Effective communication, to me, is the ability to convey your message across
to the other party, without any room for misinterpretation and at the same
time, you do not send mixed signals. It is the phenomena where your body
language, gesticulations, eye contact, facials expressions, tone and pitch of
voice send the exact same message as your words. This would then be
comprehended by the other party effectively and impactfully in cases where it
is necessary for your message to be impactful. However, communication in recent
times has encompassed not only face-to-face communication, but also electronic
mails, facebook, snail mail, phone calls and much much more.
I recall the times during national service where effective communication was
imperative in achieving your objective. A wrongly interpreted message
could lead to the failure of the mission and in the real world scenario, the
loss of many lives! Therefore, the military uses messages that carry literal
meanings and describe them well, most of the time. For example, to fire a
General Purpose Machine Gun at the foot of the mountain would carry
insufficient detail as there may be both enemy and civilian territories there. To
overcome this pitfall, the military would indicate the exact map coordinates
and description of the territory by indicating the left or right side of the
mountain, and distinct description of enemy territory(the tentage with the red
flag, the people with grey uniform, etc etc).
Next, I've always been intrigued by the ability of certain teachers to deliver
their teachings in the most effective way possible. A particular teacher whom I
have always admired is my elder sister, Noor Sarah, who has a unique innate
ability to capture the attention and interests of her students. (Her students
even set up a facebook page called 'Miss Sarah Rocks!' to talk about how amazing she is as a teacher!) As I reflect upon her actions, i realize that she subconsciously employs the
7Cs of communication in her teachings. At the same time, her nonverbal actions seamlessly
coincide with her words. This is definitely a skill that I would like to
acquire in ES2007S.
Two days ago, after Mdm Fazilah's class on nonverbal communication, I happened
to be having tea-break with a political science student named Hadi, who is
currently part of 'Young PAP'. As we were talking about his experiences growing
up, I realized that he was employing certain nonverbal communication tricks
that Mdm Fazilah was teaching earlier on in the day. Upon questioning him,
I found out that he had learned nonverbal communication 5 years ago! He says that it now comes naturally to him. From this
incident, I realized that once a person has gotten the hang of nonverbal
communication, it would come naturally in all future communications. As such, I
hope to learn effective nonverbal communication from ES2007S!
Oh yes! I just remembered that active listening is a big part of effective
communication. Ever since Mdm Fazilah introduced this concept to us, i am now
conscious that i do NOT employ active listening in lectures! I will definitely
try and change my ways from now on!
