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From our project presentation, my groupmates and I received numerous takeaways on our core topic ‘Active Listening’. Inevitably, an effective communication requires listening and the quality of listening will result to how much details are captured by the listener. Out of all the recommended topics given to us, the topic of ‘Active Listening’ caught our attention the most. We share the same thought that as a family member in our respective home, we are unable to spend time with them like we use to before our university life. It is a serious topic that deserves awareness to all our classmates and lecturers.

Today, our attention are often caught by modern technology, which results in less time speaking and listening to our family members. There are common listening barriers such as ego and status within the family that has been a hassle to listening among family members. Parents find it difficult to communicate with children and vice versa. To my team, the solution to tackle this lingering issue is active listening.

Active listening intentionally focuses on who you are listening to, whether in a group or one-on-one, in order to understand what he or she is saying. On our topic of ‘Active Listening To Resolving Conflicts At Home’, we covered that parents could not communicate with children well enough due to their incorrect listening method. Using the ‘LAFF Don’t CRY’ strategy taught by David McNaughton and Brooks R.Vostal, children will feel that they are being heard by their parents and their thoughts and opinion matters to them. In exchange, parents get to know more about their children’s lifestyle as they are more will to share. This useful strategy can not only to children but also to people around you, in order to portray signs of active listening.

‘When you talk, you are only repeating what you know; but when you listen, you learn something new.’ quoted by Dalai Lama. As a university student, we are unable to often spend time and listen to our family members due to our heavy workload. For me, the best solution is to find time to have a family bonding dinner with my family. It is when I could sit around and share my latest update in life and also listen to theirs. Because through active listening, I would be able to better understand they feel, and how I am still with them as part of the family.

In this project, I am able to apply what I had learnt in class and create a presentation that will absorb the audience’s attention throughout the presentation. The “5 W’s and 1 H” method beefs up my presentation with substances, allowing me to express my points with in-depth explanations and strong supporting evidence. Going through various kind of presentations, I noticed I had frequently fallen short on my explanations on my powerpoint slides. Till date, I am able to deliver my messages with confidence that my audience will receive sufficient takeaways from my presentation.

My group members and I went to the presentation with clear knowledge of our topic after staying up late to brush up our presentation slides. Due to insufficient rest, we did not perform to our expectation, though still performed adequately. For me, I tend to speak too quickly and this turns out to be a barrier to my audience’s understanding. From now on, I would try to speak a little slower and hopefully be able to articulate better before my next presentation. My fellow partners Syaifudin and Syahirah presented their respective parts well but with room for improvements.

On top of that, I also received other meaningful comments such as my lapse on the connection between the video and slides during the project presentation. I was working within the time constraint and failed to notice this costly mistake. I am truly disappointed with myself as a presentation veteran, who is usually much more careful managing the content of a presentation. Despite the mistake I made, it is a learning experience for me. Learning from the mistake I make will allow me to display even better for the next one. I will pay more attention to content linkage to avoid disconnection of content again.

In general, I felt that my group had picked an important topic that covers such an important topic ‘Active Listening’ that deserve awareness out of everybody. My group members and I have expressed concern as a university student, who are unable spend time with our family and listen to what they have in their mind. The only solution we can think of is to make time out of our busy schedule and gather fo a family bonding session. This is when we can actively listen to them and let them know our own latest update in our school life.

In the topic of ‘Active Listening’, I learnt that there are diverse styles of listening. Some of the styles of listening are content-oriented, time-oriented, people-oriented and action-oriented. In school or at home, we will definitely meet people with different styles of listening. In order to better transmit our message to them, tuning our message based on their listening style may lead to better understanding to the listener. 

Interpersonal communication is about effective and efficient interaction with understanding. From the presentation, I noticed my own flaws and received invaluable feedbacks from my peers. “All men make mistakes, but only wise men learn from their mistakes” once said by Winston Churchill. With the experience and knowledge gained on this project, I have confidence that my groupmates and I would be able to perform even better in our future presentations.

Last Updated: 19th April 2016

 

Commented On:

 

Rati Shukla, Marcus Yeo, Syaifudin

Guilty as charged, interpersonal conflicts such as dispute and debate are the norms in my daily life. When people with different personalities come together, it is common that they may share different views on a situation. In extreme cases, it may even lead to interpersonal conflicts. From my point of view, we should avoid unnecessary conflict and resolved it quickly once it happened.

Being the youngest child of the family, I used to be the root of all conflicts at home. Today, my role is reversed as I work as the medium to conflict resolving. My elder sister is married and staying with her husband. She is a mother of one and often return home with her son on the weekends to spend time with my parents. She is a simple woman but her weakness is that she possesses poor self-awareness and knowledge. My elder brother works in a maritime company that requires him to do shift duties. Whenever he is off duty, he prefers to spend time with his fiancé, who is facing family issues in her family. His quick-tempered characteristics have often led him to be the source of most conflicts at home.

On early December last year, my sister picked one Sunday of the month to celebrate my father’s birthday. Unfortunately, my brother had made plans on that day to spend with his fiancé. Feeling frustrated after numerous failed attempt to set a date for the celebration together, my sister blamed him in the WhatsApp chat group for his unwillingness to spend time with our family. Throughout the situation, she was unaware that my brother merely wanted to accompany his fiancé during this drastic period that she was facing. Upset with the reply, he argued that my sister’s only responsibility is taking care of his son. The war of words roared on for a while within the group chat.

When I finally caught attention of the situation, I stood in and pleaded both parties to cool down. I went on to ask my brother if he could make adjustments to his arrangement, which he reluctantly agreed. After that dispute, no message was sent within the group chat until the date of celebration. Fortunately, on the day itself, they put their personal matters aside and went on to celebrate my father’s birthday together as a family.

Before the conflict could turn from bad to worse, I reacted the best I could to resolve the problem. What would you have done if you are me? Please kindly share your idea and let’s discuss it!

Last Updated: 19th April 2016

 

Commented On:

 

Rati Shukla, Angela Cheng, Marcus Yeo

Hi Mr Han,

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Thank you.

 

JYSS Creative Senior Executive

Customer Support Services

 

Completed along with: Syai, Hyirah & Ya Wen

In the article “Principles of Supportive Communication”, published by Developing Management Skills, the author, Rogers, states that supportive communication should be problem-oriented rather than person-oriented. Instead of focusing on a person’s characteristics, supportive communication should focus on the behaviour which would cause the certain problem. Rogers mentions that to have the best interpersonal communication, it is important to ensure congruence when communicating. This means that it is necessary to make sure that what is felt is also delivered.

Supportive communication should be more descriptive compared to being evaluative. As evaluative communication comes off as being judgmental and offensive at times, this can cause arguments and weakening of the interpersonal relationship. Descriptive communication reduces defensive interaction as it becomes more objective which is based on the specific event, behaviour or circumstance. The focus is zoomed in on behaviours and reactions instead of the individual’s characteristics. Invalidating communication generates negativity in each individual’s self-worth, identity, uniqueness and most importantly denies their presence. Through validating communication, the involvement of two-way communication allows people to feel recognized, understood, accepted and valued, that their opinions are appreciated even in the worst case scenarios.

A clear supportive communication is necessary for better understanding of the opposite party. A blunt supportive communication contains extremes and absolutes which will only lead to pressure and confusion. Conjunctive communication allows flow in instruction and explanation. Only in cases like lack of equal opportunities or change in direction during a conversation should there be disjunction.

Supportive communication is all about personal rather than relative as the source of the ideas belongs to oneself instead of others. Lastly, Rogers also states that listening and responding effectively to someone else’s statement is as important as delivering a supportive message.

Completed along with: Rati, Ya Wen, Marcus

Every day people speaks to each other in a common language while illustrating the different styles of verbal and nonverbal interaction. In term of verbal interaction, the speaker sends his/her message across to the listener through words while the listener receives and decrypts the message through his/her ears and mind. As for nonverbal interaction, it could be an independent source of communication or works as a compliment or even distraction to verbal interaction. Most of the nonverbal interactions are visual, where one understands the meaning of the message through actions displayed by the sender. With these two forms of interaction, the world becomes a platform for information through actions and words.

Since young, I have lived under the care of my parents. My parents come from different kampongs of different countries and brought up my siblings and me humbly. My father is a quiet and logical man, responds to others with composure and assurance. In contrast, my mother is an extrovert woman who behaves more ‘dramatically’ in term of response and words. Once, I was caught in a dispute between the two of them. My mother was talking harshly from the kitchen, with her hands and legs moving actively as she speaks. On the other side, my father was reading the newspaper in the living room, replying to her calmly and with hardly any movements. Emotionally overwhelmed, my mother put down her work in the kitchen and stomped towards my father. Acknowledging my presence in the living room, she cooled down the moment she saw me on the coffee table doing my homework. She went on to have an effective conversation with my father and resolve the conflict quickly.

In the nutshell, different people from different culture shares different forms of verbal and nonverbal interaction. No matter how different they are, respect will prevent any unnecessary discomfort. Ultimately, we should pay close attention to our own verbal and nonverbal interactions in order to avoid dispute and improve communication with people around us.

 

Last Updated: 12^th April 2016

 

Commented On:

 

Lin Zaw, Keryl Tham, Yar Zar ( 7 C’s )

 

Words are sharper than swords and if misused, could cause a lot of problems for both a speaker and a listener. For effective communication to take place, it requires all parties to be actively speaking and listening. Right now, the art of communication is a skill that I am working on in order to better myself.

In the working society, I receive first-hand experiences on the wonders of what effective communication can bring about. From my perspective, some of my strengths in communication are brief understanding of my listener and the ability to convince. With knowledge about my audience, I have a rough concept of how to attract their attention and win them over with my idea. Some weaknesses of myself are my short span of attention and tendency to get driven by emotions. Sometimes during a conversation, I zone out in the middle of a conversation or get caught by distractions in the environment. Due to that, I often missed out important details mentioned by the speaker. Because I am an emotionally oriented person, I tend to react quickly to provoke or sarcasm without giving too many thoughts.

Once, after joining Community Service Club (CSC), I tried to convince several of the classmates who were also at the CCA booth to join. Looking into their eyes, I can feel their minds are clouded with concerns that they will not be able to manage the workload of school works along with club participations. I went on to explain to them that how low commitment the club required and yet with so many fruitful activities we can participate together. In the end, I am glad that I win them over as they signed up for the club with me too.

Even though it may just be a small matter, being able to convince them feels like a tiny battle won. I learnt that the act of persuasion requires understanding and patience. A great salesman I know once told me “For someone to buy your idea, you must know what they want. After that, let them know how your product will change their life for the better.” At this moment, I had opened myself to knowledge and experiences for self-enrichment. Right now, I see myself as a “Work in Progress” and my mission of my life is to learn and improve on my Interpersonal Communication day by day.

Last Updated: 12th April 2016