Professional Thanks!

I would like to thank everyone in this course for offering me the opportunity to experience how communication and collaboration vary from culture, professional experiences, personal experience and ones beliefs. I know that this course will further enhance my communication, conflict resolution, team building and collaboration skills. It is my professional desire to continue to enhance my communication skill by attending training, workshops and learning from other professionals within the field. I now realize how conflicting the processing of adjourning may be for some! I really enjoyed being about of such a well diverse group of professionals and I truly hope we all meet again. Be Bless! Don't Stress! With the Lord's favor we all got this!

Adjourning

I believe that that I will feel elated once I have obtained my Master degree and then on the other hand, I know a part of me will feel a sense of great lost.  Often time’s disconnection occurs when you no longer have the forum present that brought group or individuals members together.  I find that that the group I founded in high school was the hardest to leave, Ladies with Class. The group’s mission is to uplift high school young ladies to achieve academic excellence, respect themselves as ladies and others, help those in need, to enhance sisterly tides and to high light the importance of being a good citizen.  This group ten years later has been very highly successful at helping the Bowie High School student body and local community. I miss engaging in the community service and inspiring student to perform well in school academically and behaviorally. I miss the meeting, the sleep overs and most of all the members. I recently had spoken at the group’s 10 year reunion and was so very elated to see how the group went from 15 2003 member to 100 2013. I find that adjourning is a necessary process of teamwork because there is a sense of accomplishment and/or a sense of a job well done.   

Managing Conflict

According to O’Hair &Wiemann,(2012) it is extremely important for early child care professionals to understand the existing differences between productive conflict and unproductive conflict. I recently experienced an example of unproductive conflict with a child care committee board member, (who also happens to be the pastor of the church I am employed with).  She asked to meet with me in order to address some concerns she had and I hesitantly agreed to meet with her because she often demeans the productiveness of center, staff and this me as a Director. Consequently, while expressing her concerns to me she began to verbal assault me by calling me names. I was completely shock and taken off guard, because I did not expect for someone in her position act or speak in such a manner. I advised her that I would never talk to her and that I did not appreciate her talking to me the way she did and that I strongly disagree with how she was trying to characterize me. She told me that I needed to stop talking and listen. She continued outlining her concerns about my writing style with regards to stating “this Director” in announcements she demanded that I state “the center”. I made an attempt to explain to her that my writing style is a habit and that I have changed it my many cases to state “the center”. She told me that I need to speak graciously to her and others, that when rescheduling meetings with the bookkeeper, I need to speak graciously with her. She stated when I have an emergency involving the center and if it causes me to be delayed in attending meetings with a person, I need to have someone go and tell the person who it waiting for me or go and explain the emergency to the person waiting to speaking with. I explained to her that the center was extremely low in staff members on that day and she stated that she did not care and that I needed to fix it. She then told me to have a good day.

                I believe that there are so many areas in the above conflict that need to be corrected and should have not occurred form the beginning. I have never experienced that level of planned out verbal abuse from supervisors or a pastor or a child care committee member before. I believe that if she had any concerns about the center, or me as a director, she should have gone through the proper channels. The chairperson of the committee should have meet with me with her and another board member should have been present. I feel like she took the opportunity to degrade me and verbal assault with one else present so she could perhaps get away with doing it and she mostly thought I would not do anything to stand of for myself or demand respect since she had gotten away with talk with to me before in such a way. Nevertheless, when she told me to have a good day, I told her to have a good day as well. I then called another board member and explain the incident that had occurred and she stated that name calling is unacceptable and that a big meeting would need to occur with the pastor’s supervisor, (vestry chairperson).

 I know that most people would have walked, especial being pregnant, but I fell like why shouldn’t I suffer as result of her actions.

I believe that the first strategy, I will use it to remain respectful to her and responsive to my professional responsibilities.  I will not tolerate her to verbal assault me again by respectfully stating that meetings may not occur between us unless someone else is present. I would also be willing to use a cooperative strategy once guidelines of communication have been established, (O’Hair & Wiemann, 2012).

The Assistant Director stated that I should try and avoid her as much as possible, especial since I am pregnant. Although, I can appreciate her caring about my well-being and health, I believe that implementing an escapist strategy would not be productive, especial since I work in the same environment as her.  

References:

O'Hair, D., & Wiemann, M. (2012). Real communication: An introduction. New York:

Bedford/St. Martin's 

Self-evaluating My Communication Effectiveness

After conversing with one of my colleagues and my husband, I find that there are some similarities with regards to how I view myself as a communicator and how they both view me as a communicator. I believed that I am an effective communicator with regards to having a great understanding and implementing the following areas of communication in general: self-monitoring, self-presentation, understanding the existing contexts, being able to accurately decode the other communicators message, being cultural responsive, practice active listening and seeking to learn and achieve understanding of the other person’s position. One of the common statements from both my colleague and my husband is the fact that sometimes my ability to communicate effectively is impaired, because I am always multitasking. I do certainly believe this to be true, but to have them both provide me feedback on the same item (“dangers” of multi-tasking) gave me a reality check and has caused me to do some self-evaluating in terms of me making an attempt to prioritize all the demands and responsibilities that I have on my plate.

                I find that I have a deepened understanding on how my perceptions of other can great enhance or cripple my ability to communicate effective. Similarly through this week I have learned how the process of schema is a critical component in communications. According to O’Hara & Wiemann, “To send and receive messages that are appropriate, you must be able to process information in a way that makes senses to you but also high likelihood of being accurately perceived by others,” (p. 38). I further believe that being aware of the dangers of selective perception will only enhance my ability to effectively communicate to my parents, staff and my family members. I find that being aware of how I process message that sent to me or “decoding” will be an ongoing area that I strive to master as each person that I may come in contact with will vary in their ability to communicate. I do believe that understanding the challenges with schemas and perception will assist me in building meaning relationship with my family and staff members, community partners and child care committee members.

References:

O’Hair, D., & Wiemann, M. (2012). Real communication: An introduction (2nd Ed.). New York:          

Bedford/St. Martin’s Press

Communicating Strategies

I must admit that this course has deepened my understanding and enhanced my ability to effectively communicate with my child care center’s families, colleagues, and child care board members. The information I have obtained over the past few week have also enhanced my ability to community with my spouse and close family members. I find that I am making an earnest and conscious effort to understand the context of any given situation. I also believe that I am being more aware of how others would like to be treated and to be slow to respond and focus more on my ability to listen and understand the other person’s perspective.  The three strategies that I would like to achieve when striving to communicate more effectively towards the groups mentioned above are as follows: (1) Consider the Platinum Rule when interacting with other communicator, (2) Be culture aware and responsive to the other communicator, (3) Be an active listener and make an effort to understand the position that the other communicator is conveying in their speech.