Final Reflection on Learning

And that is how it ends. After four gruelling months of studies, assignments, and deadlines, yet another semester of my university education has come to an end. For me, this also marks the end of my NUS adventure. Having come here for a semester-long exchange from NTU, the entire exchange experience has certainly been very memorable for me.

I am immensely glad that I decided to complete my Professional Communications module here in NUS. It has given me the opportunity to get to know so many different students from various courses, backgrounds, and nationalities. The course has also granted me the opportunity to work with these amazing people who have taught me so much about teamwork and on a more personal level, friendship. After the end of this course, I am happy to have made more friends and was able to learn so much from these amazing people.

Working on various assignments with so many different people, the experience I gained has certainly improved my ability to work in teams. I learnt that a good team is so much more than just the sum of the individuals. Working in a team means allowing each member to utilise their strengths and fulfil their highest potential. It also means having each other’s back and picking up the slack so that others can have a well-deserved break. It is a well-used cliché, but it goes without saying that working in a team changes the focus from “me” to “us” and I have certainly learned a lot about that in this course.

Coming from a mechanical engineering course, the opportunity to hone my presentation and writing skills are sorely missing since most of my course works are heavily focused on, well engineering. Therefore, the various assignments like the peer teaching lessons, the mock interview sessions, the proposal project, and even this blogging assignment is certainly a breath of fresh air from the usual. I would also like to thank my teacher and fellow classmates for the positive and constructive feedbacks that I have received on my previous works as it has allowed me to identify my weaknesses and improved further.

Before I sign off, I would like to say a massive thank you to everyone in this class who have made my NUS exchange experience such a memorable one. I wish everyone all the best in their future endeavours and hopefully may this be the very beginning of a long and meaningful friendship. =)

Reflection on Team-based Research Project Proposal

Hi to everyone reading this! So today I will be reflecting on the research project proposal which has recently concluded.

 

First of all, I would like to thank all my groupmates for being such awesome team members! Everyone worked really hard on this project and it clearly shows in the report. I think we all clearly deserve a good pat on the back for job well done. =) It was a great experience to work with these bunch of people for the first time and we worked really well together as a team throughout the duration of the project. When we first started brainstorming on an issue to focus on, it was great to see that everyone had an opinion on what we should do. Every member of the team gave very constructive opinions on the suggestions and we were able to reach an agreement very quickly.

 

Besides that, it was great to know that we had mutual respect for one another. From an early stage of the project, we tried to understand the various commitments that each of us had and wokred out on the priorities of the project to avoid any future misunderstandings. I am positive that this is the right step to do and can certainly be applied to most, if not all, situations. Furthermore, we constantly updated one another on the progress of the project so that no one is left behind on the work progress. I believe that this is yet another important step which most certainly can be applied to most workplace situations.

 

Lastly, the project was a joint team effort as everyone played their part in ensuring that the project was a success. Every member of the team took the initiative to contribute to the project and was very much willing to go the extra mile to get things done. In every successful team, it is paramount that each member share similar goals and ideals. Since the focus of the team's proposal was on the issue of recycling in Singapore, it helps that all of us share similar ideals where we believe that we should be more socially responsible to our environment and encourage the practice of recycling. It was an exciting experience to work with people from different backgrounds and yet share similar ideals and viewpoints. Of course, this might not always be the case in the common workplace. For situations like these, I believe that it is up to the team leader or anyone from a position of leadership in the workplace to unite the team and get each member to work towards a shared goal.

 

I won't say that this was a perfect team but I believe that the team worked really well with one another and the entire journey with these awesome people has certainly been a memorable one for me. I hope it doesn't just end here and that perhaps sometime in the future, we'll get another chance to work with each other again. =)

Evaluating Intercultural Behaviour

The world as we know it is becoming smaller and flatter. It is not uncommon to find oneself working in a multinational company with so many different people from different nations with different languages, religion, and beliefs. Take my friend Refidia (not real name) for instance. Similar to myself, she came from Malaysia and is currently working in Singapore. Her colleagues consists of Singaporeans as well as foreign workers who came from countries like China, India, and Europe. To top it all, she is working for a Canadian company. Talk about diversity!  As we enter the age of globalisation, the world is becoming increasingly inter-connected. With this in mind, there has been a growing emphasis on the importance of competent intercultural communication.

I will like to share an observation I made on an intercultural scenario I encountered during my trip to Myanmar, the land of golden pagodas. My friends and I were there on an OCIP, and this particular incident happened during our initial visit to the orphanage. Upon entering the orphanage, we were ushered into one of the children's classroom. While our leader was handling the administrative matters, the rest of us took the chance to mingle with some of the kids. The kids were extremely shy and were very reluctant to answer when asked for their name and age and whatnot (we picked up some basic Burmese). 

What struck me most was how they placed their arms when we were talking to them. They crossed their arms while we were talking to them! And it wasn't just one of them, all of them did it. I was very confused and shocked to see that happening. To a certain extent, I was actually offended. My first impression was that they were just being defensive towards us. As the conversations went on, they got friendlier and more open to us, responding to our questions more warmly. However, their arms still remained cross. 

Confused, I seeked out one of my team members who is actually from Myanmar. Apparently, it is a Burmese culture for students to cross their arms over their chest when speaking as a sign of respect. Well that certainly cleared out a lot of my confusion. Needless to say, the rest of the trip went pretty smoothly and I was more than happy when the students crossed their arms when speaking to us, as a clear sign of respect for us. I think this is a clear example of the importance of understanding the cultures of others. Having knowledge about the culture of others could help avoid any possible misunderstandings and allow for more effective communication.

Resolving Interpersonal Conflict

This is the very first blog post that I have ever written and I am super excited to be sharing it with you all! So for this post I will be talking about “Resolving Interpersonal Conflict”.

A Personal Experience

Here I will share my own experience of interpersonal conflict. It happened when I was still a polytechnic student back in Singapore Polytechnic (SP). As you might be aware, each student is required to form a group for their Final Year Project (FYP). So like everyone else, I sought out my friends to form a group with. I’ll admit we weren’t the closest of friends but we have certainly worked on other academic projects together before. For the sake of confidentiality, let’s call them Sara, Michael, Zul, and Halim.

Before I go any further, I think I should give a little bit more details on our group dynamics. Halim was our group leader, of which I am particularly close to. I find it a lot easier to talk with him as he is very open to ideas and suggestions. Michael is charismatic (to an extent) and could be a very persuasive talker. He was also the man that brought the team together in the early stages. I only got to know Zul after this project and we have remained close ever since. He is someone you’ll describe as “awkwardly funny”. Then there is Sara, the lovely flower among the thorns. Always bubbly, Zul and she were always able to lighten things up a bit when the stress became unbearable.

Throughout the entire project, we had our ups and downs. Moments of victory and defeat. Highs and lows. But I will point to a particular period of time which I personally think was the flashing point in our group’s relationship. In this particular incident, I was finishing up on a technical drawing (yeap, engineer stuff) which needed to be completed soon. We were already behind schedule. I was up all night the previous day so the exhaustion definitely played a part. Halim was with me to finish up the drawing as well and was well aware of my lack of sleep. Michael was tasked to purchase an electric motor while the other two were on a separate errand. So I received a phone call from Michael. It was bad news, hardly the thing I needed at that moment. It turned out that he doesn’t quite know which particular electric motor to purchase and asked for my suggestion. What happened next was utter disaster.

Tired and sleepy, I raised my voice. I questioned his lack of preparation. Why didn’t he do some homework before going out to make the purchase? Why must he shove the work to me instead? Why couldn’t he be more responsible for the assignments that were given to him? (There were similar issues previously but that is a different story.) Enraged at such an outburst, he raised his voice as well. So a very loud argument ensued. Halim, who was beside me the entire time, had to calm me down and asked that the both of us continue this conversation once he was back. During the entire time, he acted calmly and decisively so kudos to him. Once Michael was back, both he and I had a very good talk where we expressed our feelings and agreed to put aside our differences for the sake of our group. Things got a lot better after that as we have learned our lesson to calm down and not let our emotions get the better of us before we speak with one another. We were able to work much better with one another and the project ended pretty successfully I might say.

Looking back at it, I realized that a large part of the fault belongs to me. I have learned a lot ever since about communicating with other people, both in a professional group and generally with other people. Dissecting that particular incident, I realized that several factors contributed to the entire outburst. First and foremost, there was a lack of emotional control on my part. Had I been calmer with matters, things will not have gotten so bad. Next is my misinterpretation of Michael’s body language. When I received his call, he sounded nonchalant about the matter which I perceived as a lack of interest in his task. At that very moment, I felt that my anger is justified and that he should have shown more commitment in his work. What I learned from that was to never make assumptions without sufficient information and certainly never to condemn someone based on an assumption.

Well that concludes my first ever blog post. It turned out to be a lot longer than I initially thought it will be. It might be a bit draggy but I hope you enjoy reading it! I have learned a lot from this particular incident but have always felt that I could have done better. Was there a side to this story that I missed? Any particular area in which I could have done better? Do share with me on your own opinion as I would really appreciate it. Thanks guys! =)