15 Barriers to Effective Communication

1. Wrong/inappropriate language
2. Wrong Channel: A channel may be wrong for various reasons. One reason is that
the receiver is not familiar with the channel used; such as an e-mail message.
3. Wrong encoding: If the sender fails to correctly encode the intended message, the
receiver will not receive the intended message.
4. Competing messages: For various reasons, two or more senders send messages to
the receiver at the same time. These messages may become, at least, partly
competing with one another in their very meaning (or even objectives). So the
receiver cannot receive only a single message, rather, the receiver receives many
competing messages. The receiver will give more emphasis on the more compelling
messages which, in fact, may be totally meaningless or irrelevant.
5. Channel Breakdowns: Sometimes the channel simply breaks down and fails to
deliver the messaged at all. Channel breakdown implies many different things. A
colleague you were counting on to deliver a message to your boss might have
forgotten to do so, or a computer server might have crashed.
6. Filters: Messages can be blocked or distorted by filters, any human or technological
interventions between the sender and the receiver. A filter can be both intentional
and unintentional. For instance, the structure and culture of an organization can
also inhibit the flow of vital messages and in some cases the people or companies
you rely on to deliver your message can distort it or filter it to meet their own
needs.
7. Distractions (Noises): External distractions range from uncomfortable meeting
rooms, to crowded computer screens with instant messages and reminders
popping up all over the place. The common habit of multitasking, attending more
than one task at a time, is practically guaranteed to create communication
distraction.

Internal distractions are thoughts and emotions that prevent receiver from focusing
on incoming messages.
8. Perceptual Difference: The meaning of each word and each sentence is influenced
by the perception and past experiences of the receiver. When the receiver
encodes, s/he keeps the sender in mind and then based on his/her past knowledge
and perception about the sender.
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9. Deceptive tactics: Deceptive tactics refer to illegal (or illegitimate) and immoral
messages that we discussed in the class.
10. Restrictive environment: By restrictive environment we mean basically two things:
(1) the way a particular message is being exchanged may jeopardize its privacy
when privacy is required. (2) When a message is being sent to a person without
becoming sure that the person will really receive and read the message.
11.Information overload: When the receiver receives many messages at a time, it is
very likely that the receiver will receive the message partly, or will not be able to
receive at all due to too much overload. It is quite likely that the message will be
avoided.
12.Undesirable message: If the sender sends a message in an undesirable language or
there is no justification to send the message (many banks practice undesirable or
baseless information), the receiver does not properly receive it since the message is
not desirable. Such messages are sent by the sender to give bad time to the
receiver. Messages without business etiquette are also undesirable. Inside the
organization, the sender must have the authority to send (we will discuss this in the
Linking Pin).
13.Job Stress: Managers make serious mistakes in about 27% due to job stress.
14. Technology Overload: Like information overload, if a manager uses many
communication devices at a time, s/he must make some gross mistakes. As a
simple example we can mention the finding of a research that a communicator will
definitely collapse if s/he uses more than three smart phone devices at a time.
15. Not conducive/appropriate contexts: You have to make sure that your message
matches with the contexts.

Note that until there is decoding, there is no message; you cannot have any message
before decoding. Wrong decoding is quite common. It happens due to different
filters, including distractions, etc. Wrong Decoding is not a separate barrier.