Personal Effectiveness - Assignment Example

Table of Contents Introduction .................................................................................................…..2 Perception …………………………………………..……….….….………….….…2 Communication…………………………………………………………………….. 3 Self presentation……………………………………………………………….……5 personal reflection………………………….………………………………...6 Assertiveness…………………………………………………………………..……6 personal reflection……………………………………………………………..7 References………………………….…………………………………………..…..10 Personal effectiveness Introduction Personal effectiveness refers to sufficient use of time, energy or talent as a resource at a person’s disposal relative to what is important. It deals with concepts like goals and success while integrating ideas like positive psychology and positive thinking. Personal effectiveness is important in an organization as well as in an individual’s life for self worth, satisfaction, and for continuous strife to achieve requisite potential needed to succeed in life Perception Perception can be viewed as attending, searching or paying attention to an environment in order to make sense of it and derive an outcome or a conclusion (Oliver, 2010). These views on perception involve the result of contact with stimuli in the environment which causes an individual to attend to it either through mental activity, interpretation or communication (Hooijberg, Lane & Diverse, 2010). This way, perception can be seen as an outcome of attending or as an attending process. At work place, these views help the employers and the employees to know how to perceive issues in their environment as well as how to understand each other. There are several factors that may affect either an individual or group perception. To begin with, our perception can be influenced by the unique characteristics of the perceiver. One of the intrinsic characteristics of the perceiver is the mood. The latter can affect how we perceive people, events or even situations in life (Oliver 2010). For instance, individuals tend to behave and perceive differently when they are happy or depressed. Secondly, attitude is yet another driving factor that may affect the characteristics of the perceiver (Sheafor, 2011). Some people have negative or positive attitude towards various gender roles. For example, while some believe that women can also perform male oriented jobs; there are those who may categorically differ with women’s ability to perform male-based tasks such as masonry. Other personal characteristics include self-concept, motives, interest, cognitive structure and expectations (Monson, 2010). The other two broad factors that influence perception include characteristics of the situation as well as the characteristics of the target. In terms of expectations, it is highly likely that our perception can be influenced by the kind of outcome that we expect from a given situation. Research findings on this area have found that it is quite cumbersome to see others in an accurate way unless you know yourself well (Sheafor, 2011). In addition, the characteristics seen in others are likely to be one’s own intrinsic behavioral patterns. Finally, it is possible to see (or perceive) positive characteristics in other people once an individual has positively accepted him or herself. Whatever is being observed can also be affected by the characteristics of the target situation or person. One such example is the external looks or physical appearance of an individual. People who are attractive are likely to be perceived in a favorable way compared to those who are unattractive either by the way they dress or generally appear. Moreover, size, sound and motion associated with the target also affect how we see things around us. Communication Communication at workplace is important as it involves exchanging bits of information between two or more parties. Communication of information can be through various forms of mass communication, through spoken words between groups of people or individuals or it can be through written materials (Hooijberg, Lane & Diverse, 2010). In this regard, it is important to point out that communication is an important tool in an organization as it ensures maintenance of personal relationships as well as the aspect of ensuring efficient transmission of messages (Sheafor, 2011). Therefore, everything that a business or an organization does is controlled by communication. Communication can be verbal or non-verbal. For instance, facial expressions, gestures and body postures can be actual communication existing between two individuals without them actually talking. Non-verbal communication can be more genuine and extremely powerful than actual talking (Monson, 2010). The effectiveness of an individual at workplace depends on the communication system in the working environment as well as the ability to listen and to speak. It is important to observe that in all the communications that takes place in an environment, many people tend to get and remember half of what they listen, understand and believe. Additionally, personal effectiveness of an individual is greatly affected by ineffective communication that comes from cliché, jargon, inappropriate language and too much information. Also, there are instances when individuals communicate messages that are unclear and sometimes these can be as a result of poorly structured thoughts (Oliver, 2010). This becomes a barrier to effective communication and personal effectiveness. Also, other barriers include a verbal messages that conflicts with a non-verbal messages, distractions from other activities or noise in the environment and misinterpretation of the intent or content of the communication by the receiver. Furthermore, individuals at workplace respond to stimuli that makes them interested, angry, sad or happy (Monson, 2010). Communication is of significant importance in creating such emotions at a particular time in the lives of the workers. Good communication would mean motivation and effectiveness which is the opposite of bad communication manifested by an arrogant, presumptuous and patronizing way of passing information that would exist between employers’ and employees (Hooijberg, Lane & Diverse, 2010). Self presentation In any workplace, it is expected of the employees to increase their input in order to improve the levels of production and their practices at the place of work. However, these employees at times lack the platform to express themselves or are hesitant for fear of retaliation should they express their concerns (Monson 2010). Due to this, most employees remain silent since they lack ways of effectively presenting themselves. Personal effectiveness in self presentation involves an individual being in a position to express his opinions or views about matters related to the workplace such as job related issues, need for changes in the working environment and to contribute to other people’s ideas, thoughts and actions (Sheafor, 2011). To achieve this, individuals must develop a system where they monitor themselves so as to be able to control, regulate and observe how they display themselves in interpersonal relationships (Oliver 2010). Personal effectiveness in self presentation requires modification of behaviour through high self monitors (HSMs) for this will help an individual to portray a desired public appearance. Individuals at the workplace will be able to guide their behavior by having a presentable image that first the nature of the workplace situation (Sheafor, 2011). Personal reflection At workplace, I am relatively a good listener when being addressed by a colleague or my senior. Although it is a strength on one side, overdoing it has made me branded as too much a submissive worker who finds it hard to reject unworthy offers. I usually stop everything that I am doing and then fully concentrate on the communication between me and the other party(s) concerned. By so doing, my fellow workmates have complimented me several times by reiterating that I value, dignify and also respect them. To me, the ability to give attention to others by keen listening and giving response wherever necessary has been my strength in creating the right impression that anyone would desire. In addition, being attentive to my fellow employees as well as the senior officers has undoubtedly won me credentials since it is a strength that cannot be misinterpreted or misunderstood by anybody. On the overall, people perceive me as a good communicator though I don’t talk much. However, when I overdo this strength, it turns out to be a weakness in self presentation. For instance, I sometimes give too much attention to others until I delay performing an important task which is time-restricted. As I result, some co-workers perceive me as a too flexible person and sometimes unable to communicate my needs. This is apparently my major weakness bearing in mind that I often find it cumbersome to say ‘no’ to demands from my colleagues. The reason why I often fail to self-present my feelings is because I fear being perceived as a weakling or somebody who does not measure up to the standards. I better maintain a submissive character than face the reality of criticism. Assertiveness Individuals at the workplace must demonstrate assertiveness and do it the right way to avoid being misinterpreted. Assertiveness involves speaking out what is in the mind in a tactful and productive manner with an aim of getting results. Other issues that making up assertiveness include being straight forward and honest. Workers and employees must be assertive when expressing their rights or what they want done to them. Personal refection At my workplace in an Indian store, my employer had the habit of delaying our salaries by a week and still demanded our maximum input at work. My fellow workers and I thought about it many times but my passive-aggressive nature could not permit me to arrange a meeting with the employer (as a team leader of the group) and present the grievances of the team. I remained passive-aggressive since I could not particularly bring myself to challenge my employer and be honest about how the delay inconveniences me and demand my right of a just wage paid on time. Due to this inability to be voice-steady in demanding for the rights, my suffering intensified and our behavior and attitude towards that work changed. Due to the myriad of frustrations at workplace, I sometimes acted in a very firm way as if trying to be assertive, by loudly voicing our concerns especially when I am with rest of my team members. I guess that in being assertive, I would have controlled my emotions by quietly but firmly addressing the pay dispute between the two warring parties. In addition, the ability to be steady in my speech pattern would have been an added advantage because I came to realize that I end up stammering whenever I am overcome by submissiveness and unable to exercise assertiveness. The best way I could have solved the challenge at workplace is by confronting the issue with an open mind, without acting in a manner likely to suggest that I am overbearing or creating a bother. Moreover, manipulating c0mmunocation methods as a way of concealing the reality was yet another passive-aggressive tendency that dominated me. So to speak, I came to realize that I was unable to push for the needs of my team members, let alone mine. In spite of being less assertive or passive-aggressive, my colleagues at work have often reiterated to me that one of my strengths is dedication and commitment to work. I have the ability to plan and deliver my roles perfectly well at workplace especially in regard to specific areas that I have been assigned. In addition, my employer has also been positively commenting on my awesome ability to meet deadlines set by the department on various projects. As a result, I have emerged as the best team leader in our department, capable of organizing for small team projects from time to time. I suppose one behavioral feature that has enabled me to achieve this is the ability to be assertive, that is expressing myself to the rest of my co-workers in an open way without causing harm or infringing on other people’s rights. Being assertive requires an individual to understand his or her own rights as well as pursue those rights in a cordial manner. On the other hand, my greatest weakness at workplace is lack of self confidence when executing some duties and especially those that I am not familiar with. Due to this weakness, I once found myself in dilemma between meeting the targets of the company and the initiative to assertively deny my group members the desire to engage in unhealthy lifestyles when we were on a week community outreach program organized by the company. As a team leader, I could not assertively inform my group members not to take excessive alcohol during the evening parties with the targeted communities. I failed as a leader since our theme on healthy living could not be practiced by the very campaigners on healthy lifestyles. In fact, lack of initiative has aggravated this weakness bearing in mind that assertiveness demands an individual to be self driven when conducting various tasks. Lack of self-confidence has also driven me towards pleasing everybody so that I may not be in conflict with anyone when discharging my duties at workplace. In summing up, I should have been more assertive by being more self confident in performing my duties. According to assertiveness theory, we need to know our rights even as we become assertive at workplace. For this reason, I should have known that it is my right as a team leader to inform my colleagues of the right thing to be done, and at the right place and time. References Hooijberg, R., Lane, N. & Diverse, A. 2010. Leader effectiveness and integrity: wishful thinking? International Journal of Organizational Analysis 18, no. 1, (January 1): 59-75.http://www.proquest.com/ (accessed May 15, 2011). Monson, C. 2010. Training: An Investment in Performance Improvement. Franchising World, September 1, 22-24.  http://www.proquest.com/ (accessed May 15, 2011). Oliver, A. 2010. Culture Change From the Top. Professional Safety 55, no. 10, (October 1): 21-22.  http://www.proquest.com/ (accessed May 15, 2011). Sheafor, B. 2011. Measuring Effectiveness in Direct Social Work Practice. Revista de Asistenta Sociala no. 1, (January 1): 25-33.  http://www.proquest.com/ (accessed May 15, 2011) Read More