ACCA Applied Knowledge · Business and Technology · Communicating in business
A finance manager emails a team: 'Please finalise the WIP reconciliation ASAP.' Staff from the sales department, who are copied in, do not understand the abbreviations and ignore the message. Which barrier to communication is MOST clearly illustrated?
The barrier is the use of jargon. The finance manager used technical abbreviations that sales staff did not understand, so they could not decode the message properly. Nothing in the scenario points to overload, noise or status differences as the cause.
- AUse of jargonCorrect
- BInformation overload
- CPhysical noise
- DStatus difference
Explanation
The message relies on technical abbreviations that the non-finance recipients do not understand, which is jargon. There is no suggestion of too much information, environmental noise, or hierarchy-based distortion. The failure arises from the language used.
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