The readings have all been very enlightening and all have reinforced my understanding that communication skills are the connections skills of an organisation. Also that communication underpins leadership and collaboration, so the conclusion can be drawn that effective communication is necessary for effective leadership and supports productive collaboration. All of these readings relate to change, decision making, conflict resolution and negotiation, and all of these require effective communication.
I agree with Savage that in schools, leaders need to encourage upward flow of communication, and this is harder if the staff are trying to communicate failures or problems to those above them. It is always easy to report on positives than negatives!
The study guide introduces negotiation as helping to bring about decisions that all parties can accept and be committed to. In my experience, this is not always successfully done. There may appear to be a solving of the problem, but if not properly negotiated there can be acceptance (begrudging) but rarely is there commitment to the decision.
For this reason, I was very impressed with McKay’s 6 step method for resolving conflict. McKay’s process could easily result in one party accepting the other’s point of view – this is not the same as saying you agree with them. It has certainly helped me as I am often guilty of assuming that my point of view is the right one. I can now see that it is possible to see that another point of view is as legitimate as mine without actually agreeing with the other person. It has also helped me to realise that resistance is an essential ingredient in progress, as resisters often pose alternatives you may not have considered (Fullan, 2004) (unless the resisters are acting without moral purpose).
Reading about emotional intelligence was very worthwhile, and again communication was integral to these concepts. This came in the ‘Building Relationships’ chapter in the Fullan text. Emotionally intelligent people are able to adapt to “disorientating shifts”, are self aware as well as socially aware (of other’s feelings, needs, concerns), and are good at relationship management (develop rapport with diverse members of the organisation). I try to see some of these characteristics in my approach to my work – try to be unruffled by stress, be engaging, grasp what others want and need, be adaptable, flexible, control impulses, and try to be generally happy and optimistic. The hardest for me is to be good at reconciliation as I have a very strong sense of justice and fairness, and really like to see wrongs put right! Often reconciliation happens without the wrongs being righted, very hard for me to feel OK about this. This may be why I am leaning towards doing Conflict resolution and negotiation in my Reflections Assignment.
Although not part of the Communication strand, it has also been helpful to investigate the Quality Learning website which is based on proven principles that guide an organisation towards improvement, develop a culture of continuous improvement and produces outcomes such as renewed sense of purpose with stronger goal alignment, greater collaboration and co-operation, a focus on improvement across the school and improved leadership capacity (at more than one level). It encourages teamwork and the concept that its everybody’s job to improve the systems and processes for which they are responsible. There is a large amount of detail on the 4 areas of focus – systems, knowledge, variation and people.
So what have I learned about communication? Basically that in many organisations, people assume it happens and it doesn’t! Not effective communication anyway. To be good at it we must be good listeners, and I have worked with leaders and teachers who are not good at that! It is very rewarding to have a conversation with someone who truly listens to you.
In summary, I can say that all aspects of this subject are inter-related and overlapping but all come under the umbrella of leadership, and all are underpinned by good communication.
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