Module 5: Virtual Workplace And Listening Skills

Module 5: Virtual Workplace and Listening Skills
Michael
Grand Canyon University: MGT-420
August 1, 2013

Module 5: Virtual Workplace and Listening Skills
Communication is broken down into many different parts. The biggest break down is in the areas of verbal and nonverbal communication. This is true of both effective and ineffective communication. Both types of communication can lead to conflict that needs to be resolved. How this conflict is resolved can be dependent on the manager and their use of negotiations between parties. This paper will address some of these concerns about whether communication in the two module five videos was effective or ineffective during the various parts and also how the conflict that was experienced
“Effective communication occurs when the intended meaning of the source and the perceived meaning of the receiver are virtually the same” (Module 5, 2011, p176). Knowing the definition of effective communication is important, being able to understand what it is and how to use it is even more important. In the video “Listening Skills,” Pilar and Miguel do not demonstrate effective communication. From the definition above, Miguel and Pilar were not experiencing the same meaning of the meeting. One (Miguel) perceived the meeting to be the congratulations on his success and the other (Pilar) intended the meeting to be about the budget concerns. In this way, the source and the receiver did not understand the same meaning. However, this changed in the second meeting as Miguel had a shock when he was not getting what he wanted. In this way, both the source (Pilar) and the receiver (Miguel) were experiencing the same meaning of the meeting. The same is true of the “Virtual Workplace” video in the meeting that took place between the source (Ralph) and the receiver (Angela). Angela perceived that Ralph had hostile intent with her work and was trying to discuss the problems she was experiencing. However, Ralph wanted to speak about how to not miss deadlines in the future. In the second meeting, Ralph was attempting to address the concerns that Angela was experiencing and Angela was trying to make
Gearhart and Bodie (2011) show that active listening is when cognitive processes, affective processes, and behavioral processes are working together and allowing a person to be engaged in a conversation. Based on this, we see Miguel is not actively listening to what Pilar has to say in the “Listening Skills” video. This is most evident in the nonverbal communication that Miguel is demonstrating to Pilar. His body language (feet on the desk, not making eye contact, etc.) show that he is not interested in what Pilar has to say. He was more concerned about the success he was experiencing and the communications he was receiving from other individuals. The moment Miguel started to use his phone was also the moment that he introduced a physical distraction and noise. Miguel was also seen with a magazine before the phone, giving another example of noise to the scenario. In the second portion of the video, we see that Miguel experienced a “wake-up call” by paying attention. This only happened once Pilar took away a project that Miguel had been working on. However, this also made Miguel more responsive to the demands that his manager (Pilar) was placing on