Effective communication is important to me as I would like to be able to express my feelings in a manner that will not emotionally injure others especially when dealing with sensitive issues, as sometimes emotional scars are harder to heal than physical ones. I feel that communicating effectively does not just involve talking but also active listening. Effective communication can help to prevent misinterpretation and misunderstanding, and in turn foster better relationships.
Communication can only happen when there are at least two people involved and it can be portrayed as riding on a see-saw, whereby a person talks, the other listens and vice versa. Communication breaks down when both parties try to talk at the same time and it is certainly not called communicating when both parties try to listen at the same time. This means that when one party speaks, the other party should listen and vice versa. Therefore I feel that it is important to know when to talk and when to listen. I also feel that to become an effective communicator, I have to convey my message in a manner that can be easily understood by the person I am talking to as well as actively listen when the person speaks.
Being an effective communicator can benefit us hugely in all aspects of our lives, be it in work, in school and even at home. Having good relationships with people around us will definitely make us happier people.
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Hi Zheng Yang,
ReplyDeleteI like the "see-saw" analogy you used to describe communication. Indeed, effective communication can only take place when the listener and communicator play their roles faithfully. However, this intricate balance is often hard to sustain which leads to miscommunication. Hopefully, in the near future, all of us can become effective communicators with more practice.
Hi Zhengyang,
ReplyDeleteI concur with the whole general idea of person B listening to person A while (s)he is speaking. It takes two hands to clap and this is indeed true for communication. But one mustn't forget that that a proper communication line cannot established if the speaker doesn't cater his message to the profile of his listener. Do you remember this flowchart from our first reading list?
"Source --> Encoding --> Channel --> Decoding --> Receiver ---> (back to source) Feedback"
The message that one convey must be encoded in such a way that the receiver can understand when (s)he receives it. The receiver would then decodes and understand the message and feedback to the source (in this case, the speaker).
This is what i feel effective communication is all about!
Cheers,
Ariff
Hi Zhengyang,
ReplyDeletei enjoyed reading your post, it had good points and a clear flow.
i liked the importance you give to your method of expression of your feelings without hurting others.It shows your an effective communicator who takes the other party's feelings into hand.
communication is about being part of the whole process as arriff had picked out the flowchart.You just do not be the source or the encoder or the receiver, you have to understand the roles and the state of the others to accomplish a good communication.
Especially being at the lower end of the 'see-saw', being the receiver. Many persume that if i have said what i want to say i am done.And fail to do the receiving end duty.
We must be able to be on both sides to be and effective communicator.and post highlights this importance.
cheers
alagu
Hi Zheng Yang,
ReplyDeleteI do like your see-saw analogy, but I feel that it is too similar to the "telegraph model" where only one person can talk at once. Perhaps to add on to your see-saw analogy, we can judge each other's facial expressions to see if the other party is having fun, feeling queasy or even scared. From their facial expressions we could adjust the intensity of the see-saw motion, in the same manner we look out for non-verbal cues. I believe this would be a more accurate model for effective communication. What do you think?
Wang Ting
Hey Xin wei, Ariff, Alagu and Wang ting,
ReplyDeleteregarding the see saw analogy, it was to illustrate the point that "it takes two hands to clap" for effective communication to work as Ariff pointed out. I do agree that it is too weak to explain clearly what effective communication is all about.
Effective communications consist of so many aspects and it will be naive to think that it can be explained clearly by just a simple see saw analogy. As Ariff noted, there is a lot of "coding" and "decoding" to do, and as Wang ting suggested, non-verbal cues are essential too.
Alagu also pointed out a very good point where "we must be able to be on both sides to be an effective communicator". This highlights the point that we must work on both sides ie; listening and talking.
cheers,
Zhengyang