Communication and organization

Who hasn't heard it said that an organization suffers from a "lack of communication", or that a team needs to "learn to communicate better"? These expressions, commonplace as they may be, reflect real issues linked to the key role played by communication in any organized form. To get organized, i.e. to act collectively in a minimally coordinated and effective way, we need to be able to communicate with each other in order, among other things, to share information, convince others of the validity of our position, or define collective priorities. While communication is often understood as the sole responsibility of an organization's communications department, this manual shows that, in fact, there can be no organization without communication. In other words, communication must be understood as constitutive, i.e., essential to any organizational process. In order to examine the ins and outs of this original thesis, the chapters in this handbook address classic organizational themes, each time highlighting their communicative dimension. Whether we're talking about culture or organizational identity, leadership or resistance, collaboration or crisis management, the ambition is always to show how these phenomena and practices can be rethought, placing exchange and interaction at the heart of all these processes. Ultimately, this handbook invites readers to think about communication beyond the simple transmission of information, by promoting a much more dialogical vision of the organization.