Three strategies of communication.

     WEEK 3 - Communication and Collaborating

  In life, working with different categories of people at different levels creates real cultural diversity. We are different from each other, even within the family setting, at workplace and interacting with the different families that make up our school family, every individual is unique and every group is unique with unique characteristics.

    My colleagues at school are from different races, biological background, with varying academic and social abilities. The same thing applies to my neighborhood where we have age variance and different classes of people and especially in the church where I work most of the time, it is really a mixture of different groups and classes of people. My family setting includes my husband and children and domestic helpers at certain times. With this kind of mixture and varying expectation at all levels my communication cannot be the same. I find myself communicating differently at all times because they are in different categories.

      First, when I communicate with my colleagues at school, it is professional and official. We respect our selves and work within the boundaries of our profession. There is no room for too much of familiarity, just a few pleasantries and we get to real business. In the church environment, this relationship is more familiar and a bit close, so my communication is open, it is a pastor teaching and training, counseling and listening to the people. I may have to be strict sometimes when I have to give definite instructions but quickly relax and draw the people close but not like a school setting.

     Communicating within my family setting is another experience altogether. These are my own people and no rules govern this at all. I think it is the safe place to be myself. Shout if I like, be distracted and don’t concentrate on what is been said, I think many things need to change here.

     My learning this week has been awesome. There are so many strategies to learn from and improve on my communication skills with everybody within my identified group. In view of this, I am looking at these three strategies:-

1.      I will implement the “platinum rule” by trying to understand everybody and look at issues from their perspective, put myself in their shoes and treat them the way they want to be treated. This will make me a more sensitive communicator, at workplace, with my colleagues and also family members.

2.      I will use more of questioning techniques to be sure I understand what is being said and that what is being communicated is what I understood. This means that I will probe more and reflect more without being judgmental.

3.      I will improve my non-verbal communication deliberately. My gestures, eye contact, and use of hands and body language must reflect what I am trying to say, not to confuse people by nodding my head when I mean to say no. This has to do with understanding how the other cultures read body language and consciously reflect the same.