Mid-Term Assignment

01 19B-012-PE
First Year Electrical Engineering (Power)
– Section-D
Student:
Qazi Muhammad Areeb

Teacher:
Syeda Umme Aimen Kamal

Submission Date:
05-July-2020
Course:
Communication Skills HS-121
Case Study:

Answer 1:
Communication challenges faced by both of the characters in the case study are listed below:
 Lack of feedback: We saw in the case study that there was a serious lack of feedback
between both of the communicators. Ken did not get effective feedback from Diana
regarding the response of the CEO.
 Lack of mutual respect: This case shows that the employees of the same firm had little
mutual respect for each other. The gesture of Diana when Ken handed over the copy of
publication to her clearly shows that she did not like Ken and had little respect for him that
is why she responded rudely while talking to him.
 Language barriers: Although it was not a big factor in this case, but we can see that the
language skills of the secretary were not as good as Ken. This might have led to the
misinterpretation of some messages.
 Listening problems: As we can observe in this case, that Diana was not a very good listener
and she prematurely judged what a person is about to speak. It is a huge communication
challenge faced by Ken as it is quite difficult to convey his message to secretary.
 Lack of collaboration: Collaboration is the key to effective progress in any firm. As long as
the employees will collaborate constructively with each other, the firm is going to prosper.
In this case, we can see that two of the employees of the same firm lacked collaboration
and it resulted in firm loosing highly skilled and talented researcher who would have
otherwise worked for the betterment of the company.
 Communication inconsistency: We observed in this case, that there was a communication
gap between the employee and the employer of the organization. There was no way Ken
could have communicated with the CEO without indulging Diana. This inconsistency
resulted in all the communication barriers that are listed above. If there had been a way for
Ken to send is message directly to the CEO, he might still be working for the same
organization.
 Lack of overall communication: This point sums up all the communication barriers faced
by Ken and Diana. There was a lack in communication from every perspective by Diana.
She might be a good employ, but she had no regard for someone who was out of her working
zone. She was reluctant in passing on the information, and she liked to work in her comfort
zone; when somebody came and asked her to do a job that require an extra effort, she is
quite hesitant in doing that job, and as learned from the case that in order to avoid effort
she put up communication barriers.

Communication Skills HS-121 2

Answer 2:
After being successful in his publication, Ken wanted to inform his ex-CEO about his success but
he again encountered Secretary Diana as he had faced her before leaving the organization.
Secretary Diana, at this point showed that she was not a competent communicator. She entirely
neglected all the points that make a person a competent communicator. A competent communicator
needs to have certain traits and Diana lacked them. She lacked interpersonal communication skills,
a competent communicator must be first of all be known to ethics, and we can see that Diana
neglected ethics while facing Ken when he wanted to meet the CEO to present his publication. She
not only talked with him in a rude way but she also showed rude non-verbal gestures. A competent
communicator needs to be empathetic, but Diana was not even close to empathetic. She did not try
to understand the position of Ken when he first came to her, as was unemployed at that point and
was desperate to join the same organization, if Diana had understood his position and helped him
through his way, he might still be working for the same organization. Similarly a competent
communicator should have cognitive complexity i.e. to consider number of explanation for a given
situation, but Diana lacked here too as we observed before, she tends to judge what a person is
about to say before he has completed his sentence. This leads to misinterpretation of certain
messages as she misunderstood Ken’s reason for his visit to CEO. Secretary Diana also lacked
clearness of messages, her answers to Ken were shady and the message was not clear. Considering
all these evidence it is hence proven that Secretary Diana was not a competent communicator.

Answer 3:
There are number of listening barriers that a person experience while communicating with others.
A competent communicator overcome these listening barriers, and to become a competent
communicator one must work on his listening skills. In the case of Diana, it was proved that she
was not a competent communicator so there are listening barriers that Diana was facing. The most
prominent listening barrier she faced was premature judgment. She tends to judge people’s opinion
before they even complete their sentence. Diana was also facing distraction while talking to Ken.
We can notice that Diana did not pay complete attention to what was Ken saying and ended up
misunderstanding his motive. She needs to pay serious attention on her listening barriers and
enhance her listening skills. To dampen her premature judgment Diana needs to practice listening
and to pay special attention to the fact that she has to listen the complete sentence of speaker before
forming an opinion of what the speaker was saying. To overcome the problem of distraction she
will have to clear her head before talking to somebody. Paying attention to the words of the speaker
is the key to clear all the distraction while listening. She needs to be active during her conversation
to avoid all kind of listening barriers. Thus concluding that Diana do experience listening barriers,
but these are not permanent problems and if she is devoted enough she can overcome all of the
listening barriers and become a competent communicator.

Communication Skills HS-121 3

Answer 4:
Considering the situation faced by Ken, if I were in the place of Ken my reaction would have been
different from what Ken showed. It can be observed that Ken reacted very politely with the
Secretary and showed patience when Diana was being harsh with him. My reaction would have
been different, when in beginning of the case when I, being a researcher who had become a victim
of downsizing in the organization would decide to pay a visit to the CEO to ask him to
accommodate me in other department of the organization, I would have asked the Secretary for the
appointment with the CEO same as Ken did. But when I would have faced rude behavior of Diana
and denial to set a meeting with CEO, I would have insisted on meeting the CEO and if not possible
leave a note behind for the CEO so that he may know my concerns and could call me back when
he gets free. If denied from that chance too, I would have tried to get to the CEO directly using
electronic means of communication like phone call or e-mail. I would have bypassed the hierarchy
of communication devised by the organization to reach CEO as I was desperate, being suddenly
unemployed from a good job and seeing opportunities in the same firm. Considering that I could
not reach the CEO through any mean of communication and I am returning after nine months to
give a complimentary copy of my published article. I will beforehand inform the CEO of my arrival
through e-mail and try to schedule my appointment with his free time, as I understand the behavior
of his Secretary and try not to indulge her in this communication so that I would not face any
difficulty in meeting the CEO.

QUESTION 2:

 Thank you very much for ordering from our online store. Your parcel will be delivered at
your doorstep in 15 working days. [violation= complete, courteous]
 In order to facilitate up country candidates, Usman Institute of Technology has introduced
online admissions. Candidates need to fill admission form at admission.uit.edu and attach
the scanned copy of required documents. [violation= concrete, courteous]
 Try not to be late in class again, it may affect your result. [violation= courteous]
 We need to have a conversation regarding the presentation that you gave in the board
meeting last week. [violation= complete, concise]

Communication Skills HS-121 4