Over thousands of years, interpersonal communication has been a "bridge" connecting people together or destroying relationships. There are many ways to communicate such as language, facial expression, clothes, etc in order to build relationships and interact in life. So, what is the importance of interpersonal communication? First of all, interpersonal communication plays a crucial role in society. It is essential for the survival and development of society. Communication allows people to understand one another, learn unfamiliar cultures and identify the strength and weakness of each other. Only through communication, humans can find sympathy and release their emotions.
Secondly, communication does not only help people balance everything in society, but it also brings a lot of benefits for people in the workplace. Communication has the ability to connect individuals, resolve conflicts, help eliminate fear and consolidate the spirit of unity. It also prevents misunderstanding and misinformation. Additionally, interpersonal communication accelerates business processes and increases interaction with customers and colleagues.
Generally, interpersonal communication includes five main skills: listening, problem-solving, decision-making, stress management, and asking questions. They sound like the ordinary skills that everyone possesses but properly utilizing and mastering all of these skills is certainly no mean feat.
I bet you have been stuck in a situation when you talked with someone and then ended up saying words you shouldn't say. To be more specific, I would give you a situation where you are an employee of a company. You and your next desk colleague have the same job, the same wage, and started the job on the same day. However, one day you found out that your colleague has a higher wage, which made you really angry, and decided to talk with your boss. You explained that you work as hard as your colleague and required a better wage or you would quit. However, you end up getting fired and received nothing.
Questions:
1. Have you learned anything from reading this blog post?
2. Based on your experiences, how would you describe effective/ineffective communication in workplaces?
3. If you were the CEO or the owner of a company, how high/low would you rate communication skills in term of importance? What makes you think so?
4. Some people say that little mix of white lies and deception makes us a better communicator, how do you about this statement?
5. What do you think are the common characteristics of great communicators?