Communication Essay

Companies often organize their departments into teams that support each other to complete tasks or projects. When working in groups, communication is vital to the success of the team. Teams must work well individually as well as a members of a team. Communication on an individual level differs from communication within a group. Individually, you must actively listen and insure accurate understanding, offer to help solve problems, and focus on not being distracted by your own emotions. You cannot allow your emotions to distract you or cause you to miss the key points or misinterpret information. As an individual you must attend all group meetings, provide feedback and input to the discussions, and be respectful to others input and views. It is important that everyone in the group understand their role and responsibilities to the group. Everyone must contribute to discussions and meetings, and there should not be any silent members. To promote group discussion, you can start by going around the group and allowing each person to speak. This will allow each person a chance to be involved in the discussion and will spark topics of discussion. When working in a group, conflicts usually arise and should be dealt with immediately and directly. Ignoring conflict or disagreements will cause the team to be lose focus, become less productive. Most conflicts result from poor communication and misinterpretations. To resolve conflicts, it is important to locate where the break-down in communication happened. By talking through the conflict with the members of the group, and redefining tasks and objectives, the team can resolve these types of issues. To foster good communication within a group every member must listen to each other, work collaboratively to make decisions, adapt to changes and communication styles, assign specific tasks, set clear deadlines and expectations, and conduct follow-up meetings to review.