Interpersonal Skills in Organizations - Essay Example

 Interpersonal Skills in Organizations 1. Cooperation and affinity of mind is very important in team meetings, since there are three or more persons involved in them, who , together, share the same common objectives. The four P’s of effective meetings as stated by Janusz et al (2009) are as follows: (a) purpose (b) preparation (c) process and (d) practical action. At the outset, the Purpose of the meetings must be determined; i.e;, to what extent the objective is to make joint decisions and to what extent, the objective is to build a sense of community and teamwork. The next important element is Preparation, i.e., ensuring that the respective people are well informed about the time of the meeting, its objective, materials they will need to bring and any background information they would need to have in order to ensure a smooth progression of the meeting. A part of the preparation process would also include elements such as preparing refreshments, making child care arrangements, ensuring adequate supplies of stationary and water and similar aspects. The third element is the actual meeting Process. This would involve the need to strike a balance between the (a) task dimension, which means what needs to be done in order to go through the necessary business for the meeting and (b) the maintenance dimension, which involves paying attention to the needs of those who will be present at the meeting and the interrelationships between them. The last element is the actual Practical action that is taken and the recording and evaluation of the outcomes of the meeting, through the inclusion of the minutes of meetings. This would also involve evaluating how people feel about the meetings and whether group problems have been identified and solved appropriately by the group. The Johari window of self images is a square containing 4 windows. Out of the four windows, the one titled “My secrets” is the area that only the person concerned knows, while the window marked “my unconscious self” is the area that can be seen by no one, but which nevertheless, influences the individual’s personality. The window marked “my areas of ignorance” are those which cannot be seen by the person but can only be seen by others. Since this is an area that can only be seen by others, it is important that other people tell us about them in order for us to improve. Since the window marked “my unconscious self” is not visible to anyone, self disclosure is very important in order to illuminate this area through psychometric testing in order to illuminate what may be present in this window. The Myers Briggs test is the best indicator of personality type and is based upon self assessment that is derived from the inner mental processes. The five major mental processes are perceiving, judging, sensing, feeling, thinking and intuition. Although all of the mental processes are used, most people tend to use one or the other to a greater or lesser extent and the degree to which the mental processes are used would constitute the kind of personality that the person has. Disclosure is very important in order to arrive at an evaluation and assessment of one’s inner traits and personality and to illuminate those areas which are not easily visible or evident to others. Since these are extremely private areas of one’s personality, it is not easy to extract pertinent information in this regard and people may be especially reluctant to disclose such information to others within a team context. One of the ways in which this process of disclosure can be facilitated is through explaining the relevance and importance of the Johari window testing. Individuals can build trust between themselves through the process of disclosing information about themselves, which would help them to learn more about themselves and build more trusting relationships with each other. The difficulties inherent in self disclosure are that it is difficult for individuals to divulge personal and uncomfortable details about themselves to other people. Disclosure in team settings can be facilitated by encouraging the members and informing them about the value of such disclosure and the benefits that it could bring to them in terms of an enhancement of their self knowledge. The open area is that where information is shared with an individual about himself/herself through offering constructive feedback. It is important to ensure that feedback is constructive, in order to avoid giving offence. By seeking and actively listening to feedback from others in the group, an open area can be developed for every person, which continues to widen as the existing levels of knowledge about the person are increased. The different personality types arising out of the Myers Briggs personality indicator are traditionalists, experiencers, idealists and conceptualists, based upon their learning and thinking styles. For example, people may be rational or intuitive, they tend to make decisions either from a detached standpoint or from an involved standpoint. In arriving at decisions on how to plan for the Caribbean trip and who will go on the trip because there is only enough money for three people to go, those who are logical and make decisions from a detached standpoint would tend to stand back and logically assess who are the most knowledgeable candidates that would bring most benefits on the trip. Those candidates who have the highest levels of knowledge about the project would have priority, as also senior students who can communicate effectively with 2nd year students from a strong standpoint. The basis upon which the decision is made is therefore an objective, logical decision that takes into account, factors such as the levels of money available, the level of skill and expertise in the subject which the individuals possess and the age of the individuals concerned. The decision is not made on the basis of the whims of the person who is choosing the individuals; so that the ones who are selected would tend to be the ones that the person choosing tends to favour or like; rather the decision is based more on rational, logical factors. Assertive communication is a communication style that enhances the effectiveness of communication with others and tends to produce positive outcomes. The person with an assertive communication style is neither passive nor aggressive. S/he does not avoid conflict at all costs, neither does s/he go to the other extreme of using intimidation and/or control to get their needs met. The assertive person rather, is focused upon creating a win-win situation. This style respects the rights and opinions of both self and those of the other person. This trend may be noted n the patterns of non verbal communication, because a person with an assertive style of communication is willing to express an opinion but is also willing to listen to the other person’s point of view and is prepared to listen to feedback. An assertive person makes good eye contact and respects the personal space of another person. The assertive person is never threatening or argumentative; rather s/he engages in calm, rational and informed discussions which are made in a spirit of cooperation and friendship. A person who has the assertive style of communication is able to listen gracefully to what another person says, even if he or she does not agree with what they are saying. In dealing with group conflicts, Masters and Albright have set out some strategies to deal with conflicts in a group situation. Conflicts occur when one or more parties see the other as being responsible for a problem or at fault ; but conflict is not necessarily always destructive; in some instances it can also be constructive. The first measure which occurs in some instances is forcing one party that is behaving selfishly to conform to the requirements of another party (Masters and Albright, 205). The other strategy is yielding, where one party just gives in to the other and accommodates that party. Both the above are effective solutions because they avoid conflict altogether. The third strategy is compromise, wherein both parties are prepared to give up some of the conditions they want in order to arrive at a mid way solution that is suitable for both parties. Yet another strategy for conflict resolution is problem solving, which is a collaboration method, wherein the conflict itself forms the managerial tool and problem solving is “party [that] seeks a win-win outcome that is naturally satisfactory. Is assertive of ones own interest and emphasizes with the other party’s.” (Masters and Albright, 76). This approach focuses upon the actual problem; it looks for options and methods to resolve conflicts within the organization by “exploring options, meeting interests and building relationships.” Avoidance is the last strategy which these authors recommend, and this strategy involves the application of measures such as introducing delays as a means of ensuring that the conflict is not abrasive in the short term. As may be noted from the above, conflict resolution does not necessarily involve merely arriving at an agreement; rather it may also involve other measures such as avoiding a conflict altogether, or one party forcing a solution upon the other party. Organizational productivity can be impaired if meetings are not conducted effectively. According to Lencioni, meetings are often the antithesis of what they should be, i.e, fun and compelling and offers various reasons to support the reasons for meetings being ineffective. First, meetings tend to be boring because they lack drama or conflict. At most meetings, leaders tend to try and avoid conflict in order to avoid tension; however tension and conflict can be constructive and without drama and conflict, the topics which are most important cannot be effectively evaluated. The meetings are also ineffective because the contextual structure is often too loose and badly formulated. Thus, the topics that are discussed at meetings may veer off topic and jump from one issue to the other, so that there is no clear indication of the specific topic that needs to be discussed. This was also the case at one of the weekly meetings at my company, in which the issue that was being discussed was the contentious one of elimination of the facility of holiday entitlement and leave and the reassignment of the work load on an ad hoc basis, wherein employees were required to call in each week to book in for work. In order to avoid conflict, the leader kept winding on and on and beating around the bush, speaking about the current recession and its impact upon the job and property markets, without ever directly mentioning that job cuts were being made. As a result, members kept discussing everything in a general manner which did not specifically address any of the issues that were required. In order to address these two major drawbacks, Lencioni has suggested the following measures. First, introduce a daily check in meeting, wherein the daily schedule and activities are spelt out. The second type are the weekly tactical meetings wherein the weekly activities are discussed and tactical obstacles and issues are identified. The third type of meeting is the monthly strategic meeting, in which the critical issues that affect the long term success of the company are discussed and analyzed. The fourth type of meeting is the quarterly off site review, in which the overall strategy of the Company is discussed, the challenging aspects in the competitive landscape are identified and key personnel as well as team development are reviewed. Each of these four meeting types lasts for a different duration; the first kind of meeting lasts 5 to 10 minutes, the second type of meeting lasts 45 to 90 minutes, the third type of meeting lasts for 2 to 4 hours and the last kind of meeting lasts for 1 to 2 days. This strategy can be quite successful, because the specific duration of the meeting and the purpose of each meeting is specifically laid out before hand, so that the overall productivity of the time spent in the meeting is enhanced. Longnecker and Simonetti have suggested five absolutes for getting results in organizations. These include (a) a sharp focus on the organization (b) staffing with good people (c) creating a climate for results (d) nurturing relationships and (e) constantly improving and renewing ourselves. The strengths of the five absolutes are that they enable the organization to clearly and sharply define its objectives and lay out its goals such that its employees are able to clearly align themselves with these goals, and also improve the conditions necessary for the advancement of those goals. The authors also propose that many managers stop short of effective coaching when they only provide positive feedback. They suggest that managers as coaches must also provide continual alignment between employee behaviour and goals to enhance employee performance. Their focus on the improvement of relationships also highlights the importance of people and effective human resource management . There are however some weaknesses associated with the absolutes. For one thing, this reduces the flexibility that is vital for survival in a globalizing economy, where nothing can be taken as absolute and where constant flexibility is vital. Another notable weakness is that there is a notable lack of networking that does not originate from the top in a traditional top down hierarchical managerial approach. Six different kinds of stress may be identified; they are (a) stress that is inherent within the organization, such as the work patterns, noise and work loads (b) those associated with the person’s role in the organization, such as any ambiguities in the roles and conflicts generated through the delineation of those roles (c) stresses generated through relationships with colleagues and supervisors (d) stresses associated with improper career development such as the possibility of dismissal from the employment (e) stresses arising from the environment within the organization, such as the political climate within the company and the nature of the team work and participative decision making and finally (f) stresses generated through the interface between working life and home life, i.e pressures of time management between child care and management of work duties. In order to derive a framework for coping with the factors that lead to stress, one of the first factors to be taken into consideration is the question of how to find out the causal factor causing the stress and how to remove or alleviate it. There are different levels at which interventions can be made. At the primary level is the stress that is caused by factors within the environment. In order to deal with this level of stress, the solution would be to deal with the causal factors in the environment causing stress, rather than the stress itself. For example, when stress is caused by external factors such as the design of the job or the extent of clarity in the job role and description, then the remedial measure would be to make the necessary changes in job duties or shorten the time duration of performance of the roles. At the secondary level are those elements arising at the individual level, and it may not be possible to remove the cause of such stress externally, because it originates from within the individual. The solution in this respect would be to introduce the individual to wellness and fitness programs that are designed to tackle the stress levels. At the third level are those stressors that are unlikely to be easily resolved. These originate from deep within the individual and it may be difficult to arrive at a remedy, because it may be a case of factors that have already gone wrong. In such a case, the remedy that may be effective is likely to be counselling or EAP and these measures are also likely to be more time consuming and require much deeper levels of intervention. Self disclosure is the process of revealing private aspects about oneself that are generally kept secret and well hidden from others. It may also include the process of consulting others in order to reveal the areas about oneself on which one is ignorant, in order to gain a better knowledge about oneself. The benefits of self disclosure lie in the opportunity it provides for an individual to get to know himself or herself better. This enhanced self knowledge is also useful in providing better interactions when working in a team, because it enables an assessment of individual strengths and weaknesses or individual styles so that the person best suited for a particular job can be assigned the work. The process of self disclosure can also however, be a daunting process because it involves revealing sometimes unfavourable aspects about oneself. This may be a source of worry about whether or not such disclosure would be acceptable to other people, and whether others would be repelled by such knowledge. References: De Jansz, S.C,Dowd K.O., Schneider, B.Z., 2009. “Interpersonal Skills in Organizations, McGraw Hill. O Longenecker, Clinton and Jack L Simonetti, Jack L, 2001. “Getting results”, John Wiley and Sons. Masters, Marick Francis, and Robert R. Albright. The complete guide to conflict resolution in the workplace . New York: Amacom, 2002. Print. Read More