Joshua Contti Blog

           Although I was one of the people who joined the class late it was obvious to me that the main subject of all these presentations including the one my group presented was communication. Living in an era where communication is readily available by a touch of a button through our phones and the internet I believe it is an important subject to go over especially at a young age. Although it may seem like we communicate a lot through social media it is important to sharpen our communication skills in person in order to express our thoughts and emotions correctly.  This is especially important now more than ever with the pandemic happening and most things being held virtually. It is important to progress our communication skills and social skills rather than being stuck to our phones which is especially seen throughout the younger generations that grew up with technology.                                                                              

The first subject on communication that was discussed was the importance of intercultural communication which was presented by group one. Intercultural communication is essentially the study and practice of communication across different cultural backgrounds. An example of this would be communication between different sex, race, gender, and religion. This is important especially in western countries such as the United States where a lot of our citizens come from different places around the world with different views on certain topics. It is important to have basic knowledge of intercultural communication in order to avoid misunderstood conflicts when conducting business or in general. I think group one did a great job breaking down the topic and providing us with information on how to handle situations in which the individual is from a different culture.         

                                                                            

The next presentation by group two was based on communication within groups. This chapter went over the different types of communication groups such as family, friends, and work environment and how each has their own form of communication. This chapter also went over the different methods of communication such as texting, email, and face to face and how people may struggle with a certain method of communication. This is interesting to me because it seems like people who were born before cell phones and the internet have mastered face to face communication while struggling with online communication. While newer generations have mastered online communication but struggle to communicate with others face to face. This could be due to the fact that people don’t depend on each other to gather information and news since the internet provides it for us compared to pre social media days. Personally I prefer communicating through social media such as group chats and facetime with people I already know. I do understand the importance of face to face communication since most of our interactions will depend on it such as job interviews and other general tasks that cannot be done solely online.    

                                                                                                                           

Group two then goes on to talk about healthy and unhealthy groups and the different characteristics between the two groups. Healthy groups are described as cohesive, productive, and interdependent in which everyone helps each other and accounts for their own mistakes. Groups like these are important for projects in which everyone has a role to fulfill or multi operational missions such as the military and government agency. The next group which are unhealthy groups are described as harmful and unproductive such as gangs and cults.

The last group which was group 3 discussed leadership and problem solving. In this chapter we discussed the two different types of leadership which were formal and informal leadership. Formal leadership is when a person exercises their authority that was formally given to them by the group. Informal leadership is when a person was not officially chosen as the group leader but group members see them as the leading force of the group. There are also different types of characteristics such as givers and seekers. Givers tend to give information they are knowledgeable on to the group for them to analyze. Seekers are more likely to ask questions in order for group members to contribute to the conversation. The last topic we discussed in our presentation was problem solving. Problem solving is an important communication skill to have within a group since it allows the group to finish their work more efficiently. Although problem solving may seem to be more on the technical side of career paths such as engineering and science it can be used in any workplace. Personally at my workplace we brainstorm and problem solve on how to get our task done faster even though it’s an entry level job.