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This investigation examines why junior staff remain silent in senior management team meetings. The results show that decision making by the leadership is not all inclusive since junior staff were not involved. Resolutions on far reaching work place based problems was the preserve of a few as the study found. Powered by a strong hierarchical structure and an African traditional manifest by power distance Ghosh (2011), the staff felt it was futile to raise concerns. This study aims to create an understanding of the phenomenon of silence by applying theoretical frameworks identified in five thematic areas. These are voicing and silence, conversations, facilitation of meetings, relational processes and an aspect of the African culture. Each is seen to have a bearing on silence in the context of meetings. The analysis help develop conceptual frameworks with the outcomes leading to workable recommendations on corrective actions. The investigative data was obtained at six senior management team meetings at a designated site. Methods used for data collection included video recording, field observations, administration of a questionnaire through interviews, journaling and field testing. The data was transcribed and codes assigned to contextualize meaning and for analysis for sense making later justified by triangulation. Additional data was obtained to give impetus highlighting broader characteristics of the organization under study. Supplementary documents were evaluated in relation to primary data to offer greater understanding and remove rhetoric. Additionally informal engagements helped strengthen findings showing what was peculiar to warrant further attention. As posited by Cunliffe and Eriksen (2011), organizations is a community of people where talk thrives. The lessons ICL needed to learn were a need to train junior staff on senior management meeting preparedness including development and implementation of structures that help manage meetings. Well applied, this should resolve dysfunctional practices such as misuse of power, lack of focus, a climate of fear and lack of inclusivity and involvement. How silence affects productivity is out of scope and a subject of future investigation. Conversations is highlighted as the new frontier for organisation growth and development moving away from dependency on strategic planning, process and systems development and human resource management. This study contributes new knowledge to theory and practice and also helps scrutinize known models and concepts such as Leader Member Exchange that was found to be inordinate to and at variance with field findings at ICL. |
