Sitkin, Sutcliffe, and Barrios-Choplin(1992) identify two components of a medium's ability to carry information and thereby form a dual-capacity model. The dual-capacity model explains that every organizational medium has the ability to carry two kinds of messages: data-carrying capacity and the symbol-carrying capacity. Data-carrying capacity refers to the medium's ability to transmit information while symbol-carrying capacity refers to the medium's ability to carry information about the information or about the individuals who are communicating. To be more specific, data-carrying capacity is the capacity to convey task-relevant data, while symbol-carrying capacity allows the medium to convey the organization’s culture or a symbol apart from the actual message being transmitted.
Based on the analysis above, we can see the dual-capacity model supports that companies’ determination of communication channel relies on both the data-carrying capacity and the symbol-carrying capacity of the medium. Some of the reflections in the real world are as follows:
Companies have different standards for the hiring procedure. They use different types of channels to evaluate candidates. The choices of various communication methods are a good representation of the dual-capacity model. For large companies, they usually follow the thread of online application, phone interview, group interview, and one-on-one interview. The reason why large companies choose to use this course of communication channels has to do with gathering data and presenting their organizational culture. On the one hand, large companies need to evaluate candidates from all aspects, which requires much information. Through the interaction of different types of interviews, companies could get more information in terms of candidates’ knowledge, experience, behavior, and personality. On the other hand, these various evaluation channels also have symbolic meanings. Large companies convey their seriousness and sophistication in recruiting talents through these communication channels. Even though some of the candidates are internal employees, they still need to go through the whole procedure which symbolizes the standardization and fairness of the corporate culture.