Blogpost 7: End of the beginning

Before enrolling for ES2007S, I had already started learning; learning not about communication skills, but rather, its importance, as well as the practicability of taking such a course. However, my initial fears of communications courses had almost deterred me from the enrollment. You might ask, "what fears?" Well, I was basically afraid of my incompetence in open discussions. But I guess that is history. For I am now, the ES2007S-trained effective communicator! (There is some bit of exaggeration there)

Looking back at the course, I see a significant improvement in my communication skills. To better elaborate on that, I shall talk about three things. Firstly, oral presentation skills, secondly, writing awareness and lastly, confidence.




I dare say I have improved my oral presentation skills. Before this course, I wasn't aware of various styles and approaches in oral presentations. All I believed in was confidence. I thought that was enough for anyone to present well (With good language skills nonetheless). However, I learnt about Steve Jobs' minimalistic approach and could understand the memorable effect it brings during presentations. Therefore, from becoming aware of Steve Jobs' style, I have began developing my own style and approach of presentations. Also not forgetting: Learning about the styles of my peers, such as Goh Chern and Rohan who were creative and daring enough to venture into new methods. In essence, my take away points from oral presentations in this course are creativity and boldness.









Next, writing awareness. I can't say my writing skills have improved significantly over the past 13 weeks, but I believe I have an increased awareness of writing techniques and reader's dilemma. I have learnt the value of being concise and complete in writing sentences; to be concise is to be to the point and making it simple and easy to understand; to be complete is to provide sufficient information for a clear understanding of sentences. I have also learnt the readers' dilemma, that is the reader's 'want' to understand a piece of information but the 'reject' towards reading lengthy text. A counter to this problem is to be concise yet complete; easy to say, not easy to fulfill, those are my take away points from writing.








Lastly, confidence. Nothing impedes learning more than a lack of confidence, especially when the only way to learn is to speak up in this class. Thankfully, the class seemed to bond really well from the start, and that made me feel a little at ease when speaking during discussions. My confidence in speaking thus improved over the 13 weeks; having the chance to intereact with everyone in class during discussions, mock interviews and oral presentation Q&A sessions. What I learnt about developing confidence is there really isn't a need to develop it. All one needs to do is to stay at ease and you will likely be able to speak with confidence, much like speaking with friends.





Overall, I really love the lessons in ES2007S, the people I've met and the knowledge I have gained. I believe the reason why I find the course fulfilling is because we don't just learn from the "sensei", we learnt from everyone; just like this final post, there are at least 16 other perspectives to look at, and 16 other experiences to learn from. Most importantly, the skills I've learnt are definitely going to be useful as I gradually move into the working world.





Before I end, I have some or maybe just one negative comment to make. The course had covered too much in too short a time that some aspects didn't really have a lasting impression. For instance, intercultural issues seemed like a "touch and go" lesson. If possible, it would be great to really experience intercultural effectiveness through an activity!

One more thing, I realised many of our suggested curriculum changes during the oral presentations seemed to converge on the idea of extending ES2007S or to have a "long-term" approach towards communication skills training. Perhaps this would really help in having a holistic coverage of communications skill training; maybe, just maybe all of our ideas could merge into something substantial! Just my two cents!





One last thing, the wonderful lessons for Group8 of ES2007S couldn't be possible without the guidance of 'sensei' Brad! Thank you! "Arigato gozaimasu sensei!"