 Hi everyone. Welcome to this discussion of communication channels as we continue to talk about media communication and modern communication communicating in our modern era. So communication channels have become even more expansive as our modern era of communication has evolved. And so we want to talk a little bit about how we most effectively use those. But let's start off with a discussion of what is a channel. First of all channel when we say the word channel we're talking about the medium or means through which communication takes place. A medium is just another word for channel. So we're talking about how that communication takes place. How are messages and feedback sent? How are things being communicated? So if we look at them in the context of the transactional model of communication, which you see here in front of you. So we see you have all the different elements. You have the communicators, communicator A, communicator B. So in this instance, we have two people. Then you have noise and you have feedback. You have messages being sent back and forth. But there in the midst of it all are the channels or channel or channels. It could be multiple channels. It could just be one. And the channel is how all of those things are taking place. So are you seeing somebody face to face? Are you talking on the phone? Are you sending smoke signals? Are you tapping through a wall using Morris code? Are you, you know, are you leaving a post it note or sending a text message? Those are all different types of channels. So the way that we communicate that how of which we communicate is called the channel. So with that in mind, we can get the different types of channels that we have. So first we start with verbal communication. And for our definition of verbal communication, we're going to be mostly talking about oral communication here, the way that we speak to other people using our voice and using languages, our voices. Okay, so we're not talking about we're differentiating verbal communication from sending a text message or writing things down or things like that. But so verbal communication is spoken communication, essentially. We also have been written communication, which we knows takes place in all kinds of different forms today. You can write things down. People still do that. We leave posted notes for your right letters and things. But we also email, we text, we send messages over social media that are that are in, you know, written form. So, and especially as we enter the working world, written communication becomes a very different thing. We need to be able to separate the personal written communication from professional written communication. That's something we're going to chat about here in a bit. But so we have verbal communication, which is just oral and spoken communication. And we have written communication, which is pretty self-explanatory. Then we have this other categories well of nonverbal communication, which is sort of everything else, verbal and written communication. We're really going to imply that both of those have to do with the words that we're using, the text, the language that we're using. Nonverbal communication then involves everything else. So nonverbal communication and different nonverbal channels could include body movement. And body movement is sort of a broad category that would include things like your facial displays, our facial expressions, our eye behavior, meaning are we looking at someone? Are we looking away from them? Are we, you know, how are we using our eye behaviors in that sense? Our posture and our gestures, that would all be a part of body movement or what we call kinesics, right? So that's one type of nonverbal channels, any way that we use our body. Also touch or haptics is another form of nonverbal communication. It's another channel for nonverbal communication that we use. Also voice, what we call para language. Now you may think, well, we just talked, you just said verbal as its own thing or whatever. Yeah, that's true. But again, we're talking there about the language that we're choosing and the method of communication there being oral or spoken communication. But the way that we use our voice, meaning our tone, our pitch, our volume, that's all nonverbal. And we can express a great deal through the tone of our voice and through the volume of our voice, right? But that's a specific nonverbal channel of communication as well. We also use space in different ways in terms of, you know, how closely we're standing to somebody that we have different, you know, we have our personal bubble, so to speak, which is only for, you know, people within that bubble ought to be people who are very close to us. And then we have, you know, different, different distances that we'd like to have people at when we're thinking about communicating nonverbally. If we don't know someone as well, we're likely to stand back a little further from them, both for our own sort of psychological comfort, I guess, but also as a sign of respect for them and for their comfort level. Anyway, we just use space different lens. That's a very highly cultural thing. It's dependent on culture, but we use space. All cultures do use space to communicate nonverbally. Time is a nonverbal communicator is a nonverbal channel as well. For example, in the workplace, your boss can keep you waiting for a meeting, right? But you can't do the opposite. And it's sort of a sign of who's got the power in that situation, but or, you know, how much we respect somebody else's time. And again, this is a highly cultural thing too, but, but we use time as a nonverbal communicator. Clothing certainly is a nonverbal communicator. The way we dress presents a particular style or particular interest that we have or, or a level of professionality, depending on our workspace or things. So clothing can be a tremendous nonverbal communicator and then smell. I mean, there's a reason that the perfume industry is such a massive industry, right? And not only that, but deodorant and things like that, we do a lot to control our smell and to present ourselves in a particular way. So that can be a real nonverbal indicator as well, the way that we smell and the way that we use smell to do that. So those are the different types of channels, verbal, written and nonverbal. Within each of those, though, we have all kinds of different, different ways to communicate different channels that we can use to communicate as well, right? And so it's important that we that we not only remember that we have all these different channels that we can use all these different, you know, ancient and modern technologies that we can use to communicate as well as our voice and just communicating that way through a nonverbal communication. But, but it's important, especially since we have so many tools, having all these tools doesn't do any good. If we can't remember to use the right tool for the job, if we're using the wrong tool for the job as a communicator, we're not being any more effective than this gentleman is trying to mow his lawn with the vacuum cleaner, right? So we need to use the right communication channel for that particular job. So with that in mind, let's think about a couple of characteristics that and considerations that relate to communication channels, the first of which is leanness, leanness. Communication channels exist sort of on a continuum in terms of being channel rich or channel lean, what we call channel rich or channel lean, meaning how many channels do you have access to and how rich are those channels in terms of the ability to gain understanding and context from the use of that channel. If there's a lot to be offered there, then we call that channel rich. And if there's not, then we call it channel lean. And every communication channel exists on this continuum, somewhere between highly channel rich and highly channel lean or somewhere in the middle. So for example, just to give you an idea, when we are face to face with somebody, that's incredibly channel rich. We have access to not only their words and their language that they're using and that they're choosing, excuse me, which is important, but we also have access to their facial expressions, their tone of voice, what they're wearing, where we're talking about it. Where do they choose to mention this? What's the environment that we're in when they choose to mention? So face to face offers all kinds of channels and it's very channel rich. Then somewhat more limited is a video call, for example. We can still see the person. We can hear their voice and hear their tone of voice. We can sort of see them and see kind of what they're wearing. But the truth is, you don't know apart from what you can see here, of me, for example, this is sort of, it's not a video call, but it's sort of a, you know, the same idea, but you can only see what I want you to see. Right? You can't necessarily see outside, first of all, the scope of my lens here, of my video lens. You can't see outside of the scope of that. You can't see below here. You know, you know, I could be wearing gym shorts or, you know, whatever below the shirt. I'm dressed to teach in this shirt, but you don't know outside of that, right? So there are things that I can control here. So it's not quite as channel rich. There's some things that are controllable and we can't get the full experience like we can in a face to face conversation, but still relatively channel rich, right? There's a lot to a lot that's offered in a video call or zoom call for work or whatever. But so it's relatively channel rich, but not as rich as face to face communication. Then we moving further down towards leanness, we're talking about just talking on the telephone, which you know, I understand people still do occasionally in this modern day, we still talk on the phone sometimes. And there it's, you know, it's more lean. We can't see the person, but we can hear their voice. We can see which words they're choosing the language that they're choosing, but we can't see them. Can't see their facial expressions. We can't see what they're wearing or necessarily what environments are in those types of contextual clues are missing. So it's more lean than some of the others that we've talked about. And then finally, when we talk about text and email, these are really fairly channel lean, because we're really relying mostly on just the text itself, just the words that are chosen. Now we find we have found ways over the years of trying to work around that and try and add some richness to these types of communication, right? Whether it's using all caps when you when you text or send an email or whatever to indicate that you're shouting or whatever, or we can use, you know, 100x exclamation points or whatever. But but we also have developed the text based used to be text based characters that we could use to express sort of nonverbal emotions. So we started with things like this, right? The smiley face, traditional smiley face, using the colon and the half of the parentheses there. So to indicate a smiley face, right, or you could do a frowny face, and we developed from there. And then eventually we got into emojis, right? Or this time it's probably called emoticons. But what we now know as emojis, and we had a few of these, and this is pretty spectacular, we could do that. And I were up to, you know, who knows how many we got all these. I will say my favorite one is the ice cream one, I just really enjoy ice cream. So I enjoy sending that one. But but still text and email despite all that still relatively channel lean, especially when you compare it to other types of communication channels, right? So text and email exists more on that lean. So we need to keep in mind that that while we're using these different channels, they have different elements of leanness, which can work to our advantage or can be a disadvantage. But we need to keep in mind that that they have this different element of leanness or richness, depending on how you look at it, that that exists in the type of communication channel that we choose. Another element that we need to consider is synchronicity. Synchronicity or asynchronicity. Synchronicity just means same time, that it's happening at the same time. If this were a live video call, or if we were face to face, that is synchronous communication, meaning it's happening in real time. Right at that moment, we can we can get their feedback, we can see their expressions or hear their responses and so forth right there in that moment. As opposed to asynchronous communication, which is what this is, I'm recording this at a particular time, you're watching it later, we're not live here. So you're watching this at a later time. And that's asynchronous communication, texting, emailing, leaving a voicemail, those types of things posting on social media generally are asynchronous communication, meaning they're not happening simultaneously, they're not happening in real time. Again, advantages and disadvantages, the advantages I can shoot a text off to my wife or a friend or kids or something and just leave it there for them. And I have to wonder, you know, worry about trying to catch up with them right in this very second, or worry about what they're doing, am I interrupting something, I can send them that message and it can just sit there until they're ready for the disadvantages. You know, if I'm in a hurry or something, that's a problem, right? I mean, that's an issue if I'm trying to get a response right now. So again, that's a consideration we need to keep in mind. Is this is something that needs to be handled right now? Is this something that can can just sit there until they're ready to respond or can I and can I wait that long? Those types of things we need to bear in mind that the channels have different levels of synchronicity as well. And then finally, permanence that that when we send a message electronically, for example, there's a sense of permanence there, you know, despite what some technologies may say is, you know, well, this will disappear forever in 10 seconds, well, won't necessarily, right? Even if they delete it or whatever, they're probably still going to have it on a server. And in that time, somebody could take a screenshot as we all know happens all the time. So there's a sense if you send it, then somebody else could potentially see it now or down the road or whatever. So if it's electronic involves some sort of technology, then there's a sense of permanence there, as opposed to when you speak to somebody, again, they might remember that. But unless they're recording it, there's no record of that permanently or whatever. But we need to keep that in mind. One recent example has been John Gruden was a football coach for the Las Vegas Raiders. Recently was fired because of some emails that he had sent 10 years ago when he was, you know, working as a broadcaster for ESPN. He sent some emails to a person that he knew an acquaintance of his that worked for a professional football team. That professional football team has since come under investigation and those emails were revealed as part of that investigation. And in those emails, he made some racist remarks, homophobic remarks, misogynistic remarks about women and just calling people names and just some nasty stuff. And within a couple of days, he was fired. Now that had nothing to do with this present job necessarily or anything, but some emails that he sent 10 years ago. And that doesn't excuse it when it doesn't excuse any of it, but I'm just saying those stuck around. He probably didn't think about those again or remember sending those at that time, but they stuck around. So there's a sense of permanence that's possible when you send something. One other example, just on a lighter note, this isn't just work related. You may have seen memes or something like this, or you may have even seen this particular meme. And I bring this one up because I know this person. I literally know this person in real life. I have for years, a former coworker of mine and friend of mine. And this is, I can tell you not what he really looks. I mean, this is him, but he's not, he doesn't dress like this. He doesn't have a mustache. He doesn't have a cat. He doesn't, you know, these were pictures that they took for fun to send Christmas cards to some of their friends one year. He posted this on Facebook and this was probably 12 years ago, 15 years ago at this point, but he posted it on Facebook. Somebody snagged it off there and it became an internet meme. And every year we'll see it float around around Christmas time in particular. We'll see this meme float around and say, there he is. And, you know, so we know this person, but he didn't anticipate that this would be something that would be out there forever, but it has been so far. You know, there's just the permanence. When you put something out there electronically, there's the potential that it could stay there forever. Now that can be of huge assistance. If you need to have a trail of what's sent, you want to keep a record of, you know, when you sent something and that you sent something and, or that somebody sent something to you, that's great. You have this, this permanence there that you can keep a record of that, but we need to keep that in mind as well on the other side, that what we put out electronically, either through email or text or on the internet or whatever could potentially stay there forever. So be sure that it's something you're comfortable having out there forever. So in the end, again, it really comes down to using the right tool for the job. You don't want to use the wrong tool for the job. We've got a multitude of communication channels that we can use, a multitude of ways that we can communicate with others. So we want to make sure that we're choosing the right tool, the appropriate tool for that job, which is not this one. So when we're thinking about communication channels, be sure that we choose wisely. You're going to have to choose. We have to choose how we're going to communicate something. So you must choose, but choose wisely. If you have questions about communication channels or about anything else related to media communication, please feel free to email me. Love to hear from me. Love to answer any questions that I can through that avenue, through that channel. So feel free to email me at any time. In the meantime, think about the way that you're communicating. Think about the advantages, disadvantages and characteristics and considerations of all these different wonderful communication channels that we have in the modern age. And be sure that you are choosing wisely for your purpose.