Defining Communication

Communication is a fascinating subject because it involves a major part of our existence that we put to use consciously or unconsciously at all times. The immense power that words have in society is only matched by other equally important forms of communication such as body gestures, sounds, or a plain mean look. Trying not to communicate at all can be as powerful as any single word. Whether it is for a personal or professional use, I believe an overall understanding of communication can lead to a better understanding of the people around you.

Choosing a definition for communication is not easy but one that I feel is closely in line with my beliefs is: “Communication is the process whereby people assign meanings to stimuli in order to make sense of the world” (Trenholm, 2008). I like this definition because it is simple and effective. Defining something as broad as communication takes a simple answer because you could really go on forever. As humans, we (generally) have five senses that absorb the world around us. Our senses act both ways as communicators. But without meaning to the stimuli we encounter there is really no meaning at all to the world. Communication is an evolving idea that takes on different forms that we decide. Understanding it at a base level will go a long way towards enabling us to be effective communicators.

References
Trenholm, S. (2008). Thinking through communication. Boston: Allyn and Bacon.

Gay Marriage Debate

Despite the fact that gays are clearly becoming more accepted on a daily basis in this country, gay rights is still a relatively new concept. That is not to say that being gay is a new concept or fad, but the ‘coming out of America’ and the demands of equality that come with it have really just begun to develop on such a national level. People are opening their minds and accepting the gay lifestyle more and more. According to Bidstrup (2009), nearly seventy per cent of Americans support gay rights which essentially promotes equal opportunities and equal access to the things that all other Americans are privy to. However, almost the same amount of people opposes legalizing gay marriages. How is that possible? How can a majority of people agree that homosexuals deserve equal protection from their country and in the same breath wish to restrict a very basic right? How can this one word, marriage, create so much polar opposite thinking within one person’s head?

The short answer is people are scared. Just as when the world was flat. Whether they think something is right or not, sometimes it is easier to just continue on living on a flat world. Change represents fear. People know gays should have the right to marry, but what if it changes everything? What if there is an unforeseen circumstance? Maybe we should just put it off a little longer. If only we had some proof that everything will be OK.

Well there is proof because, surprisingly, other countries in the world have to deal with the same issues as us and some of them actually take action in a timely manner. According to Bidstrup (2009), gay marriage has been legal in Denmark since 1989 and in most of Scandinavia for just about as long. They’re still on the map aren’t they? In fact some of gay marriage’s harshest critics, the clergy, have fully accepted that it has been good for the country. Seventy-two per cent of the Danish clergy were opposed to allowing gay marriage at the time it became legal. A poll taken six years later revealed that eighty-nine per cent of the Danish clergy admitted the law is good and had positive effects on their society including reduced suicides, less spread of sexually transmitted diseases, and less promiscuity and infidelity within the gay community (Bidstrup, 2009). Instead of the straw that breaks the world’s back, it almost seems like the allowance of gay marriage may actually be a step closer to a utopia on Earth.

References
Bidstrup, S. (2009, June 3). Gay marriage, the arguments and the motives. Retrieved June 7, 2009, from http://www.bidstrup.com/marriage.htm

Mangaging Emotions

 A huge part of a person’s identity and general make-up is their emotions and how they handle them. As I mentioned before, organizations are comprised of diverse personalities and that includes a wide range of emotional behavior. People’s emotions can get in the way of productivity because feelings can hurt, conflicts can arise and people can be silenced due to fear or spite. Emotions are what also keep us in check. They can keep us honest, ethical, or sympathetic to others. Emotions are often irrational because you can’t help how you feel. It is a sense that you get and there is no guarantee that extended thought and reason will change that. However, recognizing your emotions and managing your emotional intelligence is the key to open discussion and honest communication. Emotional feelings are different for everyone but they exist in everyone. Therefore, effective communication involves knowing your own emotions and understanding the emotions of those around you.

Hansen & Weis (2008) believe that in order for an organization to get the most from its workforce, they “need(s) to have authentic, differentiated individuals showing up as themselves – telling truths, saying what they mean, facilitating open communication, and implementing authentic data flow”. This alludes to having an identity and being comfortable expressing it in the workplace. However, this authentic self can only be brought out through self-awareness of emotional intelligence. Hanson & Weis go on to describe the “opposing forces” we face as individuals every day of having our own thoughts, beliefs, and feelings (conviction); and being connected socially to the people around us (connection) (2008). Finding the balance between your convictions and your connections is the essence of emotional intelligence. It is the constant task of being both separate as an individual and cooperative as a member of a group. This cannot be done without having a handle on your own emotions while recognizing the emotions of those around you.

References
Hanson, L. & Weis, W. (2008). The use of training groups (T-Groups) in raising self and social awareness and enhancing emotionally intelligent behaviors. Allied Academic International Conference. Academy of Organizational Culture, Communications and Conflict. Proceedings. Retrieved April 27, 2009, from Proquest Database.

Challenging Norms

Everyone is born into a time and place on Earth. The setting for which your time is spent is based on the evolution of your environment up until your birth and the continuation of such as your life plays out. It is not just the turn from monkey into man that represents evolutionary change. It also encompasses changes in ideals, challenging of norms, and striving towards understanding. Being ignorant to truths is not necessarily a shameful thing. While it is true that the world has always been round, it existed as flat in the collective consciousness for generations. No harm, no foul. Generations later had the luxury of having the truth as knowledge and all of the other findings that continue to be aided by it. However, a shameful act would be to torture and imprison the person that had the insight and human curiosity to challenge the old belief. That is what allegedly happened to Galileo Galilei in 1633 by the order of Pope Urban VIII who, for whatever ideological or political reasoning, would not accept the change (The New York Times, 1878).

Galileo had the courage to challenge an idea so grand and vital to the understanding of life itself: the ground we walk on; the sky we gaze at; the forces that keep us grounded. So what is the big deal about marriage? Is the concept of two people getting hitched as scary and sacred a concept as having the idea of our world almost literally flipped upside down? In our time and place, there is a fight over who has the right to wed. That is not to say there is a fight over who is intelligent enough, who has proved themselves to be mature enough, or even who has established a long enough relationship to take it to the marriage level. The battle is being fought on a more basic level than that. The fight is about whether legally practicing homosexuals should be allowed to marry their partners in the same way that legal practicing heterosexuals can. And while Galileo had to endure physical torture for his personal obligation to science and understanding, the homosexual community today faces the torture of being denied a basic civil right.

References
The New York Times, (1878, March 24). Was Galileo tortured? Retrieved June 9, 2009, from http://query.nytimes.com/gst/abstract.html?res=9F0CE4D6113FE63BBC4C51DF B5668383669FDE

Persuasion, Manipulation, & Seduction

Much of human communication involves attempts to influence. It is done verbally and non-verbally; consciously and unconsciously; honestly and deceitfully. Some people may be swayed with reason and logic or by emotions and character. There is no doubt that the power to persuade is a coveted tool for anyone regardless of how they wish to use it. However, beyond simple persuasion are other acts of influence that are just as powerful. The three terms, persuasion, manipulation, and seduction are sometimes used interchangeable when describing influential behavior. However, there are subtle and blatant differences between the three concepts. While using anyone of these methods could yield the same result for an influencer, there are clear differences in the way they are done.

Persuasion

Persuasion is the act of influencing others, who are conscious of the intent, through communication. That is they are conscious that attempted influencing is taking place. Also it is under the assumed umbrella of free will meaning that there is no form of duress or outside pressure involved that would force influence. Persuasion is an honest approach to influence in the context that there is an acknowledgment of attempt.

Manipulation

While persuasion is an act that takes place between at least two conscious parties, manipulation happens when the side being influenced is not aware of it. Our brain is setup to learn a vast amount of normalcy in life which can be executed unconsciously. There are certain stereotypes, frames, and schemes encoded in humans that make up their cultural programming (Codoban, 2006). That is a human is programmed over time to execute everyday decisions mindlessly based on the expected behavior of themselves and others. Manipulation takes place when a conscious person triggers an automatic response from an unconscious thinker.

Seduction

The art of seduction, as it is often described, is a kin to persuasion as its intent to influence is known. What sets it apart, however, is the influencer (seducer) is setup to be the object of desire that will complete the missing parts of audience so that they may be complete (Codoban, 2006). Seduction is also a kin to manipulation as is draws upon social programming and natural responses of people. As the term is used mostly in the relationships of a man and a woman (or sexual preference), there are many programmed and natural responses that take place when a seducer successfully makes themselves the object of another’s desire.

Sometimes the lines may be blurred when influencing takes place. There are definite moral stigmas attached to each of these influencing techniques. While persuasion has a broad connotation of simple attempts of influence to any or all audiences, manipulation and seduction have specific undertones of being immoral. While manipulation has the power to be an effective technique for wrong doing, it also happens every day when a parent tricks their child into acting or thinking in the right manner. And while seduction can build sexual relationships based on false intentions, at its core it may just be a desire to be desired by someone. It is important to realize that a lot of our constant communication is spent influencing others or being influenced by others. The choice is yours of how open you are to different influences and how you choose to influence others.

References
Codoban, A. (2006). From persuasion to manipulation and seduction. JSRI. 14(151 to 158). Retrieved July 29, 2009, from http://www.jsri.ro/new/?download=jsri_14_articol_14_aurel_codoban.pdf

Humor and Persuasion

Everybody likes to laugh. There is not anything wild about that claim. Humor can elevate the mood of someone who is down or contribute to someone’s already good time. A beneficiary of a raised mood is the person or message providing it. In terms of persuasion, when people are in a good mood they are less likely to disagree and furthermore, they connect with the source because a shared sense of humor represents a shared set of underlying values (Lyttle, 2001). Simply, humor creates likability for the source that helps to break down the walls of persuasion by building a relationship between the sender and receiver.

The use of humor for persuasive purposes is no secret. Just watch TV for a short while and notice how many commercials try to make you laugh. Humor can create a comfortable and likeable feeling between parties, distract an audience from weaker messages, and add to overall exposure. Humor can be seen as the preferred choice for weaker arguments. So unless you are building your persuasive case based on strong convincing arguments, it may be a good idea to splice some humor into your message.

References
Lyttle, J. (2001). The effectiveness of humor in persuasion: The case of business ethics training. The Journal of General Psychology, 128 (2), 206-217. Retrieved August 15, 2009 from ProQuest database.

Forgotten Triumphs

I remember sitting on the bench next to Bill. We had been deemed to sit out the final inning for no other reason than two of us had to. That was the life of a mediocre ballplayer: playing the field one inning and riding the pine in the next. It wasn't all bad. In fact it wasn't bad at all. We got to play plenty and we got to practice spitting seeds when we were benched. I could hold my own, but Bill was like no eleven year old I had ever seen. He could hit a batting helmet from ten feet away in mid sentence. To this day, I've yet to see a spitter with his presence. He could have been a big leaguer if he could only hit a baseball.

I didn't know it at the time, but this would be the only championship game I would get to play in. We had a pretty good team that year. On paper we were decent. On the field we were above average. On the bench we were loose. Win or lose, game or practice, it didn't matter. The team got along and we were all better for it.

Neal was manning right field for the finale. Neal was easily our worst player. He couldn't hit, throw, catch, or run. Hell he couldn't even spit a seed past his foot. Nobody hated him for it though. Every team had a Neal. Most of them wouldn't put him in the championship game for the final inning though. But coach felt bad. He had been ignoring Neal most of the game. Besides, we were winning by five runs. How could Neal mess that up? This game was all but over.

As Bill and I sat and watched, our five run lead slowly eroded to one. It started with an infield single, followed by a walk, followed by a lazy fly ball straight to Neal that he predictably dropped. It seemed like every silly play kept repeating itself. Every hit was barely hit. Every ground ball found the one piece of ground we couldn’t cover. It was a slow and painful choke. The two outs we managed to get were like pulling teeth and Neal had already booted two sure things. Our loose fun loving team had tightened up. And that is when I got the call. “Kevin!” coach yelled at me even though he was standing four feet away. “Get in there for Neal!” I didn’t say a word. I grabbed my gloved and ran out to relieve Neal. Trust me, he was thankful.

To know me as a ballplayer, all you need to understand is that I was fundamentally sound. As a hitter, I was no one a pitcher feared. However, it was virtually impossible to strike me out. I could hit foul balls for days until a guy got tired and finally walked me. As a fielder, I never dropped a ball. Whether I was scooping balls at first or shagging them in the outfield, I was as reliable as they came. You know all those remedial cliqued quips of advice that all coaches say? I followed them. When I was at bat, I kept my eye on the ball. When I was in the field, my hands were on my knees thinking about what I would do if the ball came to me before every pitch. I always knew the outs. I always knew the scenario. I always made the catch. And now with the bases loaded, up by one, I was injected into the championship game with the sharpest hit fly ball I had even seen heading right towards me.

I remember the ball taking off like a rocket. A loud collective gasp from every player and everyone in attendance was quickly followed by a loud consistent noise. People were yelling. People were screaming. Nobody was sitting down. Through the noise, all I could see was a ball that may never come back down to earth. However, what goes up must come down and after a fleeting moment of panic, I realized that I could catch this ball. By the time I realized that, I was already running to my spot. As fast as the ball went up, I couldn’t believe how slow it was to come down. I was there and ready to catch the ball with several precious moments to spare.

So what did I do?

I caught it. It was like any other catch. In fact, it wasn’t even one of my most spectacular ones. I caught it though. I made it look easy. The other team was stunned. The sound of the bat hitting the ball alone was enough to make them think they had won. But I caught it. No problem. I jogged in and tossed the ball over to the coach. We always did that. These were the balls we played every game with. He smiled at me and said “You made me look like a genius” as he tossed it back. “Keep it,” he said. “That’s the game ball.”

Sometimes it’s easy to forget triumphs of our youth. Years after my playing days were over; I got a job painting houses for the summer. I was a nineteen year-old kid burned out on the fundamentals. I couldn’t even remember being an eleven year-old anymore. I showed up the first morning and was greeted with a smiling new boss whose first words to me were “You made me look like a genius”. It took less than a moment for it all to come rushing back to me. I made the game winning catch; the championship game winning catch. That is one triumph that I never will forget again.

Sefl-Awareness vs. Self-Confidence

I talk a lot in this blog about knowing your identity. Self-awareness is an important and dominant human characteristic to me because it is the essence of all of our thoughts and actions. Being self-aware is what enables us to have confidence in ourselves and also to doubt ourselves. If you ever want to develop yourself and your identity into an ideal state it takes self-confidence. The kicker, as Cathy McCullough writes, “is that we rarely gain it (self-confidence) when things are going at a steady pace” (2007). Essentially, we cannot gain confidence in ourselves without first failing along the way. Life is full of ups and downs and when we err is when we learn the most about ourselves and our surroundings. Self-confidence is not just the feeling we have when we know that we can succeed; it is also the feeling we have when we know that we will survive any mistakes we make. From my perspective, keeping things the way they are for fear of failure will stunt any growth you wish to make.

References
McCullough, C. (2007, December). Developing YOU! T + D 61(12), 64-65,67. Retrieved April 27, 2009, from Proquest Database.

Learn to Listen!

Listening is one skill I could use improvement in. According to one study, American listeners pay more attention to individuals’ feelings and concerns during interaction as a reflection of our cultures importance on “the individual”; while in Israel, listeners focus more on details and information in order to limit misunderstandings (Brosius, Kiewitz, Weaver, & Weimann, 1997). I believe I fall into the American category. My “game play” involves recognizing human emotions and true intentions. I think that is important but it should be done in more of a balance with retaining actual information. I also focus too much on how I am being perceived which diverts my attention away from the details. Simple things like a person’s name do not stick in my memory because I categorize it as unimportant. However, later on it can be confusing or insulting when I cannot recall a name. Another problem I have is with involuntary attention. Something like strange or sudden stimuli can easily distract me from what I should be listening to. I believe some of my shortcomings are important skills to have. Understanding peoples’ emotions and being alert to the world around me can be very helpful. However, the balance I spoke of before can sometimes be lacking.

Reference
Brosius, H. B., Kiewitz, C., Weaver J. B., Weimann G., (1997). Cultural differences in listening style preferences: A comparison of young adults in Germany, Israel, and the United States. International Journal of Public Opinion Research, 9(3), 233-247. Retrieved April 3, 2009, from Research Library database.

Interpersonal Communication

Interpersonal communication is basically face-to-face interaction between two people (Trenholm, 2008, p. 141). This is important in all facets of life. It is how we build relationships, tell stories, or close a business deal. My overall skills in this aspect of communication have evolved over time. As a shy kid, I often had trouble expressing myself around strangers especially one-on-one. That was one reason I had trouble building new relationships outside my friends and family. It has also helped me to value the strong personal relationships that I had even more. I have grown to be more open and casual in my interpersonal contact which has made me an overall effective communicator.

The communication perspective I identify with the most is the pragmatic model. In this perspective, communication is seen like a game. The two “players” exchange “moves” which are based in strategy and routines. This kind of makes communication sound self-serving and impersonal. However, I argue that most, if not all, of life is spent serving our own interests whether it is perceived as selfish or not. And much of life is also based in routine. Even though every second we live is different than the last, we draw on the basic principles and experiences we know in order generate our responses. Games can also be friendly or played for profit or personal gain. Overall, though, communication is a game we have played a million times. We see patterns, recognize types of people, and adjust our communication to whichever game we feel like playing. Playing together so often allows us go in directions that we know the others around us can follow. It's chemistry and is mostly all unsaid.

References
Trenholm, S. (2008). Thinking through communication. Boston: Allyn and Bacon.

Matching Personal Identity with Organizational Identity

In terms of core beliefs, values, and other descriptions of a person’s character; it is important for an individual’s identity to match with their organization's identity. This is the case because part of working within in an organization is taking on their beliefs and practices. If a company does business in an unethical way, then you will be part of an unethical identity and there is a chance you will also take part in unethical acts. If this conflicts with your own identity, then you may experience an identity crisis. The more you act in a way different from your own perceived character, the lower your self-worth will become. This is because you are not living up to the identity you see yourself as. As your self-worth or self-esteem lowers, communication may as well. You may begin to resent your job or the other workers there and your job performance may slip as a result. Ethics are always a “hot-button” topic but more subtle identity differences could just as easily affect a person. For instance, if your identity values being heard and part of the decision making process and you work in company with a very autocratic leadership; then you will face a similar identity crisis.

I had an experience where my personal identity clashed with the organization I was working for. One summer I worked in a telemarketing office attempting to solicit sales appointments for a home meat delivery company. I had a feeling going in that I would not like the company’s business practices but I just needed a summer job. A huge part of my identity is respecting other people’s privacy and their rights to be left alone. Quickly the job began to drain me because I would get yelled at for not keeping people on the line longer and pestering them into an appointment. My job performance was not good at all because I did not believe in what I was doing. It would be one thing if I even believed in the product, but I kept hearing countless stories about how much of a scam the actual service was. I already hated bothering people that did not ask for it and then I certainly did not feel comfortable essentially lying to them about how great the product was. I did not last long at the job because I eventually quit. I was having an identity crisis and I was scared that if I continued to work there long enough my self-worth would just continue to drop.

The lessons I learned from my short stint in the telemarketing business have shaped the way I sought after jobs since and will continue to in the future. I have a high opinion of myself and the core beliefs, attitudes, etc. that make up my identity. It is not so much that I need to show others the strength of my character; rather I need to prove it to myself. I am my own worst critic and I am the one that has to live with myself day to day, minute by minute. If I feel that I am not living up to the identity in my personal or professional life, I am the one that gives the constant reminder. In terms of maintaining a high self-esteem and a high self-worth, I need to partake in actions that fall in line with the standards of my identity. I am not perfect by any stretch but I live with the shame of my mistakes everyday just as I live with the satisfaction of my triumphs.

Understanding Personal Contructs

The judgments we make about people are not all without merit. We have spent our whole lives trying to figure out other people and our judgment skills have been honed and well practiced. However, as we blindly assess the people we are in contact with we sometimes forget how much alike or not alike we really are.The Personal Construct Theory explains that we create certain truths about people and things to help explain the reality around us. For this post, I did an exercise in constructs by comparing people I know by simply writing down a few words that come to mind when I think of them. I think the results of this exercise show how things can easily seem so different at first glance and how relationships help to dictate our thoughts.

I first compared my sister, Bridget, with a kid I knew from high school, Dave, who I did not like very much. I must preface this by saying that I have always been friendly with Dave and we were more friends than rivals. But I always knew he would be someone I did not stay in contact with all my life because I just did not like certain things about him. The similarities between the two were their stubbornness and selfishness. Their differences were Bridget I saw as smart, shy, and nice while Dave I saw as vapid, loud and materialistic. Next I compared one of my best friends Peter and one of my best female friends Andria. I wrote that they both were nice and generous. For Peter I wrote loyal, easy going, and goofy. For Andria I wrote caring, engaging, and pretty. Lastly I compared myself with my sister Bridget. Like her, I wrote down smart, shy, and stubborn. However, instead of selfish and nice, I saw myself as calm and calculating.

This exercise made me realize how the type of relationship I have with someone may affect my initial thoughts about them. I do feel, at least in written form, that my values could be unrefined because I kept going to similar adjectives. I think I may have stereotyped a bit based on the relationships I have and gender. For instance, when I started the list for my sister, I went straight for her faults even though I am closest with her than most on the list and think very highly of her. With my two friends, I immediately wrote loyal for my male friend and pretty for my female friend. Loyalty is generally a best friend quality. Pretty, on the other hand, is not something necessary for a friendship. However, since she is a female the first thing to come to my head was how pretty she is.

As far as being fair and complete; I think that is almost impossible. While the assessments I made were fair in my mind, they are far from complete. All of the constructs I used could probably be applied to everyone on my list in some capacity. We are all made up the same traits but some are more prevalent in others. I did judge myself very favorably because I have a favorable view of myself. I included some of my faults because I am very aware of them. I think for people to develop rich and complex constructs they must first realize how much they have in common with the rest of the world. You could be just like your worst enemy and nothing like your best friend even on the surface. They key is to respect people’s strengths and remember your weaknesses when criticizing.

The Individual in Organizations

Organizations are composed of a vast amount of individuals all working towards the greater success of the business. People (employees) are a company’s best resource. From people, an organization gets ideas, establishes a company culture and basically gets work done. The people working for companies lend a huge hand in creating and maintaining an overall organizational identity.

In order for businesses to thrive and make use of their greatest resource, they must first have good communication from within. The larger an organization gets, the more moving parts become involved and the more communication it takes for everyone to be striving towards the same overall goals. The challenge for good organizational communication is managing the diversity of the people involved. That is not to say the color of a person’s skin or their gender; rather the diversity of people in general. We do not all think alike or express ourselves in the same manner. People at different levels of their lives may have different perspectives, or wisdom, gained from experience. People may have been raised differently than others and have different communication expectations or emotions when it comes to dealing with the people around them. Regardless of the numerous differences that divide people under one large organizational umbrella, the key to communication starts with the individual. Each person needs to have (know) their own identity within a business and have control over their emotions to be an effective communicator. In order to know the people around you, you must first know yourself.

Sun, Skin, & SPF

Life as freckled and fair skinned person is truly the worst of both worlds.
Not only is getting a decent tan impossible; attempting to get one results in nasty sunburn and more freckles. Add to that the increased chance of developing skin cancer and I start to wonder if I am a fully evolved human being. I mean the sun produces light and life and yet my doctors tell me it is slowly killing me.

I did my part for a while by staying inside during the sun’s strongest hours and toiling away at an indoor job. I lived in the northeast my whole life so if I could minimize the damage for three-months or so I was setup to survive the wrath of my arch nemesis. However, all that changed when I moved down to Florida and started taking jobs directly under their big orange ball of light. Talk about senselessly facing your fears. It would be like someone who cannot swim getting a job on a shrimp boat on the world’s most dangerous ocean.

There is no question that the only way to protect a face like mine is to keep it out of the sun. With that being said I do a lot of dumb and dangerous things day-to-day. There is so much in the world to look out for that you usually end up missing out. So I go toe-to-toe with my worst enemy daily but not without some help. The SPF protection of my trusty sun block fights off the sun and its harmful rays for me. It is literally a life-saver. However, sun block is not a magic coat of armor and in fact with rising SPF numbers it is being misused more than ever. This essay is meant to explain the basic functions of sun block, the meaning behind the SPF number, and how a responsible person should use it.

Sub block has gotten an SPF boost in the past couple years. Gone are the days when 15 or even 30 seem adequate. SPF 45 and 50 have become wildly popular while new SPF 85 and 100+ have begun showing up at retail stores. However, what seems like great strides in sun protection may actually be confusing people into using their sun block all wrong and essentially doing more harm than good. A sun block’s sun protection factor (SPF) measures how much protection it provides from the suns shorter-wave ultraviolet B rays (UVB), the radiation that causes sunburn (Saint Louis, 2009). So if the SPF represents our level of protection from the sun, then certainly a tube of SPF 100+ would be ten times better than one that is only SPF 10. That is not the way it works however and it is not even close. According to Galehouse (2009), SPF 15 protects against 93% of the suns UVB rays; SPF 30 is at about 97%; SPF 50 is 98%; and anything higher than that is just splitting hairs.

So why is there such a rush to shatter SPF records? Because in our minds there is there is a big difference between the number 30 and the number 100 (roughly 70). However, in the context of protection, the difference is more like 2%. This is becoming a dangerous misunderstanding because people are assuming that these bloated SPF sun blocks provide an impenetrable force field for all-day fun in the sun. And not only that, the same people are using less of it for the same reason. A general suggestion is that a person should use one ounce of sun block to exposed areas of their skin (roughly a full shot glass). Anything less and your protection drops down dramatically. Using half of the recommended amount does not mean you will get half the SPF protection. It is actually the square root of protection. For example if you use half an ounce of SPF 100 you will not receive the same protection of an SPF 50. Instead you will get the square root of 100 for protection which is 10 (Saint Louis, 2009). So the more you skimp the more useless it becomes.

I remember the first time I saw SPF 60 on the shelves of my drug store. My eyes lit up with excitement because I was landscaping at the time and I was putting on sun block constantly. I fell into the trap I described before because I thought this new sun block could not be defeated. I found out quick that no matter what the SPF number is, the only way to combat the sun is to use the sun block. These amazing numbers are meaningless if you do not reapply frequently and cover all exposed skin properly. The sun is a mighty foe and there is no miracle cream that will beat it.

References
Galehouse, M. (2009, May 22). With sunscreen, it’s a numbers game. The Houston Chronicle. Retrieved May 22, 2009, from http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/life/main/6433965.html

Saint Louis, C. (2009, May 13). Confused by SPF? Take a number. The New York Times. Retrieved May 22, 2009 from http://www.nytimes.com/2009/05/14/fashion/14SKIN.html?_r=2

A More Perfect Union

The Constitution of our nation was intended to design a form of government that would nurture in time a “perfect union” free of tyranny and persecution. It is written in plain English that within our democracy that all citizens would be treated equal under law. What is haunting us now over 200 years later is what President Obama described as our country’s “original sin” of not initially heeding those words. While we make strides everyday towards a perfect union, the fact that we had nurtured separatism for so long is the reason we still have racial resentment today.

At the core of resentment and anger on both sides of the racial divide are fear and worry. There are major problems within this country that aren’t strictly race-related yet it always seems to be at the end of the discussion. The black community harbors the resentment of being second-class citizens pretty much under law up until some fifty years ago with the ramifications still being felt in their communities today. The white community feels persecuted for sins they personally haven’t committed while they watch their jobs get outsourced and the separation between rich and poor grow rapidly. Everyone would appear to be in the same boat when it comes to fearing for the security of their livelihood and for the country as a whole and that is why it is counterproductive to turn our anger towards something as simple as race.

We are all in this together. In order for the dream of a perfect union to be realized we must become a trans-racial society that doesn’t see race as the problem. As I implied earlier, Jim Crow laws and segregation were only a half a century ago. That means generations alive today witnessed and lived through something so blatantly Unconstitutional. Part of bringing about a perfect union is the time and generations it takes to heal such wounds. We need to come to a point where instead of fighting against each other we fight with each other as Americans regardless of race, color, or creed.

Intercultural Communication via Virtual Worlds

It is a small world and after all the years of discovery and settling we are left with people who are defined and act in ways according to where they were raised. People are different and alike within and across cultures. People are people. But the same human emotions we all share also create some of the most powerful barriers to communication between cultures. Mainly fear and anxiety hinder our ability to feel comfortable around people from other cultures. Through internet globalization and the concept of virtual worlds the world is getting smaller because we have access to each other with a simple mouse click. These new channels create new relationships and learning possibilities between people of different cultures that could vastly improve the way we think about others.

Intercultural communication is basically communication between different cultures. It seems like an easy concept to grasp but recognizing the level to which it affects the way we think about others is much harder. On the surface, simple language barriers restrict our contact with other cultures but what about other cultures that do speak the same language? On the surface people fear Arab looking people because they may be a terrorist but what about the people that fear African-Americans because they may be a “thug” or a criminal? The cultural divide is not restricted to people from other countries or skin color. Cultures are different whether you fly half way across the globe or half way across the country. The fact is you are comfortable with people from your own culture because you know what they are like. And you know what they are like because you have spent a lot of time around them. And spending time around a culture eliminates the fear of unknown that restricts us all.

Virtual worlds are places on the internet where people get together and socialize. They can take many different forms. It could be just a casual setting, a game setting, or even a classroom setting. The actual world may be simulated but the interactions are real.
Being in a virtual world can loosen major barriers for intercultural communication that would be harder to do in the real world. First of all you are (ideally) in the comfort of your own home in a safe environment. You also may have a greater feeling of anonymity because you are interacting with people outside of your everyday life. Both of those factors contribute to relieving anxiety. According to Jandt (2010), in the presence of strangers (or people of different cultures) our anxiety level is high which ultimately leads us to avoid interactions. It is the same anxiety we face our first day at a new job or at a new school but at least if we are around people we can relate to we are more likely to attempt interaction. Interacting with a stranger has a high probability of being awkward. In a virtual world you can worry less about awkwardness or embarrassing yourself because most people will be strangers to each other.

Interaction in the virtual world as it is now is still limited compared to the real thing. The major difference is reading people’s nonverbal behaviors. Simple behaviors such as facial expressions can say more than actual words during an interaction. Smiles, frowns, or fright (just to name a few) are a universal language of humans and even animals. Another nonverbal behavior restricted in the virtual world is proxemics. Different cultures have different “personal space bubbles” meaning how close we get when communicating with each other (Jandt, 2010). Standing too close or even too far could mean different things to different cultures.

Basically our interactions with people are vastly different based on our comfort level. We are restricted by fear of being embarrassed, clueless, or misunderstood. Intercultural communication raises the level of fear and anxiety because we are interacting with strangers with customs we are unsure of. Virtual worlds help to close the gap by allowing us to interact with different cultures from our home. They say familiarity breeds contempt but being unfamiliar breeds fear and results in less interaction. What virtual worlds do is allow new access to different cultures and the possibility of familiarity.

References
Jandt, F.E. (2010). An introduction to intercultural communication: Identities in a global community (6th ed.). Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage

Confronting a Hostile Employee

Case Study: “You are a department manager in a mid-sized company that provides technology support services. You have ten employees who are required to maintain a high level of technical expertise and deliver excellent customer service. One of your employees, who has been with the company for two years, is performing at a substandard level and you have received numerous complaints from customers and coworkers. In addition, this employee has displayed confrontational behavior which has created a hostile environment. You must now meet with this employee and deliver an ultimatum regarding the need for immediate improvement or dismissal.”

“The only way to appropriately handle conflict is to actually deal with it” (Goldsmith, 2008). It sometimes seems easier to just “let it go” and continue a dangerous cycle of conflict avoidance. Sometimes you wish to engage in a much needed conflict but just don’t have the nerve to confront the other person. At some point though, you just need to jump in the pool. But just in case you are still timid, there are smart and proper ways to initiate confrontation that will give the conflict a good chance of being successful.

In terms of initiating, Cahn and Abigail (2007) have identified two important steps: preparation and tell the person “we need to talk.” Preparation falls right in line with the stop/think portion of the S-TLC. At this point you need to think about the conflict and where it should go. Two ways to prepare include self-talk and imagined interaction. Think of this as talking through the issues with you imagining possible ways the confrontation may go. In this case you may expect the employee to act defiantly or hostile. When the time comes to initiate, tell the person “we need to talk.” As cliqued as it sounds, “we need to talk” is a universal way of calmly making a statement that a conflict must be confronted. Think of it as your go-to method to ease your way in to the pool.

When it comes time to talk, it is time to be serious. According to Stockwell (1997), you should state you message assertively, do not get off topic with small talk, and directly state your purpose clearly without any ambiguity. After that it is time to listen. “Expect that your message will surprise your listeners. It will take them time to ‘process’ your remarks” (Stockwell, 1997). There is a good chance this employee will not take the news very well. It is important to listen to him have his say. Another notion to think about during the communication phase is the use of I-statements. I-statements help to reverse the heat from the other party. In the midst of battle, we tend to repeat ourselves and try to express what is wrong with the other person. I-statements replace you-statements. For example a sentence starts with “I feel…” instead of “you make me feel…” (Cahn & Abigail, 2007). What this does is express to the other party the feelings you are experiencing instead of attacking them and making them more defensive. Anyway to ease the tension can open up communication lines for a more honest discussion.

Eventually you must give the employee the ultimatum to either shape up or ship out. Honestly, if the employee is that expendable this should not be such a hard thing. If he takes the confrontation poorly it is probably clear that he should move on. If the employee takes the criticism well and acknowledges that he needs to work on being a better employee then give him the chance to. No matter what, it is necessary to confront an employee that is not only not working up to standard but also disrupting the workplace.
 
References
Cahn, D.D., and Abigail, R.A. (2007). Managing conflict through communication (3rd ed.). Boston: Pearson Education, Inc.

Goldsmith, B. (2008). Difficult Conversations. Cost Engineering, 50(9), 20. Retrieved May 17, 2010, from ProQuest Database

Stockwell, R.G. (1997, April). Effective communication in managing conflict. CMA, 71(3), 6. Retrieved May 17, 2010, from ProQuest Database