Prelims
Managing Silence in Workplaces
ISBN: 978-1-78973-446-1, eISBN: 978-1-78973-445-4
Publication date: 15 August 2019
Citation
Vemuri, S. (2019), "Prelims", Managing Silence in Workplaces, Emerald Publishing Limited, Leeds, pp. i-xii. https://doi.org/10.1108/978-1-78973-445-420191001
Publisher
:Emerald Publishing Limited
Copyright © 2019 Emerald Publishing Limited
Half Title Page
Managing Silence in Workplaces
Title Page
Managing Silence in Workplaces
Sivaram Vemuri
Charles Darwin University
United Kingdom – North America – Japan India – Malaysia – China
Copyright Page
Emerald Publishing Limited
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First edition 2019
Copyright © 2019 Emerald Publishing Limited
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A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library
ISBN: 978-1-78973-446-1 (Print)
ISBN: 978-1-78973-445-4 (Online)
ISBN: 978-1-78973-447-8 (Epub)
Dedication
In memory of Dr Danny Kane Economist Extraordinaire 1949–2018
Contents
| List of Figures and Tables | ix |
| Preface | xi |
| 1. The Silent Killer | 1 |
| The Need to Manage Silence | 2 |
| Costs of Silence | 4 |
| The Significance of Managing Silence in the Workplace | 6 |
| 2. Paying Attention to Silence | 13 |
| The Importance of Managers Paying Attention to Silence | 14 |
| The Importance of a Transdisciplinary Framework | 15 |
| Silence, Voice and Pluralism | 17 |
| Ethics and Decision Making | 20 |
| 3. Conceptualising Silence | 23 |
| Silence as a Form of Workplace Communication | 23 |
| In Search of a Conceptual Model | 24 |
| Employee Participation | 24 |
| Models of Employee Participation | 28 |
| 4. Types of Silence in the Workplace | 31 |
| Employee Participation: Movements in the Workplace | 34 |
| The Management Implications of Silence in the Workplace | 40 |
| 5. Measuring Silence in the Workplace | 45 |
| Measures of Silence in Decision Making | 47 |
| Possibility of Using Existing Body of Work on Silence | 47 |
| Proposed Changes | 53 |
| Impression Formation | 53 |
| Coping Strategies | 55 |
| Decisions Made | 60 |
| Measurement Framework Based on Hope | 64 |
| Management Implications Based on Framework Underpinning Existing Measures | 65 |
| Suggested Framework for Measuring Silences | 66 |
| 6. Application in Real-World Contexts | 71 |
| Context of the Workplace and Internal Structure and Process | 75 |
| Public Sector Agency A | 75 |
| Public Sector Agency B | 80 |
| Combined Public/Private Sector Agency Findings | 84 |
| Combined Public Sector Agency Result | 86 |
| Private Sector | 88 |
| Private Sector Results | 92 |
| The Role of Organisational Structure | 93 |
| Commonalities Between Public and Private Sectors | 93 |
| Differences Between Public and Private Sector | 94 |
| Assessment of Management of Silence in Workplaces | 95 |
| 7. Conclusions | 97 |
| References | 103 |
| Index | 111 |
List of Figures and Tables
Figures
| Figure 3.1 | Curve Depicting Combinations of Voice and Silence | 29 |
| Figure 4.1 | Underlying Dynamics Influencing Employee Participation | 37 |
| Figure 4.2 | Stages of Employee Participation | 38 |
| Figure 4.3 | Managerial Responses in Different Silence Zones | 41 |
| Figure 5.1 | Changing Levels of Hope of Employees in Workplaces65 | |
| Figure 6.1 | Proposition 1: Staff Expressed a Combination of Voice and Silence in Their Communication Behaviour | 75 |
| Figure 6.2 | Silence Behaviour and Number of Working Years in Agency A | 76 |
| Figure 6.3 | Willingness to Express Views and Opinions at the Time of Joining | 78 |
| Figure 6.4 | Current Behaviour of Silence | 79 |
| Figure 6.5 | Proposition 5: Staff Moved Through Zones of Silence | 79 |
| Figure 6.6 | Proposition 1: Agency B Staff Expressed a Combination of Voice and Silence in Their Communication Behaviour | 80 |
| Figure 6.7 | Willingness to Express Views and Opinions at Time of Joining the Organisation | 81 |
| Figure 6.8 | Current Silence Behaviour Agency B | 81 |
| Figure 6.9 | Proposition 5: Staff Movements through Zones of Silence | 83 |
| Figure 6.10 | Stages of Employee Participation | 84 |
| Figure 6.11 | Proposition 5: Staff Movements through Zones of Silence | 87 |
| Figure 6.12 | Proposition 1: Staff Expressed a Combination of Voice and Silence in Their Communication Behaviour | 88 |
| Figure 6.13 | Willingness to Express Views and Opinions at the Time of Joining | 89 |
| Figure 6.14 | Current Willingness to Express Views and Opinions | 89 |
| Figure 6.15 | Staff Movements through Zones of Silence | 90 |
| Figure 6.16 | Proposition 5: Staff Movements through Zones of Silence | 92 |
| Figure 6.17 | Comparison of Silence of Private and Public Sector Employees | 94 |
Tables
| Table 5.1 | Multitude Meanings Assigned to Silences in Workplaces in the Literature | 48 |
| Table 5.2 | Categories and Sources of Stress in Workplaces | 56 |
| Table 5.3 | Suggested Occupational Health and Safety | 59 |
| Table 5.4 | Manager–Employee Interactions to Coping with Stress | 60 |
| Table 6.1 | Proposition 2: There was Overall Evidence of a Common Reason for Being Silent in the Organisation | 76 |
| Table 6.2 | Proposition 3: Experienced Staff Responded Differently to Silence than Staff Who Joined Recently | 77 |
| Table 6.3 | Proposition 4: Evidence of Future Perspective and Present Silence | 77 |
| Table 6.4 | Changing Future Perspective of Employees Over Time in Years in Employment | 78 |
| Table 6.5 | Proposition 2: There was an Overall Evidence of a Common Reason for Being Silent in the Organisation | 82 |
| Table 6.6 | Proposition 3: Experienced Staff Responded Differently to Silence than Staff Who Joined Recently | 82 |
| Table 6.7 | Proposition 4: Evidence of Future Perspective and Present Silence | 83 |
| Table 6.8 | Agency B Employee Future Perception | 84 |
| Table 6.9 | Proposition 2: There was an Overall Evidence of a Common Reason for Being Silent in the Organisation | 85 |
| Table 6.10 | Proposition 3: Experienced Staff Responded Differently to Silence than Staff Who Joined Recently | 85 |
| Table 6.11 | Proposition 4: Evidence of Future Perspective and Present Silence | 86 |
| Table 6.12 | Silence Behaviour Over Time in Agency | 86 |
| Table 6.13 | Proposition 2: There was an Overall Evidence of a Common Reason for Being Silent in the Organisation | 90 |
| Table 6.14 | Proposition 3: Experienced Staff Responded Differently to Silence than Staff Who Joined Recently | 91 |
| Table 6.15 | Proposition 4: Evidence of Future Perspective and Present Silence | 91 |
| Table 6.16 | Number of Years in the Private Organisation and Silence Behaviour | 92 |
Preface
This book is the outcome of several years of introspection and exposure to silences in workplaces that I witnessed myself and learned about from others who shared their experiences with me. I was interested in exploring how managers can deal with silence in the workplace. It is a very common experience but I soon learned that most managers are themselves quite silent about it. Many ignored it and those who did acknowledge it dismissed it as ‘just an employee who had issues to deal with’. I was sure there was more to it than this and I wanted to explore how silence in the workplace can be appropriately addressed.
I searched in vain for a methodology that would adequately serve the purpose. I needed a framework that could link individuals’ workplace decisions to the role managers can play to create environments based on trust and mutual respect, and that contribute to managing change and improving productivity. It was a tall order. It required an investigation into ethical ways to manage silence. It was clear that the solution to managing silence cannot be prescriptive nor descriptive but has to contribute to the manager’s toolkit. The solution had to lie in understanding the ethics of silence.
I was fortunate to co-author a book with my friend and colleague Nancy Billias on this subject. The book is based on an interdisciplinary (philosophy and economics) framework that we developed; however, as I began researching how to manage silence in the workplace, it became clear that I would need to move from interdisciplinarity to transdisciplinary work. To do justice to the formation of an appropriate management tool, I needed to bring ideas from several disciplines and go beyond to create a comprehensive approach to understanding the management challenges of dealing with silences in workplaces.
Chapters 1–3 are the result of my pursuits in creating a transdisciplinary approach. Chapter 4 explains the several theoretical types of silence that prevail in the workplace. In keeping with the transdisciplinary nature of my exploration, in this chapter I construct the importance of hope to develop the management tool.
Chapter 5 is devoted to measuring silence in the workplace and the measure is then applied to real-world constructs of public agencies and private institutions to examine the relevance of the tool for managers who may wish to use it. As I was interested in treating the management of silence in workplaces in an ethical way, I worked with my colleague Silpi Dhungana Pant to illustrate how it can work without being prescriptive on what managers need to do.
In preparing and writing this book, I was helped by many people. I am grateful to all the leaders, managers and employees at my own workplace, Charles Darwin University (CDU), those at the Institute of Managers and Leaders and fellow NT branch members, as well as fellow Rotarians of the Darwin Sunrise Rotary, who have allowed me insights into silences in their decision-making processes. I am also grateful to the line managers in the public and private sector agencies that allowed me to administer a questionnaire to staff and who encouraged staff to cooperate. It had proved exceedingly difficult to gain access to larger organisations and indeed many small ones, so the fact that we received almost 100% response rates, albeit from small agencies, allowed us to draw valid conclusions.
I have benefited immensely from the knowledge I received from all of them. I also wish to acknowledge the contribution of my friends (too many to mention) and family (Jyoti, Alia, Sidharth, Ed, Ila and Ariki) who willingly and sometimes unintentionally shared their own personal experiences with silence. I am grateful for the support I received from the wonderful Roopali Misra and Amander Dimmock who willingly obliged me to bring to life the graphs of my sketches. I am also very much indebted to the wonderful library staff at CDU, Carolyn and Brenda, whose support made my journey into transdisciplinary work so much more rewarding. I finally wish to thank my very dear friend and colleague June Kane for bringing life into the manuscript. Thank you, June, for doing such a wonderful job.
I hope this book will make a small contribution to making workplaces of the present and the future more inclusive of their employees. People are, after all, at the very core of everything we say and do.