Saturday, March 3, 2012

What is communication?

Communication is the way a person uses symbols and behaviors to share and receive information (O'Hair & Wiemann, 2009). It is something that I have found challenging from time to time.  However, my friend and previous colleague was a great communicator.  Many times I found myself admiring her ability to captivate an entire roomful of teachers whenever she shared information, which can be difficult since teachers are notorious for being "talkers." Her personality was very bubbly, energetic.  She was not fearful of speaking out or voicing her opinion about an issue.  At the same time, she was able to listen to our ideas and find creative ways of intertwining them with ours.

Certainly, I would love to model her ability to listen to others ideas and be able to quickly interweave with them with my own because it shows you care about other's perspectives and value you their input.  I think a significant part of communicate is listening which I do really well.  However, I fall short when it comes to expressing my own ideas because I don't want to offend others or sometimes I feel insecure or lack confidence. Therefore, I am hesitant to speak up quickly or share out ideas.  Often, I am fearful that others won't accept my perspective and perhaps this fear was created by ineffective communication from others.      

"The basic building block of good communications is the feeling that every human being is unique and of value."

— Unknown

3 comments:

  1. Hi Maggie;

    Life experiences does have a way of causing us to be more cautious. Due to an unfortunate experience with a co-worker involving strong differences of opinions cost me and that co-worker our jobs. I learned a lot from that experience and saw my own error. Since that incident, I am very selective when it comes to addressing conflict and I am more reserved in voicing my opinion about things, especially if they are trivial.

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  2. I too fall into that gap, of trying not to hurt the other person’s feelings, however if we want to be a great communicator we need to be honest.

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  3. Maggie,
    When I was reading your blog it reminds me of myself. I have a lot of hesitation when it comes to being open and expressing my feelings. However, we have the right to be heard; we must conquer out fear and move on to be effective in all aspect of communicating. Also I love to go to trainings where the trainer is bubbly and energetic, it keeps me involved and focus.

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