Gender difference in working and communication styles

Abstract

The primary objective of this research was to assess whether there are consistent gender differences in communication style and working styles, of the type that Tannen (1990) and Gray (1992) have reported. And the two authors suggest a general agreement on ways in which men and women differ, but as mentioned in the literature review not everyone agrees with them. In order to further investigate the validity of the claims and statements of the two authors, Gray (1992) and Tannen (1990), this research was conducted to examine various interpretations of the phrases and also whether it is seen as an accurate explanation for communication difficulties between genders. Based from this empirical study, the communication differences between men and women is found to be minimal and of little significance. In particular, it is critical to understand that even if there may be average tendencies in the directions Tannen (1990) and Gray (1992) suggested, their generalizations certainly do not apply to all men and all women. There are certainly some men who would fit the communication characteristics described here as common to women, and there are certainly some women who would fit the characteristics described here as common to men. The empirical analysis on the 182 responses from Pos Malaysia Berhad provided with evidence that the different people may have different ways of communicating, rather than to assume that all women communicate in one way and all men communicate in another way. Thus it is imperative that men and women in the organization to work together for achieving the organisational goals and one of the critical requirements for which is effective inter-gender communication. Through this empirical study, could validate Gray and Tannen propositions within the employees in an organization in the context of Malaysia. Besides that the findings also reveal the communication styles between the inter and intra gender within the organization so that they could understand their differences for better understandings.