For this assignment please follow instructions below; This is a communication class, and It should be 4 pages MLA Style not including cover and title page ,Please only bid if you have access to the book Adler, Ronald B., Lawrence B. Rosenfeld, and Russell F. Proctor, II, Interplay, The Process of Interpersonal Communication.13th ed.New York, New York:Oxford University Press, Inc. 2015 : This is a 8 week communication skill improvement project.

Pick a skill and write a Communication Improvement Plan

Paper will be graded on the following:Including each section with headings.Grammar, punctuation, and spelling.Completeness of descriptions and examples.

Skill:

What type of communication skill do you want to work on improving?

These communication skills are the concepts that were covered in each chapter.Examples:Listening, Perception, Conflict Management, Emotions, Self Esteem

Problem:

Describe the problem that you have now.This problem could only be with one person.How does this communication skill affect your life?

Goal:

In an optimum situation how would you like this communication skill to be?

Procedure:

Set up a timeline that you will follow for this skill change.

What steps will you take to improve this skill?What is your plan?

Test of Achieving Goal:

Select a situation where you put your plan to work.What happened?

You should attempt to change this skill over an eight-week period.

Success:

Analyze the results of your attempt to change this skill.Were you successful?

Example

Skill

The communication skill I chose to improve upon, or actually really learn to do for the first time in my life, is listening.I did not realize what an essential component active listening truly is for successful communication, until I took this course.From my experience these past several weeks, listening is part of every facet of communication in our personal relationships, professional interactions, and overall self-concept.

Problem

Life is very busy for all of us.I, personally, am a wife, mother, grandmother, daughter, sister, friend, employee, and student.With so many responsibilities and people counting on me, I find myself rushing through my day-to-day interactions just so I can move on to the next chore, interaction, essay, etc.In looking back through my many years as an adult, I see that I haven’t given the attention to those around me who so much deserved my undivided attention.Although I might’ve thought I was listening by nodding my head or engaging the other party in small talk, I see now that I really wasn’t.I have learned that I probably missed out on some important moments in life that can’t be retrieved or replayed; they are gone forever.As I get older, what really matters in life becomes more important such as hearing about my grown children’s daily lives with their families and their experiences as mothers, or sharing with my grandchildren in listening as their little minds grow and absorb all of life’s little miracles.I also feel that because I let life get in the way of listening, I am very forgetful about conversations that I have had.Daily, I have trouble recalling details of conversations that I should’ve remembered.I feel that if I were actively listening, this wouldn’t be a problem.

Goal

I hope to become an excellent listener in my personal and professional communications.This isn’t something that others will necessarily see, but rather a skill that I will make second nature.It is my purposeful intention to be so engaged in my daily communication of listening that I am truly focused on my dialogue with others, and that thoughts of “when is this conversation going to end because I have this, this and this to do” will not even enter my mind or if they do, I will have the mindset to not allow the thoughts to continue.To put it in other words, I will focus more on mindful listening rather than mindless listening.I hope to become someone others really want to talk to because they do feel I am completely engaged in their thoughts and sharing, rather than always offering my thoughts and opinions when, in fact, that isn’t what the other person needs from me.I want listening to become my priority instead of the business of everyday life. As stated, “…listening to one another’s personal narratives is fundamental to our humanity and sense of well-being.” (Adler and Proctor II 211)

Procedure

To become a more effective listener I will do or not do the following:

• I will stop whatever I am doing when an employee comes to my office with a question or concern, this includes not answering the phone, reading emails, looking at cell phone, etc.
• I will have empathy for the individuals I am communicating with.
• I will have positive self-talk in situations where communications might become unpleasant for the employee or myself.
• I will not allow the preconceived opinions I have of others interfere with engaging in active listening with them.
• I will keep a journal of the days interactions wherein I did or did not effectively engage in active, mindful listening.
• I will repeat what I hear the other person saying to insure I am hearing them accurately and that they are feeling heard.
• I will follow up with those who share concerns with me to show that I actively listened and am concerned about their feelings, thoughts, and concerns.
• I will not let information overload interfere with my ability to effectively listen.I will stay focused on what is being shared.
• I will implement silent listening in my employee meetings and not share information about my thoughts, experiences, etc., unless it is solicited or necessary to complete the task.

Test of Achieving

Week One:The first week of being mindful of my new goal of active listening was rather easy.I’m not sure why this was so, but now look back and see that it must’ve been beginners luck.In reviewing my journal from this week, I found myself really realizing how bad of a listener I really am.When employees came to my office I made mental notes each time I wanted to look at my email or my thoughts moved to other things I had to do or negative self-talk about the employee or the situation they were sharing about, and there were many.

Week Two:In week two, I decided to try and put into play what I had been thinking about for the past several days, which was taking steps to assist me in becoming a better listener.This week when I felt I was going to have obstacles before me that might cause me to listen as effectively as I should, that I would change my surroundings to provide less interruptions and distractions.I have been handling a difficult situation between a manager and a staff member.Their communication is lacking and the staff member comes to me constantly with minor complaints.Because I am so familiar with this issue, I find myself not actively listening to the employee, but rather mindlessly listening to her. When she came to my office this week, with another complaint, I moved our conversation to the conference table in my office.I was then out of sight of my computer where I might be tempted to look at my emails while she spoke about her complaints and away from the phone so I wouldn’t be tempted to answer the call. I attempted to have all meetings in my office this week away from the temptations of my work area.

Week Three:One of the problems I realize that I have that could have a negative impact on my listening skills, is my desire to offer my thoughts, opinions, and experiences when it is of no value to the recipient.I elected in week three to try and keep my thoughts, opinions, and experiences to myself unless the recipient specifically asked for feedback.I felt silent listening was probably a good approach in my role as a human resource professional.I regularly meet with employees who have concerns, complaints, or are subject to discipline.It is easy to share my experiences and recommendations, etc., in these types of situations, but not always welcomed or effective.I elected to only provide feedback if it was solicited.As stated in our assigned reading, “There are even times when silent listening can help others solve their problems.” (Adler and Proctor II 223)

Week Four:Now that I am more cognizant of silent listening, I thought this week would be a good time to begin repeating what I heard the other person saying to insure I was actively listening and was accurate in what I thought they were saying.In addition, I think that by repeating what I heard them to say, helps the other person feel heard.In my work, 75% of the complaints employees have, only require they feel they are heard and nothing more.I made it a point to begin repeating what I heard the employees who wanted to share concerns or complaints had to share.The complaints I heard this week included an employee questioning his supervisor not authorizing vacation, a supervisor complaining about the employee evaluation process, a supervisor wanting to dismiss a temporary employee who had not shown up for work, and an employee sharing about accepting another position in another department because of her manager’s management style.

Week Five:I decided to implement an “empathy check” in week four.I have been told by former supervisors that I am too empathetic, but feel that as I’ve aged and because my role is consistently filled with unpleasant situations such as employee discipline and termination, and investigations into allegations of sexual harassment and/or unlawful discrimination, that my empathy for others might be compromised.I elected to be mindful of others this week and be aware of their situation, understand that they were feeling, and seeing their situation through their eyes.

Week Six:I found that I needed to continue to focus on my empathy and insuring it is adequate to allow me to improve my listening skills.

Week Seven:As I’m nearing the end of this eight-week assignment, I reviewed the goals I had set for myself to aid in me becoming a successful listener.I realized that I had not followed up with the employees with whom I had interactions wherein I applied the weekly changes to my communications.The purpose of following up was to take the time to ensure the employees, once again, felt heard and to see if silent listening facilitated in any way them solving their problem.In addition, it was also important that I take the time away from distractions to give my undivided time and attention to someone else.I make it this week’s goal to follow up with a few employees to see how they were doing with the issue they came to me with in the previous four or five weeks.

Week Eight:This week I elected to focus on the processes that I had implemented over the past several weeks and the affect those processes have had on my communication style of becoming an active listener.

Successes

Week One:My week one successes were that I found it very satisfying to truly feel like I had listened.I saw that I helped me to really evaluate the situations that were put before me.My job a manager includes listening to employee complaints, and there are many!Of course, actively listening to the major complaints of sexual harassment, discrimination, or unfair labor practices is easy; listening to the complaints or concerns that seem minor to me but are so important to the employee is a challenge.This week allowed me to really hone in on better listening to the “small stuff.”

Week Two:In reviewing my journal from week two, successes were that I learned being free of distractions did help me to engage in active listening and to recall the details of the conversations.I also found that I, without consciously making an effort, spent more time talking with employees when away from my work station.

Week Three:My success this week was interesting and a bit unexpected.While making a point to not offer my thoughts, etc., I found that I was able to listen more effectively.I believe it was because I was not thinking about what I was going to offer as a recommendation or what experiences I was going to share, I could focus more intently on what the other party was sharing.I also found it a bit less stressful to know that my role was just to sit and listen and not offer any thoughts, unless asked.

Week Four: This week’s challenge really forced me to pay closer attention to what the other person said.If I needed to repeat what I heard them to say, I couldn’t be distracted by other things such as email or the telephone, or I wouldn’t have been able to accurately repeat back what I heard the other person say.Although it is easy to repeat back what you heard someone to say, it isn’t so easy if you are not actively listening.It is in week four, that I am beginning to feel more confident about my listening skills.While I am far from mastering the skill, I do see how I and the other party involved in communicating benefit from my realization of what I need to do to actively listen.I am feeling better about myself because I am, for the first time, really listening.I think the other party is also benefitting from my attempts to be a better listener and leaving the conversation feeling heard and even empowered by solving their own problem.From this week’s complaints and concerns expressed by employees and supervisors, I listened silently in hopes this might facilitate them solving their own problems.

Week Five:My empathy check didn’t go as well as I thought it would.I saw that my empathy for others sharing their concerns or even those in the midst of discipline was not where it should be.I noted that my communication and ability to listen effectively were indeed impacted by diminished empathy.Although I believe it is imperative to be a successful listener one must have empathy for the other person, I was seriously lacking.I knew that I did indeed have empathy, I just needed to ensure that my preconceived thoughts and previous experiences with employees didn’t affect my ability to empathize with them.This meant that I had to filer those negative thoughts and experiences, and address the matter at hand.Leaving my personal beliefs, thoughts, and experiences out of the current interaction helped to ensure my level of empathy was appropriate proved to be more difficult than I thought.I saw this multiple time throughout the work week.I struggled with employees whom I had previously had negative interactions with in either complaints or discipline in keeping my empathy in check.One example is an employee who has a history of leave abuse and consistently not performing at an acceptable level comes to complain about his assigned work zone.It was a challenge to have empathy for this individual because my initial thought was, “of course you are going to complain about your assigned work, because you don’t like to work”.Something that needed my continued attention…

Week Six:This week I journaled that I continued to focus on empathy.I saw that it was not only lacking in my professional interactions, but also in my personal communication.I had to do a lot of self-talk and remind myself of my role and that judging others and having personal opinions is not my role.In addition, in order to be an exceptional human resource professional, effective communication skills are imperative and empathy is one of the skills necessary.The key to empathizing is to remember that just because your empathy for someone’s situation, thoughts, and experiences, doesn’t mean you have to agree with what they are saying.Recalling this, helped me to put my ability to empathize in check.

Week Seven:This week was a success for me!I found that by following up with the employees whom I had spoken with recently, helped me to close the gap on active listening.I learned that taking the time to reach out to these employees was probably more helpful to me than to them.I can use the follow up as a gauge on my listening skills.It will prove helpful as a “check” for me in the future.

Week Eight:My final week, although it continues to today, I reviewed what the changes I have implemented in my communication style.They are:

• I relocate away from my workstation to minimize distractions and interruptions when listening to employee concerns/complaints;
• Employed silent listening in conversations to ensure I do not offer my personal thoughts, experiences and opinions unless solicited, where applicable;
• As a form of checking to ensure I am actively listening, I repeat back what I heard the other person to say;
• Remind myself that I don’t have to agree with what the other person is sharing in order to have empathy and keep my preconceived thoughts and opinions separate from the interaction; and
• I will follow up with employees to get an update on where they are with their concern in order to come complete circle with my active listening skills.

I have benefited from this assignment by employing these five strategies to ensure I am listening to the best of my ability.I have improved on listening as a communication skill, but believe it is a life-long skill that may never be mastered.I also believe that I am well on my way to being someone others want to come to because they know they will have my undivided attention and will feel heard.

Works Cited

Adler, Ronald B., Lawrence B. Rosenfeld, and Russell F. Proctor, II, Interplay, The Process of Interpersonal Communication.13th ed.New York, New York:Oxford University Press, Inc. 2015