Communications begin with individuals within the organization discussing beliefs, goals, structures, plans and relationships.
Taylor drew on the work of sociologist and educator John Dewey's pragmatic view society exists not "by" but "in" communication.
He was born in 1928 and is Professor Emeritus at the Department of Communication of the Université de Montréal, which he founded in the early 1970s.
Drawing from research in fields of organizational psychology (Karl E. Weick), ethnomethodology (Harold Garfinkel), Deirdre Boden), phenomenology (Alfred Schütz) and collective minding (Edwin Hutchins), Taylor formed the original text and conversation theory.
This line of thought has come to be known as "The Montreal School" of organizational communication, sometimes referred to as TMS, and has been acknowledged as an original theory by authors such as Haridimos Tsoukas, Linda Putman, and Karl E. Weick.
Proposed by Anthony Giddens (1984) in ‘’The Constitution on Society,’’ structuration theory, originated in the discipline of sociology.
Additionally, these systems are based on responses and interpretations, and the meaning interpreted by individuals via communication[6] This theory is based on interaction between two or more individuals, with unlike perspectives[7] The significance of having unlike perspectives is that it enables a distinctive standpoint: it permits the ability to study how people identify differences and understand meaning.
Additionally, these differences create shared and consensual pockets of interactions and communications as discussed in Structure-Organization-Process.
[8] Another idea of conversation theory is learning happens by exchanges about issues, which assists in making knowledge explicit.
[12] It defines the ideological basis for people and lays the foundation for how they frame and can be observed and described, but not controlled.
For example, of being a part of an informal or formal structure, it is important for managers to learn to recognize signs of trouble in order to shape context as they attempt to coordinate meaning and solve day-to-day problems.
Specific implications for organizational learning include enhanced performance, coordinated activity and structure, division of labor and collective goal setting [15] While a formal organization is visually represented by a typical hierarchical structure, it visually shows how formal responsibilities are spread, as well as job dispersal and the flow of information[16] In contrast, the informal organization embodies how people network to accomplish the job, via social relationships and connections or subject-matter experts that are not represented on the organizational chart[17] By leveraging this informal organization, people within the organization are able to use their social network to access and shape the decision-making processes quicker, as well as establish cross-structural collaboration amongst themselves.
The hierarchical and network structures can allow an organization to recognize signs of trouble from people, accomplish core framing tasks, and to be able to communicate with mindfulness and meaning.
By unlocking the value of an organization's structure, leaders and managers can use this knowledge to boost performance or achieve specific goals.
Knowing individuals’ personalities, conflict tendencies, as well as their unique circumstances help an organization to understand its mental models and cultural discourse.
Additionally, by noticing abnormalities and not being blind to details, an organization should be able to recognize signs of trouble within day-to-day operations and management, whether it is fraud, lack of maintenance standards, sexual harassment, or even a poor framework for communication.
Understanding and the ability to recognize signs of trouble empower managers to employ the rules of reality construction: control the context, define the situation, apply ethics, interpret uncertainty, and design the response, which leads to communicating by a structured way of thinking.
[1] To examine this further, Taylor defined "six degrees of separation" to understand organizational communication:[18] This theory uses interactions of text and conversation to construct networks of relationships.
Taylor stresses the importance and impact of dialogue, specifically relating to how people interact with one another and interpret context.
Additionally, he points out dialogue should not prevent issues that arise from debate[19] Since 1993, Taylor's theory has been the focus of more than six organizational communication books.
Text and conversation theory places significant challenges and burdens on the organization to articulate knowledge.
Whether knowledge is passed directly by individuals, up and down or horizontally on the formal or informal organizational structure, there is no guarantee text has proper context to be effective as conversation.
Additionally, conversation codes are influenced by how the organization ensures knowledge carriers pass information and communicate with purpose, message, and meaning.
Some of these challenges, or factors, include how individuals and an organization adapt to meaning, culture, structure, and knowledge, in order to communicate.