The influences of corporate cultures on business communication: An ethnographic and textual analysis

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Abstract

It is proven that corporate cultures have a great impact on productivity, job satisfaction, and turnover. This study, through ethnographic and textual analysis, aims to investigate the influences of corporate/organizational cultures (Cooke & Szumal, 1993) on management and business communication. To form a comprehensive, holistic, and in-depth understanding of the organizational culture and its direct and indirect effects on professional communication in the workplace, participant observations were conducted, interviews were carried out and interorganizational and intraorganizational textual data was collected from an educational institute. The ethnographic and textual analysis revealed that the act of adaptiveness to the organizational culture shaped the communicative practices, the linguistic structures, and the behavioral norms of the place discourse community. As the employees were bound by the rules and regulations, they made direct and indirect references to the policies using referential intertextuality, functional intertextuality, and conventional formulaic expressions. As the employees were also bound to be supportive, friendly, and respectful, they strived to use proper opening and closing markers, positive and negative politeness, and affiliative humour to create a positive environment and reduce stress. Employees also used ellipsis, substitutions, hedges, and emoticons to mark excitement in conversations and writing. The study revealed that organizational cultures influence business communication through shaping the “I think”, “I feel”, and “I act” attitudes in different situations.

Keywords: Corporate Culture, Management, Language, Business Communication, Textual Analysis, Discourse Community

Authors’ individual contribution: The Author is responsible for all the contributions to the paper according to CRediT (Contributor Roles Taxonomy) standards.

Declaration of conflicting interests: The Author declares that there is no conflict of interest.

JEL Classification: A20, M10, M140

Received: 16.01.2021
Accepted: 30.03.2021
Published online: 31.03.2021

How to cite this paper: AlAfnan, M. A. (2021). The influences of corporate cultures on business communication: An ethnographic and textual analysis. Journal of Governance & Regulation, 10(2), 34–43. https://doi.org/10.22495/jgrv10i2art3