that researchers have applied to bad news is
Brown and Levinson's politeness theory. As a branch of pragmatics, politeness theory describes strategies used by speakers to protect the listener's image, or save face. Depending on the power and personal relationship between the speakers, and the degree of negativity of the message, speakers employ various linguistic strategies to mitigate a potential threat to the listener (Brown & Levinson, 1987). These strategies, originally identified in oral communication, have been applied to written documents. Campbell (1990) found that including reasons in bad news messages served as a politeness strategy. Also, Hagge and Kostelnick (1989) applied linguistic politeness to sample letters taken from an auditors' firm to illustrate the frequent use of stylistic "passives, expletives, nominalizations, and hedging particles" in mitigating potentially threatening interactions with clients.
On the other hand, Cherry (1988), applying linguistic politeness to
letters written by faculty to the president of a state university objecting to a tenure decision, found that they violated some politeness maxims. Cherry consequently advised that awareness of contextual features is needed in a linguistic analysis. Analyzing in-house oral messages, Lee (1993) concluded that politeness theory did not explain strategies used by females, and she also noted several specific strategies that politeness theory does not identify. Her research suggests that the large number of options for style and content of bad news messages seriously hampers attempts to catalog them. Thus, politeness theory has contributed basic principles for explaining politeness in messages, but cannot address all of the nuances of style and content produced by changing contexts. In fact, Brown and Levinson in the 1987 reissue of their work on linguistic politeness acknowledge the importance of contextual features to their theory and the contribution of compliance-gaining research.
While these approaches to an analysis of bad news can elucidate some
effective writing techniques, they are limited in explaining the important contextual features in a communication. Some composition researchers see the context as vital to understanding the message. For instance, Odell, Goswami, Herrington, and Quick (1983) found that writers in a social services department were uneasy when asked to review memos taken out of context even though the memos were taken from their own organization. Awareness of the events that preceded or followed the memo and the writer and subject matter was imperative to their judging the memos. Yet discovering such contextual features is a task that Faigley describes as "formidable" (1985, p. 236).
One method that may reveal some of this contextual data is
compliance-gaining theory, developed by researchers in psychology and organizational communication. Similar to linguistic politeness, this research has been conducted on oral, interpersonal communication, but unlike politeness research, it has not addressed stylistic techniques of sentence structure and word choice. Instead, the principles of compliance-gaining theory illuminate many of the power bases, verbal strategies, and contextual features of persuasive business communication. In the following section we discuss pertinent compliance-gaining research. When needed, we have amplified the reported research with findings drawn from research in professional writing and with examples from our own experience.
COMPLIANCE-GAINING FEATURES
Compliance-gaining research has addressed the use of power in
persuasion. Much attention has gone to identifying the verbal strategies actors use to influence others and compiling taxonomies of these strategies. However, because of the number of taxonomies used in research and their discrepancies in definition, the taxonomies have not allowed replication of experiments and expansion of the theory. In their research Kellermann and Cole (1994) conducted an extensive study of strategy taxonomies and identified seventy-four classification systems. Responding to the Kellermann and Cole study, O'Keefe (1994) urges researchers to look at features of the message rather than concentrating on the classification of message strategies and Roloff (1944) responds to the Kellermann and Cole study by emphasizing that because compliance-gaining research spans a number of disciplines, context
is important in interpreting messages. Although some of the research
situations have involved social relationships, many of the experiments have used business contexts. Furthermore, early power literature on which much of compliance gaining rests (Barnard, 1938; Etzioni, 1961; Simon, 1947) addresses organizations.
We have divided the following discussion of compliance gaining into two
sections: features of the message and features of the context. We have
chosen to discuss the power base, verbal strategies, and tactics in the message section because they reflect the features of message production. Also, we have included in this section some discussion of the process of communication underlying compliance-gaining theory. Under context we have placed employee resistance, goals, and corporate culture because these categories are not methods of gaining compliance but rather features of the persuasive situation (Kellermann & Cole, 1994). We believe, however, that in operation the features are essentially inseparable. Because research has examined a wide variety of contextual features in persuasion, we have selected from it what seems to best pertain to the two types of memos we discuss: reminders of company procedures that have been overlooked and changes in procedures and policies. Similar to other research on oral language, such as linguistic politeness theory (Campbell, 1990; Cherry, 1988; Hagge & Kostelnick, 1989), this study will adapt the research findings on oral communication to written communication. However, in examining the written texts, we have added some stylistic explanations to compliance-gaining theory.
Message Features
Features of the message include the power base underlying the method of persuasion and the verbal strategies that implement power with their
more specific breakdown into verbal tactics. These features create the basic content of the message.
Power Bases
Early research in compliance gaining identified power bases which actors
use in motivating their target audience to comply with the request. An early theory that has remained the most relevant (Wheeless, Barraclough, & Stewart, 1983) is the power base taxonomy of French and Raven (1959). They identify five primary power bases: legitimate power, where persons are granted power because of their position in an organization or society; reward power, the ability to provide remuneration (for example, money, prestige, promotion); coercive power, the ability to provide punishment (for example, reprimands, demotion, termination); expert power, the appearance of special abilities or knowledge; and referent power, the appearance of sharing similar values. An especially useful feature of French and Raven's theory is the ease of translating power bases into strategies of control. For instance, the legitimate power of managers often gains compliance simply because of their rank. What they ask is essentially mandatory in a hierarchical organization. Likewise, reward and punishment, expertise, and referent power suggest motivations and strategies for gaining compliance. Additionally, Etzioni (1961) adds a further component to the power bases: normative power. He divides this power base into two types, "pure," which boosts the target's feelings of self-esteem, and "social," which activates the need for group acceptance. Implementing normative power of either type and its inherent social constraints may result in self-imposed compliance or group-imposed rewards and punishments. Also, when managers request that all employees
follow institutional rules, individuals are not singled out, and the
requirements may seem more fair.
As the power literature has shown, when managers have the legitimate
power to make their requests, often the changes meet with little resistance. Barnard (1938), in early power theory, postulates that subordinates will comply with a supervisor's request because they grant the supervisor the authority of leadership; that is, they recognize the supervisor's power to ask or demand certain behaviors from them, and they will comply even if they experience some reluctance. Barnard explains that, in addition to being comprehensible, communicative acts should conform with the lines of authority--that is, a hierarchical channel of authority should exist where every person below the head reports to someone else, and communication, to maintain compliance, should follow the channel of authority. In hierarchical organizations employees may expect decisions to be appropriately authoritative. Driskill and Goldstein (1986, p. 41) document the disastrous effects when the announcement of a plant closing came from the human resources manager instead of the CEO.
Currently, the norms of hierarchy and authority still exist within large
corporations; however, most companies grant employees some opportunities
to participate in decisions. Referent or expert power may be used more
often in current team concepts, even in hierarchical organizations. Such power bases may diminish the expected resistance of the employees because they feel more involved in decision-making.
Communication--A Negotiation
Compliance-gaining models have described persuasion as a reciprocal
process, where writers and readers negotiate meanings based on their past
experiences and the context of the immediate message. Shelby points out that the attitudes and needs of the employees play a major role in determining the optimal choice of power strategy (1991). As early as 1945 Simon's Administrative Behavior recognized the importance of the reciprocal nature of manager and employee communication. Simon extends Barnard's argument of authority to the issue of commitment, which he refers to as "willingness" or "conviction". Like Barnard, Simon believes that the authority or power of a supervisor alone will yield compliance from a subordinate. He also argues, however, that behavioral compliance does not necessarily insure commitment. This concept of commitment