And then...It all came to an end................

The problem with communication ... is the illusion that it has been accomplished ~ George Bernard Shaw

Communication is defined as the ‘state of exchanging information between two entities’ or ‘the act of transferring a message across two entities’. I chose the quote above to start this post since I believe it puts across the sad reality about communication....people do not consider communication to be a skill, a skill that needs practice, a skill that can be improved. I am not exaggerating. I was one of those people.

This was why ES2007S was an eye opener for me. I learnt that communication is not merely a ‘word’ in the dictionary. Effective communication involves good listening, non verbal cues, good presenting and so much more. In my very first blog post, I mentioned that I wanted to know how convey information in a clear and concise manner. This class enabled me to improve my presentation skills a LOT, through the peer teaching session, oral presentation and in general, when we had to go in front of the class and talk. I am much more confident now when presenting and in fact, when I did my FYP presentation, I got a lot of positive feedback and praise on how I presented, about which I was so happy. All this is thanks to ES2007S.

I must admit that I had my doubts when I first took this module. I knew it was going to be a very busy semester for me and I had heard that ES2007 involved a lot of work. And yes, there was certainly a lot of work! The blog posts, proposal, peer teaching...all these required me to put in constant effort throughout the semester. However, this was also the best module I had taken, during the four year of my university life. It was the first class in which I knew all my classmates by name, the first class in which I had spoken to all my classmates, the first class where I was given a proper chance to speak in front of the class, the first class in which I actually got constructive feedback from the tutor, a class which I really enjoyed taking with no regrets what so ever......

Reflecting on the resume and application letter writing and job interviews, I must say that before taking the class, I never gave much thought to these at all. For instance, I never knew going for an interview involved so much preparation, or how important the format of the resume is. After editing the application letter and resume multiple times, I now have a much better idea on how to write in an objective manner when I apply for jobs. I’m also glad that I got a chance to sit for the in-tray assessment, which was certainly a new experience to me.

On that note, I want to thank Ms. Lim for giving me an opportunity to speak up, and for all the invaluable feedback. Also, thank you for having all the activities, which made the time spent at class so useful, yet at the same time, fun-filled and happy. I must also say that Aishwarya and Benedict were some of the best group mates I have ever had and it will be hard to forget all those long hours spent at the benches at Engin, working on the proposal and slides to make them perfect and colourful. It was nice to be in such a friendly class and I was glad that my final class at university was last week’s ES2007S class, which was indeed a memorable one.......

Reflection on Oral Presentation

Oral Presentations are always a torture to me. I enjoy preparing the slides, adding animations, adding colours and pictures, but when it comes to the actual presentation, all the ‘fun’ goes away. I get tense and nervous, and end up doing a bad job. This was before I took ES2007 and learnt about good presentation skills. I had plenty of opportunities to present this semester, so I had a chance to practise my oral presentation skills. But have my skills improved? How did I present the proposal on Monday? Hm........

My biggest weakness when it comes to oral presentations is the volume at which I speak. I am quite soft spoken, so, the audience often cannot hear me clearly. However, on Monday, I think I spoke much more loudly than I usually do, which I am happy about. While rehersing, my group mates told me that I should slow down when I speak but during the actual presentation, I believe I still spoke too fast. I usually have a script or cue cards to which I refer to when I present. I did not have the script with me during this presentation, but I think I managed well enough without one. Unfortunately, I think I looked back at the screen too much, especially when I was presenting the statistics of the survey results, which I should not have done. I made some amount of eye contact, which I think is an improvement on my side, however, l think I looked and sounded rather tense. Overall, I thought the slides prepared by our group were pretty good. I also think that there is considerable improvement in my oral presentation skills but there is still much more areas that I need to develop on.

Blog post 4: "It doesn't matter what nation we'r from..we'r all one big family!"...hm...not really!

Individuals from dissimilar cultural backgrounds bring with them factors that can influence a conflict process. Cultures cause people to think, see, hear and interpret the world differently. A person acts according to the values and norms of his or her culture; another person holding a different worldview might interpret such behavior from an opposite standpoint. This situation creates misunderstanding and can lead to conflict.

I have a cousin who grew up in USA and she was getting married to her boyfriend, who was also a Sri Lankan living there. They decided to hold the wedding ceremony in Sri Lanka and asked help from my parents and other relatives with regards to arranging the ceremony. That is where the problems began. My family is rather traditional and has strong cultural beliefs while my cousin, who never lived in Sri Lanka, had a totally different way of thinking and point of view. At the beginning of the planning, she was in USA and so discussed with my relatives over the phone. This is an example of how one such conversation went on.

Relatives: “So when are you going to get your traditional wedding costume sewed?”

Cousin: “Oh I decided to wear a gown instead of the traditional costume!”

Relatives: (With strong looks of disapproval on their faces) “What??!!! No that’s not right!”

Cousin: “Why? It’s my wedding! It should be the way I want!

Relatives: “That’s not the way things are done in Sri Lanka”

Cousin: “Why not???”

The arguments went on forever. My relatives suggested having traditional music, she wanted rock music. They wanted to serve Sri Lankan food, she wanted western food. The discussion went on and so did the disagreements. Being already fed up with the situation, I avoided picking a side which unfortunately ended up with me having to listen to complaints from both sides. Life was hard indeed!

When I was beginning to think that matters could not get any worse, my cousin and her fiancé came to Sri Lanka. My relatives, already having a biased opinion about her, disapproved of many things, including the way she dressed, her way of expressing public affection, her way of talking and so on. My cousin on the other hand, thought that that my relatives views were quite “backward” and that they took their beliefs too seriously. Rather than trying to adapt to each others’ differences, they ended up in a conflict. In the end, the wedding ceremony did take place (which I was starting to think might not) after compromises from both sides, though not everyone was satisfied with it.

I believe that the main reason for this situation was that the two parties were from contrasting cultural communities and their different value assumptions, expectations, verbal and nonverbal habits that brought about misunderstandings. I cannot think of a clear cut solution to end such a conflict. However, if both sides could have communicated better and had a better understanding of each others cultures, it would have helped them to find the middle ground and be in a better situation.

Post 2: I ignore..you ignore..we all IGNORE?

Conflicts can occur within any group of people or person you interact with, and at any point of time. Though conflicts can damage and break up a relationship, I believe that in some occasions, it can help to strengthen a relationship too. The way a conflict would get resolved, if it ever does, is directly linked to the way the people involved in the conflict reacts to it.

One such situation I had was with an ex cluster mate of mine. Being a non-Singaporean, I stay at the PGP residence on campus. There, the different levels in the buildings are divided as clusters with about 15 people sharing a common kitchen and bathroom. The earlier mentioned cluster mate, whom I will refer to as person X, stayed in the room opposite to me. In the beginning of the year, she barely spoke to me, even though I saw her talking to some other cluster mates of mine. Once, I had some friends over and we were talking in my room when X came out of her room and banged on my door. I found that to be quite rude since she could have politely asked us to lower the noise. However, I tried to apologize to her, but was quite coldly ignored.

From that day onwards, we’ve never been in good terms with each other. Whenever I hung around in the common kitchen with some friends, she would come and say ‘Shut up!’ in a very aggressive manner. This happened so often that I tried to ignore her but it only got worse. She would use my kitchen utensils without my permission. I would have been fine with it if she had just asked me before borrowing them, since she did not, it made me rather angry. Thus, I went and complained about her to the head of the cluster, which again ended with X coming to me and accusing me of making false accusations. By then, I realized that trying to talk to her was quite like taking to a brick wall, and I also stopped communicating with her and we ignored each other the whole year.

Reflecting back on that incident now, I keep wondering whether I did something wrong and whether I should have put some more effort to resolve the problem before it got worse. For instance, I realized that X only spoke in Chinese to the other cluster mates and so, one reason for her behaviour might have been because she had difficulties communicating in English with me. Furthermore, I think that instead of overreacting and complaining about her, I should have tried to explain to her first that I was not happy about her using my utensils or about her banging on my door. Or maybe the way I reacted was the best I could do.

Could the conflict be resolved, had I expressed my emotions and feeling in a different manner? I have no clue…………………………..

Post 1: Why are effective Communication Skills important to me?

As my university life is gradually coming to an end, I have gone through many situations in which I had to communicate with various people in a face-to-face manner, as a group, through emails and many other channels. I believe that good communication skills; let it be speaking or listening, are essential to life, as it is the basis through with one can build a good relationship with one’s family, colleagues, neighbours and anyone else you come in contact with, throughout your life.

I am a quiet person by nature and being quite shy too, I find talking in front of an audience to be a tedious and nerve wrecking task. There have been many instances when I have tried to get across a relatively simple message to my friends, group mates but which ended with them misunderstanding me. After a period of self reflection, I realized that the reason behind such incidents was somewhat related to my poor communication skills.

Since I have a lot of presentations coming up (especially my FYP presentation), it is important that I learn how to convey what I want to say to another person or a group in a clear and concise manner to ensure that there is no miscommunication. Thus, I need to get over my fears and so I hope that what I learn in this class will be a good starting point and would help me ‘fight the demons’, so to say.

First blog..first post!!!!

I finally figured out how to become a 'follower'..yey! I shall now go and read the articles to prepare for tomorrow's class..See you guys in class..