The Final Blogpost R.I.P

The final blog post for cg1413! Somehow the semester seems to have sped past and it is already the last week, truth be told i am kind of sad to know that most of our class would be fragmented and split next semester, this semester's class was pretty fun!

I felt that I've learnt quite a lot from this module in terms of communication and teamwork, although there is still much more skills to acquire and hone. First off, i must say i have become more aware of how to make powerpoint slides that are easy for the audience to read and understand, as well as be aware of the little nuances that we tend to overlook when preparing slides like font colour, size and phrasing. The advice given to us after each presentation helps to point out stuff where we can improve on and i felt that this is a very useful skill to know!

Secondly, i think i have gained much more confidence and appreciation of the skills involved in presentations. I used to think that presentations were something that happens instinctively and preparation was not necessary, but as each presentation happened, i learnt the fallacy of my ways. Especially after OP2, i realised that improvisation is an impedance for team presentations and that preparation is key for such situations. I managed to learn how to control my subconscious body posture better as well, from meetings, to presentations itself, i managed to stop myself from slouching, leaning, and pointing callously.

For both my 1102 and 1413 project, i felt that i had a great time working on the project with my teammates. I think in both cases, we communicated well within the groups, worked together to solve problems, challenged each other's ideas with courtesy and politeness, in the end leading to a harmonious working relationship.

Last but not least, i've also learned to appreciate the finer points of being careful with the way we write in any form, all these blog posts have reminded me to be careful with spelling errors, the need for proper phrasing and somehow, the 7C's are always haunting me at the back of my mind whenever i write these days!

In summary, apart from all the presentations and the multiple reflections, i've really enjoyed the lessons, thanks to Mr Stephen and my classmates no less have played a huge part in making the module fun!

Reflection on OP 2

Picture taken from Qinxian!

I'm not even sure if i have anything positive to take away from OP2, from what i observed of myself during the presentation, it seemed to me like i made a mess of the presentation.

One of the things i felt i did wrong was that i did not practice my script properly, not only did this make me look bad, it also made my teammate Qinxian look bad too. There were times where he did not when to click out my slides and i had to prompt him to progress in my presentation,i felt that this oversight on my part affected the smoothness and connectedness of my presentation. I had recorded my speech into the speech cards which i held in my hands, but i thought that i had enough confidence to deliver my speech, hence i did not refer to the cards at all. This was an extremely regrettable mistake on my part because i had forgotten about teamwork, which was that Qinxian needed me to stick to my arranged speech so as to cue me in as planned.

Moreover, there were times where i was looking around at my audience, without saying anything, I'm not sure what i was trying to do then, but i remember looking at certain members of the audience and then having to stifle the urge to laugh. Well, not only did this create a awkward break in my presentation, it also made me look unprofessional as well.

Even the Q&A session was not very well done in my opinion, maybe because most of the questions asked were directed towards nuclear energy, so i felt i had to answer them, therefore i felt i was 'dominating' the segment. I should not have dived into every question so fast, instead i should have waited and look for visual clues from my teammates to see if they would like to tackle the question as well.

Perhaps the only plus side to the presentation was my body posture, i made an effort to me more conscious about how i stood and how i were holding my hands throughout the presentation. I did not slouch or lean on one foot and i made sure that my hands were not 'loose' so as to project a professional etiquette.

This presentation was really a wake up call for me, learning and translating what is learnt is process that will probably take time and repeated reflections to improve, and from what i feel about my presentation, that is much much more to improve on. :(

Effective Communication gone wrong!

Credits to i205.photobucket.com/albums/bb42...sign.jpg for the picture.

Sometimes we tend to overlook the repercussions from the careless use of phrasing! This picture is a sterling example of good intentions gone wrong simply by careless phrasing! While it may be funny, it goes to show how much damage poor phrasing and poor awareness of what we write without reflecting on it, can lead to the reader translating it otherwise from our original intentions! We cannot afford such mistakes when we are interacting with other people!

P.s in case you don't get it, the sign could also be saying that instead of getting killed by worries, let the church help, i.e let the church help to kill you :)

Effective Communication 101

Forums are a great way of displaying effective communication! This is a clear example of someone asking a clear and concise question, and being replied to in a similiar manner.

Reflections on meeting 1

If the above picture describes why you hold meetings, then you'll probably need a lot of help at work because your perception of holding meetings is eschewed! Thanks to www.funnymail.co.za/wp-content/u...e-10.jpg for the picture.

After observing the meeting with Abinav and Frank, I'm embarrassed to say that I feel that my body language in the meeting was very unprofessional. I was regretfully leaning on my hand throughout most of the video, hopefully I'll be able to restrain myself from doing that in future meetings so as to put up a more professional front.

On to other matters, I feel that the meeting was quite successful in that all 3 of us were actively discussing how we would be tackling the problem. Abinav and Frank both injected their opinions and perspectives, so that the momentum of the discussion would be sustained.

We managed to settle each issue rather swiftly, but i feel that is due to the 'problem' not being a actual problem yet, so it was within our scope and we thus resolved each issue we faced rather fast.

Particularly, in my team, i knew that my programming skills were not exactly top notch, so I was unsure of how to go about solving the problem. Thankfully, when I brought up issues that we had to face for the programming, Abhinav and Frank were receptive and responsive as well, providing insight on how we were supposed to go about doing the code, helping me decide exactly how to do the programming aspect, unfortunately this was not done on camera, but happened after the meeting.

I feel the meeting was very objective and we cleared our objectives set in the agenda very fast, before moving on to other businesses. This I feel is attributed to my team's preparation before hand, as well as every one's discipline to work along the agenda's outline.

On the whole, I would say that the meeting was mostly positive and beneficial, we all knew what we had to do at the end of the day, with minimal fuss and we accomplished it faster than expected!

Resolving interpersonal conflict

If every conflict you come across leads to this, then you're probably going to be the lonliest person on the planet! Credit to www.videogamesblogger.com/wp-con...sion.jpg for the picture.

The most recent 'conflict' i had was around last december, where i had a disagreement with my best friend of 6 years. It was quite a minor trigger factor to be honest, the both of us were very keen on a new computer game in the market. When the exams in semester 1 had ended, we went to Bishan's Junction 8 to look for the game, only to reach there too late, the shop had closed. We were both disappointed and decided to get it as soon as possible. So the very next day, i was out at Marina Square, so i decided to look for it, and i texted my friend asking him if he had got the game already. He replied saying if i got it, then he'll go get it also, since he lived opposite Junction 8 and he could just go over and buy the game. So what resulted was a frenzied search for shops that sold the game, but there were none that did in Marina Square, so i walked over to Suntec City and combed the entire place. Unfortunately they didn't have it too, so i resolved to take the train all the way back to Sengkang(where i live) and try my luck at the shopping centre there.

In the end i did manage to buy the game in Sengkang, and when i texted my friend telling him i got the game, he replied 'good for you! I'll go get it sometime'. His reply greatly annoyed me, because he had implied that once i got the game, he would go over to Junction 8 and get it so we could try out the game together.

So i pressured him to go get it, but he kept saying he was lazy, so in the end i got so annoyed i just gave him a sarcastic comment. To me i felt quite 'cheated', because it seemed like he said he'll do something, and i went the extra mile to uphold my end of the deal only to see him flip over and change his mind. I felt very frustrated with his nonchalant attitude towards my efforts to get the game, but on hindsight i suppose on his part, he would think that since we're such pals, i wouldn't have minded his sudden change of mind, he actually thought it was quite funny.

In the end though, the issue was quickly resolved because i think he knew he had irked me, because the next day he texted me said that he got the game too. While i feel that this is actually not a 'conflict' per se, but it does highlight how things can go wrong without us knowing that it did.

It seemed that the main problem was that there were expectations on each other's part, especially between close friends, when there is a breech in behaviour, it would surely hurt much more than just a normal friend, likewise the assumed 'acceptable' behaviour within close friends is greyed out, meaning that we might actually offend our close friends while not meaning to.

Observation of team behavior: intercultural and interpersonal communication

The most recent inter-cultural scenario i experienced was actually back when i was in an overseas military exercise during my active service term. Just a little over one year ago, i was spending the majority of my January in sunny New Zealand, from the 5th to the 24th. As the exercise was bilateral with the New Zealand Army, at the end of the whole exercise, we were all brought together to celebrate the end of the exchange at a barbeque dinner. So soldiers from both armies were brought together and allowed to mingle and chat, all formalities aside.

While eating, i started to chat with a NZ soldier and got to know more about him. What was interesting is that i found out that he was only 19, to me that was quite a shock because the NZ army is a professional one, and at 19 he was willing to commit himself to a life in the military. When i explained to him that although i was in the army, it was more of a 'no choice' situation and that after my term i would be going back to studying. His reaction to that was laughable, he gave an astonished look and said "bummer eh?", he then went on to tell me that he's far away from home, having led an independent life since 16. He said that studying and getting to university was something not on his mind at all. When i told him about how our culture was to study hard and get a degree to support our parents, he told me their's was to get out of their parents home as soon as possible and live independantly.

I can't imagine living independantly at this moment to be honest, i don't think that most of us Singaporeans are brought up in such a way, our asian culture is more family centered and i suppose it's raises eyebrows when told to people outside Asia, perhaps exculding Australia and New Zealand.

Thinking back on it, having learnt something about him and his way of life was extremely interesting, knowing about how different we all lead our lives based on culture was very intriguing. We may be of the same age but how we have seen the world is vastly different! It also brings to mind the ignorance we hold when communicating with someone of a different culture, i could have said something to offend and still be none the wiser! I feel that communication was largely effective because we were both polite and considerate to listen to each other talk about their own culture, the questions we exchanged helped to sustain the conversation and build interest, which led to such a meaningful exchangeg!