Because strategic planning can have a powerful effect on a district's future and its use of resources, district leaders must anticipate the need for extensive communication with all segments of the community at every planning stage. As the experience of Tacoma (Washington) Public Schools shows, regular communication is crucial to success. (MLH)

Argues that, if rhetoricians are to make significant strides forward in understanding writing that takes place both within and external to a single workplace culture, they will need to develop a much more expansive, complex, and sophisticated vision of collaboration across multiple organizational cultures. (SR)

Explores the pluralism model which undergirds both the systems and rhetorical perspectives in public relations theory. Shows how pluralistic assumptions affect the study of organization-stakeholder relationships. Calls for a more serious consideration of power's impact on the organization-stakeholder relationship. (HB)

Argues that meaning and persuasion are essential to public relations. Presents a model based on a rhetorical perspective, which addresses the impact of words and symbols, as a worthy candidate to be the dominant model in the field of public relations. (HB)

Argues that two basic propositions and their imperatives constitute an "ecological paradigm" useful in public relations theory and practice. Describes the ecological paradigm as constituted of two competing models of organizational change, adaptation and selection. Discusses implications of this model for research. (HB)

Reviews research on differing communication strategies of men (instrumental/empowering) and women (affiliative/depowering) in professional settings. Examines important communication differences along these lines, offers theories that explain why those differences exist, and determines when differences are most likely to occur. (SR)

Demonstrates how corporate culture stifled adaptive efforts of strategic planners, operations managers, industrial hygienists, and issue monitors in the asbestos industry thereby leading it to the brink of bankruptcy. (MG)

When crisis strikes, internal audiences at institutions of higher education need accurate information which depends on groundwork laid during good times. Key principles for emergency communication include predicting disasters by reading internal warning signs; preventing a potential crisis from growing; and preparing for smooth communications…

Evaluates an organizational diagnosis program that assesses managerial communication skills and provides the frame for follow-up training programs. Finds that managers participating in follow-up communication skills training performed significantly higher on interpersonal skills, problem-solving ability, and productivity over three long-term…

Discusses the important features of a successful public relations internship program. Considers the academic preparation, the academic structure, and the administrative procedures necessary for deploying a successful internship program. (HB)

Describes, in a study of an insurance company's communication department, how three written products served as parts of larger messages in multiple media campaigns; an attempt to combine composing processes for print and video failed; and conflicting generic and stylistic properties of other media caused an intermedial graft to fail. (SR)

Correctly used communication tools such as focus groups and organizational surveys actually inhibit the learning and communication that corporations now demand of managers and employees. They do not encourage individual accountability or allow the revelation of threatening or embarrassing information. (JOW)

Discusses the author's ongoing research analyzing several sites of discourse related to a military training accident that resulted in the death of the first female military pilot assigned to a combat position. Contributes to scholarship discussing interactions of technology, gender, and military culture. Explores how language influences…

Contributes to scholarship on organizational communication by tracing how voluntary cooperative standards were developed for the semiconductor industry through reflexive communication processes initiated by the SEMATECH consortium. Analyzes seven pivotal incidents that show how increased communication produced new provinces of meaning, actions,…

Examines Prudential's actions regarding misleading sales practices, its response to the ethical crisis, and the ways in which the organization communicated its response to stakeholders. Concludes that Prudential is making amends to its customers who were harmed by egregious sales practices, but considers how it may take the organization a long…