A Conflict Situation: How do we resolve it?

A, B, C, and D are NUS students who are taking a particular module together. All of them hailed from different faculties, they didn’t know each other beforehand. By coincidence, they were grouped together for a project which weighed 40% of the continual assessment component of the module.

A is the leader of the group.

B is a committed student who is gunning for an “A” grade for this module; sadly, he is found lacking in certain EQ components, most notable of all, he has a “calculative” character.

C is a conscientious worker who views the completion of the tasks set for him as his topmost priority. However, he is taciturn and reserved.

D is taking this module out of necessity, and has told much earlier to the group that he will only do “this much” as he has intended to exercise the S/U option for the module.

The lecturer of the module is a research-mad professor, not very student centric and apparently prefers to leave all the “troublesome” matters, such as tiffs within project groups to the students themselves to resolve.

Over the course of the project, it became increasingly clear that B had a bone to pick with D. B had this pre-set notion that D is in the group for a free ride, so B spent most of his time “ensuring” that D was doing his fair share of work (such that it is similar to everyone else in the group). Due to this additional “task” which B assumed, the quality of the work produced by B went far below his best.

The work D produced was slipshod at best, and most of the time D was late in submitting his part of the project. Worse still, when he realized B’s attitude towards him, he took on a defensive stance. Things became worse as subsequently B spent a significant amount of time “scrutinizing” D’s work, and D on the other hand spent a lot of time defending the quality of the work that he had produced. Quarrels ensued and all these resulted in inefficiency.

Time is running out for the group as the deadline loomed.

Question:

Based on the above situation, what should Team leader A do to resolve the conflict situation and get the group going again?

Blog Post #1: The Importance of Effective Communication.

Simply put, effective communication means the successful conveying of an intended message/idea from one party to another. This seems clear-cut enough, and many might argue that as the age-old adage “Practice makes perfect” goes; given that we have been communicating since our infancy, with the amount of practices involved, we should be master communicators by now. However, many things seem to be easier said than done. In my humble opinion, the art of communication is definitely one of those skills which are relatively easy to learn, but hard to master. Yes, indeed it might be the case that we have been practising communication skills since young, BUT the important thing is, are we doing it the right way?

Case in point:

Have you ever been in a situation that after blurting out a seemingly innocuous comment, the response from the listening party is just not what you expected? OR have you tried to pass on information to team mates in your project group, but after some time has passed, learnt that what had been interpreted by them were simply not what you meant.

Well if the answer is yes for the above situations, then I am pretty sure that ineffective communications have taken place. In less serious cases, crucial time and efforts are wasted, but in less fortunate ones, ineffective communication skills can cause relationships between friends/colleagues to sour. Mastering effective communication is indeed important.

In my case, the main driving force behind me wanting to learn effective communication skills is due to the nature of my work. (Work will start end July this year in my case, and I will return to my sponsoring company. Like what they say in the movies, it is PAYBACK time.) In the course of my work as an engineer in the shipbuilding industry, effective communication skills are of utmost importance.

Why is that so? Let me elaborate. Being one of the underlings who has just stepped into the industry (yes, degree or no degree, honours or no honours, if one has no experience, a graduate engineer is still an underling); I would have a 3-way communication “network” to maintain. Firstly, communication has to be established between me the underling, and those work mates who are most unfortunately tasked to me to complete the work assigned (i.e. I’m their team leader). Most often than not, they hail from different countries, commonly India, Bangladesh, China amongst various others. Secondly, as if things aren’t interesting enough, throw in the ship owners to the concoction, whom in this context are the clients of the shipyard (i.e. telling them to s*d off is plainly not an option). From time to time, we must report to them on the progress of their ships. Trust me, they aren’t the most charming of people around, especially so if we are running behind the build schedule which they have set us. It certainly doesn’t help much when they could be Russians, Japanese, Indians, Americans, Martians (ok, I’m exaggerating for the last part, BUT you get my point). If communicating with people of the same culture is complex enough, then imagine doing it with people who neither share your culture/language nor social makeup. And oh, did I say that there is a 3-way communication “network”? Well, the third one is communications between yours truly (the underling, try not to forget that), and the superiors in the yard (which of last count stands at a meager number of 947 (senior engineers+ managers+ anyone who thinks trampling all over a fresh graduate is their idea of fun), thank you). Get the picture now?

As challenging as it might sound, on a more optimistic note, I think it is with challenges like these which will help fresh graduates like me grow. Thus choosing to learn about effective communication skills right before commencement seems like a logical choice to me. Hopefully with the skills learnt, the transition from a studying life to a full-fledged working life will be a much smoother process.