Communications is one of the most important skills that you will need in life. Whether it is talking face-to-face, email, phone, or skype, getting your point across clearly and/or being effective all depends on your communication skills. In an article by Greg Satell, titled, “Why Communication is Today’s Most Important Skill,” the author states that, “Growing up, I had always heard about the importance of hard-work, honesty, and other things, but never communication” (Satell, 2015, p. 1). Today, many teams are formed to complete projects because they provide the best solutions. With opposing viewpoints, knowledge, and/or biases challenging one another, you will come out with the best solutions. Whether it is a college project, a consulting
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As a “proby” we were trainees learning to be a class I firefighter. During my probationary period, I was involved in group discussions with other trainee firefighters to delegate training, truck cleaning, equipment checks, and numerous other responsibilities. Each probationary firefighter would be assigned a different assignment each week. Our weekly discussion group consisted of 5 people and was a disaster. Out of the 5 members, there would always be one person that was late. When all the members got together to discuss, nobody cared enough to take it serious. There was a time where I got sick of the lack of caring, so I decided to yell at everyone. This backfired on me with one guy saying, “I do not take orders from an Asian.” In the textbook, the authors states, “group members often react strongly to a peer who seems direct and commanding because the manner suggests superiority to the other members and perhaps dislike” (Galanes & Adam, 2013, p. 29). I noticed that the members resented me for yelling at them which made our communication even less productive. There were many barriers that made the communication dynamic terrible. One barrier was opposing viewpoints on how to do things in a certain way. Another barrier was egos making people think they were better than the other so they did not have to listen. The last barrier to effective communication that I noticed was the lateness and lack of effort from the members. In the end, these barriers caused a miscommunication and got a firefighter seriously hurt during an emergency call due to faulty
As a “proby” we were trainees learning to be a class I firefighter. During my probationary period, I was involved in group discussions with other trainee firefighters to delegate training, truck cleaning, equipment checks, and numerous other responsibilities. Each probationary firefighter would be assigned a different assignment each week. Our weekly discussion group consisted of 5 people and was a disaster. Out of the 5 members, there would always be one person that was late. When all the members got together to discuss, nobody cared enough to take it serious. There was a time where I got sick of the lack of caring, so I decided to yell at everyone. This backfired on me with one guy saying, “I do not take orders from an Asian.” In the textbook, the authors states, “group members often react strongly to a peer who seems direct and commanding because the manner suggests superiority to the other members and perhaps dislike” (Galanes & Adam, 2013, p. 29). I noticed that the members resented me for yelling at them which made our communication even less productive. There were many barriers that made the communication dynamic terrible. One barrier was opposing viewpoints on how to do things in a certain way. Another barrier was egos making people think they were better than the other so they did not have to listen. The last barrier to effective communication that I noticed was the lateness and lack of effort from the members. In the end, these barriers caused a miscommunication and got a firefighter seriously hurt during an emergency call due to faulty