#1 Effective Communication (Edited)

Effective communication to me is a key to all relationships. Whether on a professional or a personal level, we all need to be able to convey our message. At the same time, we need to ensure that the recipient can easily comprehend the intended message. This life-skill of communicating effectively as I would say, is something that I believe all of us should learn because we are constantly communicating. Communication comes in several forms. It can done face-to-face, via the world wide web in the forms of emails and instant messaging and even take up the form of body language or a picture! Well,as they say, a picture speaks thousands of words so don't underestimate what a picture can actually tell you.

As for me, effective communication comes in the form of working on laboratory experiments. The Faculty of Science is teeming with students and it is definitely impossible for us to know every single student hence when it comes to laboratory practicals, more often than not we are grouped with people whom we are not familiar with. We usually have more than ten samples to prepare for our experiments and in order to ensure that the experiment progresses smoothly, effective communication is a key aspect that will allow each group member to share the workload. Time is of the essence to a NUS student; hence, doing the job twice or even thrice would be a waste of time really. Even simple things such as labeling our samples and telling our lab partners that this is Sample X is a form of communication because you're telling that person 'Hey, I've already prepared this sample so you don't have to do this anymore. And this is where the sample will be so it'll be easy for you to locate it should you ever want to run the sample.' and etc.

Another way I'd say effective communication is important to me is being able to maintain a long distance relationship with my boyfriend who is currently residing in Taiwan. He is currently working there full-time and due to my school commitments, we are only able to meet each other once or twice a year at most. I'm not too sure how many of you have actually experienced a long-distance relationship before (No,going off to Pulau Tekong for a duration of 2 weeks doesn't count haha!) but it is really hard to maintain it without communication from both parties. Most of the time you can't really see what the other party is doing or feeling and if he/she is upset, it can only come in the form of words (emails,MSN,facebook etc). That's why when I want to convey something to my boyfriend, I have to not only say 'I'm feeling upset today' but also give reasons and examples of what had upset me because it is different as to telling him in person that I am upset because he can read my body language or see from my facial expressions that I am upset. But thank goodness for FaceTime and WhatsApp which allows both of us to still talk to each other daily and at a low cost too.

In a nutshell, effective communication is important to me because it is something that I have to carry for the rest of my life whether I'm using it for work or on a personal level. I hope that this module would really help me gain an insight on how to improve my communication skills. My father would always tell me that people judge you by the way you speak,how well you can carry yourself and if you are able to form good interpersonal relationships. Thus, bearing these words in mind I certainly hope I can master the 7Cs of communication and there is another C which I want to master: Confidence.