Genre Theory and Response Time

Genre Theory is a concept that can help organizational leaders understand the culture and communication styles within an organization. The culture and communication style within the organization may determine the how employee respond to conflicts and environmental challenges. Organizations that desire to enhance their organizational response should consider the posits of Genre Theory.

Genre Theory posits that people take events and categorize and perceive them as recurring, and people respond in pre-defined rhetorical responses to those situations (Miller, 1994). The Theory further indicates that in business communication and actions socialization takes place within the organization. Such behavior can lead to pre-defined responses to problems. However, not all situations work well with "canned" approaches.

Genre Theory can be rigid or flexible (Amidon, 2008). When the genre is flexible organizations can have a multitude of responses that can either help or hinder the organization. Pre-defined responses can be beneficial to mundane problems but could be inadequate to challenges that companies face that are not routine. The challenge of an organization is to encourage innovative responses to challenges while still ensuring relative order in these responses.

However, this is not an easy balance to maintain. Order one side encourages concerted effort but also limits innovation. Yet developing appropriate channels for innovative response may better solidify the approach of the company. This may be developed through a strong communications strategy (Rains & Young, 2006).

For example, an organization that faces a problem out of the ordinary may require a unique approach that wouldn't be forthcoming the standard approach of responses. Genre Theory indicates that people respond to problems through pre-defined measures that are embedded in organizational culture (Miller, 1994). In order to change the genre of an organization the culture and standard responses must change.

Changing the genre and the culture of an organization requires the development of new stories and understandings. Rhetorical writers and marketing messages have an important impact on the genre of an organization (Pope-Ruark, 2008). The way in which the company approaches the market and how it defines its existence appears to influence the standard response to problems within the company.

The very nature of how people communicate within the organization is also important for changing organizational genre. A study of 193 email signatures helps highlight the communication styles and social hierarchy within the organization (Rains & Young, 2006). The communication styles within the organization highlight how people make decisions and how people interact.

Amidon, S. (2008). The learning history. Journal of Business Communication, 45 (4).

Miller, C. R. (1994a). Genre as social action. In A. Freedman & P. Medway (Eds.), Genre and

the new rhetoric (pp. 23-42). London: Taylor & Francis.

Pope-Ruark, R. (2008). Challenging the necessity of organizational community for rhetorical genre use: community and genre in the work integrated marketing communication agency writers. Business Communication Quarterly, 71 (2).

Rains, S. & Young, A. (2006). A sign of the times: an analysis of organization members' email signatures. Journal of Computer-Mediated Communication, 11 (4).