Why effective communication skills are important for me?
Effective communication skill(s): Effective – adequate to accomplish a purpose; producing the intended or expected result, communication – the interchange of thoughts, opinions, or information by speech, writing, or signs, skill – the ability to do something.
If you have the ability to convey and receive a piece of information, you effectively possess communication skills. However, to produce the intended result requires more explicit knowledge which can be innate or accumulated instinctively from experience. All of us possesses qualities that mark and make us effective communicators.
These qualities need not be taught to us because we would have learned them as we grow and experience the ever ongoing exchanges of information, thoughts and opinions regardless of medium in our life. Each member within a society interacts with each other by a certain way. The same individual would have interacted differently in a different social context.
How then do we know exactly what can be done and not? Through observation and evaluation of our own actions, one can simply be the best communicator without being ever taught. We wouldn’t shout to calm someone; we wouldn’t smile to make someone angry (unless in the right context)!
Why wouldn’t we communicate in a certain way? We achieve negative results in the past. What would we do? Evaluate and think of what we should have done and put into practice the next time.
Are these skills important for me then? No, I would have learned them one way or another; how can they be important?
ES2007S 
Yau Pak Ming said,
August 24, 2009 at 10:52 AM
Yes, I agree communication skills can be learned through our everyday lives. However, most are learned through mistakes or simply by observing others. In this modern day society, second chances are quite rare sometimes. What if you are asked to do something new and how well you do it will affect the next step in your career? Falling back into pass experiences has its risks, all grounds might not have been covered. Having some knowledge on communication skills however, can provide some base for you.
Perhaps these skills can still be important to you in some ways.
liews_ryan said,
August 25, 2009 at 1:42 AM
Greetings,
I have to apologize that i dont really understand the post. 😦
You have raised quite a lot of questions and i think it is not recommend by effective communication. I believe that one of the crucial element for effective communication is that the receiver can interpret the massage immediately. If you have raise too many questions, it will not be that effective anymore.
Enlighten me if you have other point of view.
Cheers,
Ryan
Tan Wei Hong said,
August 25, 2009 at 3:46 AM
Pak Ming: I’ll wait a while more before i reply your comment.
Ryan: All my questions have an answer save for the last which is rhetorical. Contrary to what you’ve pointed out, a QnA is one of the fastest way one can understand, Isn’t it?
liews_ryan said,
August 25, 2009 at 9:06 PM
Hi Wei Hong,
I remember that based on ES1301 i took one year ago, my tutor has told me that a professional writing for, say, argument do not raise question at all or just maybe 1 at the end of the writing/argument.
Well, it is a blog and i guess it could be a different story.
Cheers,
Ryan
keerth said,
August 29, 2009 at 10:23 PM
Hi Wei Hong,
I have yet to meet you… Hope to cya in class on Monday.
I like the way you started the Blog, by giving the meaning of Effective Communication I agree that “All of us possesses qualities that mark and make us effective communicators”. However, I would have to defer to your opinions that communication skills need not be taught and are completely learnt through experience/ or you are born with it.
It may be true that people know the norms of communication; not to smile when someone is angry. However this ability alone is not ‘effective’ communication skills. The ability to comprehend what others are saying and the ability to convey messages in a manner that the receiver is able to understand you is what effective communication skills mean in my opinion. Moreover I feel it is wrong to say that these skills can’t be taught. If I take myself as an example, I would have to say that the way I converse with people have changed a lot since my younger days. I believe that these changes were due to different experiences encountered and also the teachings of others. Learning from experiences is a form of teaching in itself.
It was rather unexpected when I read that these skills are not important to you. However, thanks for your honest post, it was interesting.
In terms of language, I felt that the post could have been phrased in a simpler way. Because it was confusing to understand the elaborative way in which it was written, but I liked the way you questioned yourself in the post…
Cheers,
Keerth
Tan Wei Hong said,
August 30, 2009 at 1:17 AM
Dear All,
It must have been amusing to read the post as to why weihong can have such a drastic view and completely missed the point of effective communication skills!
From the first paragraph, I started with the definitions of the words “effective”, “communication” and “skill”. By combining the definitions, we get the definition of “effective communication skill”. It is in this light I would like you to read and discuss my post. That is, good communication.
Firstly, to Pak Ming, success is different to many people. One can work up the corporate ladder; be a CEO, start a business; be a millionaire, or for me, be contented with my life. I subscribe to the view that opportunities and “chances” are created. Not just for career advances but also for everyday life.
It may be true that “perfect” chances are rare, but they do occur. For example, if we were to woo somebody, we would not wait for a “chance” to speak or to get-to-know the person better! Befriending the friends, finding out the individual preference and habits are a great help in creating that “chance”. It is, by default, calculated random occurrence.
I would call this networking. Why do we attend career fairs, vie for internship positions and try to attend conferences or symposiums which we know that potential employers will be attending? We want that connection, that personal acquaintance, before even deciding to try for a position in the company. It is by no chance that we feel this way. From young, our parents would have bought toys for us not only because we managed to persuade them, but also, more importantly, how well is the relationship among many other factors. Coupled with making others “think” that we are suitable, we also try to make them “feel” we are suitable.
I quote: “What if you are asked to do something new and how well you do it will affect the next step in your career? Falling back into pass experiences has its risks, all grounds might not have been covered. Having some knowledge on communication skills however, can provide some base for you.”
To that, I do not mind failing. If we were to fail an interview, would we say to ourselves: “My communication skills were not good enough.”? We might, but, we will more likely say to ourselves that there were better qualified applicants who have better grades, better portfolio and, lesser times, they talk better.
Knowledge is gained by experience and learning. We learn from other’s experience. Whatever we learn as “effective communication skills” cannot have been just some hypothetical skills. It would have been put in actual use, tried and tested before being able to be presented as something good that we should learn.
Thus, they are useful, but not important “for” me, that is, in my opinion.
Secondly, to Ryan, you have not explained what you do not understand of my post. I think you meant to say that with so many questions, it makes it difficult for you to understand the post?
You’ve mentioned that it is “crucial” that the message can be interpreted “immediately” to be considered as effective communication. Is it? Asking question indeed does not allow the reader to know “immediately” what I want to say. However, what I want to say is not something concrete, but rather something that we can have our own interpretation. You would agree that we all have a different stand however similar it is, don’t you? To be termed as effective really depends on what you want to achieve by communicating. If I want to point out that we really have much say by letting the reader think and answer the questions themselves along with me as we read on, did i achieve that? Can it be ineffective?
We will never have too many questions. The knowledge and wisdom of man is gained by asking questions! We are now taught and imparted knowledge in a way that may be detrimental to our mental probing capabilities. That is to say, what is presented to as facts are, in fact, answers to questions others asked. Do we question what is presented? Do we think about why they came to be so? We need to if we are to learn something new, to add on to the vast knowledge and to contribute.
If I were to employ the method of merely instructing on my ideas and presenting it to others, how would they respond? Nodding in agreement or disagreeing. However, if I am to present it in many questions, challenging the readers to question the validity, the wholesome value, the intrinsic subtle points which really need to be thought about, then try to answer it along with me, how will the responds be like? More than a Yes or No! Would you call this an effective way to communicate?
I do besiege everyone not to take anything that is told to us by our lecturers or teachers as facts that can never be changed. As Singaporeans love to put it: “who says that professional writing must only be limited to one question at the start or end?”. Your tutor may be an authority on the subject, but then again, who says that he must be right and only he is right? Some of the greatest lectures such as the one on nano-technology by Richard Feynman are given in questions! At that point in history, the term “nanotechnology” does not even exist but look at what it has become today. He was presenting the facts by asking why not this and that, why shouldn’t that and this. It was most certainly a professional giving a professional lecture as it would have been his profession to do so as a professor.
I dare say in dealing with language and communication, no one is right because all are wrong; no one is wrong because all are right. There are only better or worse and it depends…
Thirdly, to Keerth, smiling at a person is an ineffective way to make him or her angry unless it is suitable in the context. (I did say “make”). I did not say that we wouldn’t smile at an angry person. Why wouldn’t you smile at an angry man? That is, unless you are smirking at him?
Compare: “The ability to comprehend what others are saying and the ability to convey messages in a manner that the receiver is able to understand you is what effective communication skills mean in my opinion.” And “If you have the ability to convey and receive a piece of information, you effectively possess communication skills.”
When you convey a message, you don’t just send, you make the other party understands it too. The points are subtle, but really, how is your definition different from mine?
In my post, I’ve said “These qualities need not be taught to us…” Did I suggest that these qualities or skills “cannot” be taught to us? And taking your example, “Learning from experiences is a form of teaching in itself”, is exactly what I have said. I do not get your point for disagreeing, perhaps you read it wrongly. It is precisely we talk to others as we grow older each day that the way we communicate changes.
These skills are important “to” me because I have learned, will learn them and can employ them. However these skills are not important “for” me because I would be able to learn them with each passing day. We all agree that learning from an expert or someone with more experience would aid us in learning it faster and better, but boiling down, it is not essential. It is also not important “for” me because I do not think that we succeed at first tries or that there is no second “chance”. Please refer to my reply to Pak Ming.
Lastly, the points I want to make are subtle but nevertheless interesting and also thought-provoking to look at. What is the point of writing something that everybody knows, agrees on, and is just so obvious? This is your ordinary, everyday post? I bet not.
I apologise for the way the sentences are structured. I tend to use a lot of punctuations and also the sentences may be longer than the usual at times. However, we must understand that each thread of thoughts and ideas are connected and should be explored, discussed together to avoid misunderstanding and also misinterpretation.
This is a personal comment; the post is a personal one too. I have answered the assignment with my understanding from various resources, my thoughts and feelings, and my insights and projections about it. You are free to disagree, but please read, a few times if so requires.
Certainly not the brightest without a filament,
Wei Hong,
a bulb that grows, with roots and shoots,
Much like the onions, but lilies are family too.
keerth said,
August 31, 2009 at 1:17 AM
Hi again,
I guess I interpreted your post wrongly. From your reply it seems like we are in the same line of thought…hahaha
cheers