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There was a period of time where my superior and fellow officers were away for a course for a few weeks, thus before leaving he left me in charge of the administrative and training matters of the men to me. Including me, there was another officer of which was of equal rank who was to assist me in the planning and carrying out various tasks.

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At the beginning, we had an agreement that it would be more uniform for only one person to make the decisions regarding the arrangement of the training schedule, thus it was decided that i would do the planning, while he would oversee and conduct the training itself.

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However, after a short amount of time, conflicts arosed. I was more of a strict and routine person, therefore i put it upon myself to be available in the office during office hours, while he was more of a carefree person. For most part of the day he would not be available in the office unless contacted to do so. As such, planning for the activities weeks in advance including of manpower management left me very much occupied and exhuasted, while he was nowhere to be seen.

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After awhile, I saw him as a not very dependable person, and being not close with him and partly due to my character, i did not seek his help or asked him for his opinion, as it would take the extra effort to contact him and ask him to discuss with me. Therefore weeks went by without much interaction with him besides informing him briefly of the upcoming trainings, often in a not-too-pleasant tone, while he would accept the information nonchalantly.

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The misunderstandings continued until my fellow officers came back from the course, and through mediation and talking things through did we resolve the conflict.

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The question now :

What was going through the minds of both me and my colleague, and how did we percieved each others actions in our point of view? What could have been done by either of us to resolve the conflict earlier? Instead of waiting for my peers to meditate and help in ironing out the issues.

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Well, given my lazy nature, instead of creating a new blog i opted to post it in my old blog.. haha sorry if the format isn't very conducive to reading. Anyway here goes.

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Why developing effective communication skills is important to me?

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I believe the importance not only applies to certain individuals, but its importance is often overlooked by the general human population. While being individualistic creatures, there comes not a single day or occassion that the average person has to communicate in one fashion or another, be it in a formal or informal setting. With that being said, countless times and again was productivity in the work setting or, in general, misunderstandings between people caused by ineffective communication skills.

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In my perception, i feel as if most singaporeans aren't verbal or are able to express themselves coherently, be it due to the asian "culture" of being reserved, or it could be due to the format of the education system that leaves them with a lack of communicating skills. As such, i see myself as one of those that i have afore mentioned. Be it due to my slurring or mumbling when trying to speak as a matter of habit, or my passive listening and lack of pro-activity to seek clarifications. In more than one occassions i found myself in awkward situations or found that i was being counter-productive due to my lack in inter-personal skills, of which i seek to improve.

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While being students and not yet fully stepping into the working society, Misundestandings in our social lives comparatively has less of a long and severe impact as compared to those caused during our work in which money or reputation is involved. Therefore, i guess nobody would want to learn things the hard way when we can develop them in a more pleasant atmosphere early.

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With all that being said, i do have hopes that picking up communication skills, or the least, understanding them would improve the quality of my life. Nobody can turn away from the single fact that we are but one person out of a sea of faces, and being able to communicate well within society would make us stand out and be noticeable, in words, or in deeds. =]