Communication · Executive Insight Brief · 085
Change the rule that makes the next move seem necessary
Recurring communication failures are often jointly produced patterns, even when participants understand the situation differently
Premise
A recurring communication problem is rarely contained in one message or one person. One executive presses for detail, another becomes defensive, the first increases pressure, and the second withholds more. Each move appears reasonable from inside one participant’s interpretation, yet together they produce the pattern both sides oppose.
Coordinated Management of Meaning gives executives a way to analyze this circularity. It asks how people jointly create social realities through communication, what an act means within its context, and why a particular response comes to feel required. The model shifts intervention from correcting personality to redesigning interaction.
What the model is: Coordinated Management of Meaning in Knowledge →
Continue in the series
- The essential model
- Why this matters
- Risks and limits
- Executive takeaway
- Key questions
- Selected sources
The full brief is in its volume, with the other works of the series.
Or start with a sample brief →
New works are announced in The Debrief. Subscribe →
- FamilyModel
- CategoryTheories & Explanatory Models
- DomainMeaning & Clarity
What these mean
Editorial orientation · Family
Model
In this series, Model names the editorial family primarily used to understand and explain communication: theories, frameworks, effects, traditions, principles and other conceptual resources. It is an umbrella for a route into the field, not a claim that every included object is a predictive model.
Editorial orientation · Category
Theories & Explanatory Models
Explains how or why a communication process works by relating mechanisms, conditions or variables. Its value is an account that can guide inquiry into what produces an outcome, rather than a name for the outcome alone.