C hester-restrial

For our SEM2902 project, we were given several topics to choose from. At first, my group
decided to go with the topic “first impression”. We had several ideas, including some role-
play and ideas documented. Ideas such as, looking into how people perceive others, through
first impression or behaviors presented. We had several discussions regarding this topic,
however, we started to scrape this topic and find other topic that is more applicable to us.
We started looking around for other topics, and eventually we came with our own topic
“bullying”, and since we will be going through Integrated Work Study Programme (IWSP) in
our third year of our SEEMS course, we decided to look into “workplace bully”, to better
prepare us next time.
My team started to research into the topic, documenting all the issues regarding workplace
bullying, to prepare pitching our ideas to the class and our lecturer. Besides our research, we
also discussed on our video production – how it is going to be made. After our pitch in week
6, we started building up on our video ideas, including video perspective and direction, story
line, script and storyboard throughout the weeks. We structured the meeting such that,
every week, we focused on a specific area of our project.
Week 7 meeting: We researched on more details on workplace bullying, such as case studies,
consequences of workplace bullying, and how to raise awareness regarding this issue. The
workload is split between the four group members, researching on particular key points
regarding workplace bullying:
Clement – Case studies
Zache – How to identify workplace bullying
Francis – Statistics of workplace bullying in Singapore
Chester – Solutions to workplace bullying

Week 8 meeting: We started planning our script, and drawing out the storyboard scenes.
Clement suggested we film our video in first person view to be unique. He then showed us
various video on how a first person view video should be done. We then tried it with our
iphone camera to have a better understanding of how it should work.

During the trails, we are contented with work we produced. Therefore, all of us agree to have this, as our mode of
shooting. Another point francis and chester noted is that by shooting in a first person view,
we are able to show the audience how does a bully act or types of emotions they will show
more clearly.
Week 9 meeting: We planned on filming our video this week and discussed the process,
including considering the time limit for our story line, and modifying our story line. During
the discussion, we came to the agreement that we will address the solutions to bullying in
the presentation. We considered on how to trim the video into a 3 minute short film without
losing any footages and information. Such as cutting down on the bullying scenes, but at the
same time intensify the rest of the bullying scenes. This means that we have to ensure that
the bully’s emotions and dialogues have to be what a victim will see or hear from a bully. We
then research on various cases of bullying shot on videos on YouTube so as to have a better
understanding on bully will typically do at office.
Soon after our discussion, our team started on the second part of filming of the video that
took around 2 hours to complete.
Week 10 meeting: We drafted out our outline for the presentation. The outline is as follows:
Clement: He will start with the introduction, follow by the case study. His case study will be
a 17 second video on which a Singaporean boss can be seen beating a 28 years old
Singaporean intern worker. With this, he will continue to tell the audience on the purpose of
our presentation and the definition of office bullying. He will then raise question to
audience on why are we so concern with it. The research method which Dr. Lee specifically
asked for will also be presented by him.
Zache: He will then takeover from Clement, by starting on how to identify workplace
bullying such as the signs and symptoms on it. One point to note is to really explain each
and every of the signs and symptoms. Following, he will go through Thomas-Kilmann
conflict model. This is so that the audience have a better understanding of what we
perceived the bullies and victims will use from this model. He will then give the audience a
brief introduction to the video itself, explaining to them the main characters and the main
setting of the whole video.

At the start of this module, we were introduced to this project where we were required to create a video regarding what we had learnt in the module. We had scrambled thoughts as to what topic we should use.

Our initial idea on the video was to use the concept of interaction between the presenters and the video. We wanted to make it as though we could reach out and affect the outcome of the video with the help of the audience participation. However, due to time constraints, we dropped this idea and we proposed another idea. Before our current idea was chosen, we got into several disputes. The disputes arose mainly due to the conflicting of ideas. Each of us in the team felt that their idea was better than the other. We found it very difficult to agree upon something.

In this situation, I noticed that Clement was content-oriented listener. He had many ideas and was eager to give his opinions in every group discussion. However, he may run into trouble, ignoring ideas and wishes if there was not enough facts or evidences. Next, I noticed that Francis and Zache were people-oriented listeners, they channel their focus into the emotional parts of the discussion. For example, when Clement proposed an idea, they will return a reply based on their emotions. Since Clement was a person who is only accept facts and therefore, Francis and Zache’s comments will likely be rejected in a harsh manner. Their ideas will clash and the tension in the team grows bigger.

For myself, I am a time-oriented listener, who constantly have eyes glued to my clock. Due to the difficulty of this course, I find it hard to cope with time in this course, increasing on the need to push myself do things faster. I am always the person who will be setting unreasonable datelines for the project. Whenever we have conflicting ideas, I will be there anxiously trying to stop them due to time constraints, making the situation worse because the conflicts are not resolved and they eventually get snowballed to the next meeting.

From what we had learnt from COM 150, we had to accommodate and understand each other before giving unnecessary comments that will only create tensions in the group. We sat down together to discuss this issue. In our efforts to resolve the conflicts, Francis and Zache made sure that they had provided substantial information before proposing an idea, Clement took a step back from his harsh comments and instead try to understand Francis and Zache’s points of view. For myself, I gave reasonable time constraints for the project so as to not give unnecessary stress upon my teammates. Also, I restrained myself from feeling angry whenever we had sessions over-runs.  From the accommodation of one another, we felt that we were able to work as a team productively and thus, completing the project without any conflicts unresolved.

Overall, we learnt to appreciate our differences and I strongly feel that in future projects to come, we should not have problems working together as a team. I have learnt that COM 150 is important to teach us the vital values and disciplines that is required to have in a group project.

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Father : Chinese New Year is coming, go and help out with the decoration!

Son : But, we don’t even have anyone coming over to our house. What is the point of decorating our house?

Father : Every Chinese New Year we are supposed to decorate our house! It’s the tradition!

Son : I have a lot of assignments to do! I really can’t help it.

Father : Last time I have to help my father prepare for Chinese New Year no matter what, why are you not mature enough to think? You are not young anymore!

Son : But, we never had this tradition of decorating the house before Chinese New Year. Why is this year so special?

Father :*Frustrated* You are not young anymore, we let you off the last time because you are YOUNG!! Now you should be old enough to help!!

Son : We are not used to doing this, and now you expect us to do this just because it’s the tradition. This tradition doesn’t even apply to us! Besides, my assignments are piling up, surely assignments are more important than the decorations at this moment!

Father : [Shouting] Don’t argue with me, just go and help!!

Son : Argh…

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In most cases, we can get into such situations where the problem may seem relatively small but it gets blown out into big proportions. What went wrong in this scenario? Is it the father’s fault for insisting his demands on his son? Is it immature for his son go against the tradition?

This scenario was based on my personal past experience. Allow me to share my personal views on this matter. To begin, I was feeling very demoralized for the Chinese New Year (CNY) because of the pending assignments I was required to complete. I had already dedicated the entire day to complete my assignments. Being presented with a new task, which is to decorate the house, seemed to me would only add pressure onto myself. Feeling dejected, I was forced to say no to the simple task. The conversation escalated, both parties were feeling frustrated and angry for not understanding each other.

As I was writing this blog post, I felt that there were many factors causing this situation to arise.

Firstly, it was the underlying emotions of both parties, on my end I was feeling moody because of the assignments and I did not respond to my father in the inappropriate manner by saying, “But, we don’t even have anyone coming over to our house. What is the point of decorating our house?”. This clearly shows that I was challenging him, which escalated the issue. On the other end, my father feeling dejected knowing that he could not spend time with me, was desperately trying to create time for both of us.

Secondly, the clash of our expectations, my father expected me to help out in the preparation of CNY because it was the tradition however, I was brought up thinking that CNY decorations was less important. Based on my father’s example, ” Last time I have to help my father prepare for Chinese New Year no matter what”, this implies that he was imposing his expectation on me. To him, it was required of me to help out while I thought otherwise.

Thirdly, misunderstanding of my father’s intentions, all he wanted was some time together in this joyous occasion, however, I treated it as an additional task on top of my assignments. By saying “my assignments are piling up, surely assignments are more important than the decorations at this moment!”, it will only make the situation worse.

Lastly, my father was not accepting no for an answer by shouting at me “Don’t argue with me, just go and help!!”. This indicates that I was not given a choice in the beginning which created tension in the conversation.

Conflicts between parents and child are common, because of the environment we are living in, often results in culture differences. In this situation, I learned that if we take a step back to think, the problem will not escalate. For example,from the beginning, despite of my moody behavior, if I answered my father in an appropriate manner, this will not happen. It takes both hands to clap, so if I am the one to step back and recognize that the problem is escalating. I could have better control of the situation. Also, I learned that it is way too difficult to influence someone to believe in your beliefs, however, it is much simpler to believe in other people’s beliefs. This may sound contradicting but it is true and this is the key to better communication and resolving conflicts. Instead of trying to persuade someone to believe you, why not believe in their beliefs. Be the person to take the first move to believe in others then people will more connected to you. This is important as it helps us understand each other better.

Here’s my question to my readers:

Imagine that you are either the third party or first party, how would you have better handled a situation when both parties are fuming with each other ?

We have all been in such situations where a simple argument or conversation turns into full-blown battle between the two sexes. This validates the famous quote  “Men are from Mars, Women are from Venus.” which made us feel as though we were from a different planet. So, what makes us so different from each other? Does gender play an important role in communication?

Imagine this situation where a female could be easily offended by a male, when a male made a casual remark to her.

Alice: “I bought this new bag from the mall today, how does it look on me?”

Michael: “The bag looks great but doesn’t it look a little too big for you?”

Alice: “What? Are you trying to say that I am short? ”

Michael: “No, no. That’s not what I meant. I meant that it is a little too long for you.”

Alice:  This bag is the standard size. What do you mean by it is longer for me? So now, I am the only one who doesn’t fit this. ”

Michael: “No Alice, the problem lies in the bag and not in you. ”

In this example situation, Michael was passing a casual remark without the intent of hurting Alice’s feelings. However, Alice felt that it was a personal attack from Michael. Alice wanted to be understood by Michael, and all she needed was a positive remark from Michael and she didn’t bothered about the other things which Michael was concerned about.

Men are rational thinkers, while women are emotional thinkers. When a question was posed to men, men tend to analyse the question, and often reply them in a form of a solution . While women tend to add emotions into the questions, and often reply them in the form of complement. It is the difference in the type of answers which the party would prefer to receive.

According the given scenario, it was observed that in order to speak to someone of different gender harmoniously, men have to more careful in what they say and women have to learn to differentiate between an insult and a comment.

Thus, gender affects communication because we have to change our communication pattern in some way or another to suit the other party.

There is a popular saying by the famous Chinese philosopher, Lao-tzu, “He who knows others is wise, but he who knows himself is enlightened.” This is the true beauty of knowing yourself. When you want to treat others well, you have to start from within. Today, I will review my personal strengths and weaknesses, so I can get to know myself better.

Being approachable is my greatest strength in communication. I am friendly individual who is open to any relationships or communication possible. Most people I know felt that I was easy to confide to because of my honesty towards them. Also, I had established my own golden rule in communication and it is to make the other party feel comfortable when they are talking to you. This builds rapport which is essential to progress in any relationship.

Being unable to detect emotions well is my weakness in communication. In most situations, I need to be told by a third party that my words made someone angry or sad. My inability to read their body language and tone patterns have landed me into various difficult situations such as arguments. Being too forceful or straightforward is another weakness in communication. For example, when I get close to another party, I may appear to be forceful by asking too much or saying without thinking. This had became a tricky problem because I tend to do this unknowingly.

I have learnt that the key to have a quality life is to have good communication and the best way to start a great change is to know yourself better. We can do so by learning from our past, learning from the good and correcting the bad. It is a skill that is difficult to master but it is definitely worth it.