ABSTRACT
Communicating and organizing - there are two main approaches to defining the relationship between communicating and organizing: 1) the container approach assumes that organizations exist independently of communication and serve as containers that influence communication behavior. For example, organizational structures, such as hierarchical, are assumed to exist independently and influence the content and directional flow of communication; and 2) the social constructionist approach assumes that communication creates the form and shape of organizations. For example, when organizational members consistently funnel their information through one person, they create a centralized network structure where one person maintains a high degree of power because s/he is at the hub and controls the flow of information. When people change the content and form of their communication such as transmitting their information to a larger array of people, they create new organizational structures, such as decentralized networks. There are several research areas within the field of organizational communication. For ease of presentation, identified here are five major areas that organizational communication scholars study: (1) leadership, (2) teams, (3) communication networks, (4) organizational culture, and (5) organizational learning.