Archive for month: November, 2014

I took the online assessment for handling conflict and the results showed that my conflict style is compromising.

1. Write an analysis of how your dominant and less dominant conflict styles affect your leadership abilities and outcomes. How might using a different conflict style improve the outcomes? Provide specific examples to support your argument.

I was surprised to see that I was assigned the compromising conflict style. However, I am happy with the results provided. It shows that I am able to satisfy both parties involved in a conflict. With this style, both sides are heard and respected. I am happy with this style because there is a sense of fairness in the resolution of conflict. I listen to all parties involved and try to find a solution in order to appease all involved. This also shows that as a leader, I am impartial, unbiased, and give others their due respect. The one negative aspect of this style is that both sides are not fully and completely happy. It provides a quick solution instead of thorough examination of the conflict. It appears to be a lazy way to work through problems instead of fully embracing them. I don’t think that this applies to me in real life because I like to fix conflicts and focus more in depth on the conflicts than the style I was given according to the assessment.

All the other styles can work in certain situations. For instance, if one party is being completely unrealistic or unfair then the competing style should be utilized. I had to use this at work one time when a coworker was being unprofessional and lazy. Or if there are problems but people don’t want to ruin relationships then an accommodating style should be applied. All the styles can work well but it depends on the situation.

Describe an actual conflict you had with a family member, roommate, or coworker

1. Describe the positions and interests of you and the other person in the conflict.  Describe how you could fractionate the conflict.
2. Using Fisher and Ury’s methods, describe how you could separate the person from the problem and how you could work together to address the conflict.
3. How could you have helped the other person in the conflict save face?  How could the other person help you save face?

I am a rather non confrontational person and I don’t have many conflicts so it’s hard for me to draw up any examples. But one time a few years ago I had a fight  with my friend but at the time we weren’t as good of friends as we are now. We were playing basketball and we were arguing over something trivial. (I can’t remember exactly what it was). Also the game was getting heated and we were badmouthing one another. Eventually, the argument escalated and the fight turned physical. I could have separated the person from the problem and saved face by simply stopping the game and talking through the issue. The intensity of the game propelled our issues but stopping the game would have been a smart move. We could have fractioned the problem by acknowledging there was an issue and resolving it early so that we could move on peacefully.

Survivor Blog #5 Listening Chapter 7
In episode 5 the tribes are changed completely. No more blood versus blood! The blue tribe is made up of mostly singles and the orange tribe is made up of mostly blood. So Dale is the lone one in the orange tribe and Reed and Josh are the only couple on the blue tribe. In Chapter seven they talk about the importance of listening and speaking. From watching the show I’ve got a pretty good idea of who’s more of a listener and who’s more of a speaker.
Before the tribe mix up it was clear that Josh was more of a leader and speaker for the orange tribe. He made the alliances and people respected what he had to say. Being a speaker benefited him. For Reed I noticed that he didn’t speak as much, but stayed in a safe zone by listening to people. This also benefited him. Now that they are together however their balance of both listening and speaking could benefit them BUT they are the only couple on that tribe.
For Drew who got voted off last, he was too much of a speaker and did not see how people were interrupting him which got him voted off.
One big part of Episode five that connected with this chapter was when Baylor and her mom were making the rice for the tribe and were trying to figure out how many scoops to use. Baylor and her mom both agreed to add more scoops however Dale thought they shouldn’t use more, that they were going to run out if they used so much. All three of them started to get frustrated since they disagreed. This demonstrates Gender Differences in listening greatly. The book says usually men focus more on content while women focus more on relationships. The girls Missy and Baylor were more annoyed with Dale for telling them what to do, while all Dale was doing was focussing on the content of the situation and what was smart. It was a perfect example of listening differences.
Claire Campagna Comm220-02

In episode five of Survivor things were shaken up when the tribes were switched leaving completely new tribes, the Hunaypu with four singles and one couple while the Coyopa has four couples and one single which may create tension in the new tribes with such differences. To listen in groups one must accommodate for another which is not happening in the Hunaypu tribe between Dale and Missy; Dale being over controlling with the rice but on the other side Missy is not taking into mind the idea of rationing in order to last out the remaining days. Before the tribes had found their flow but the Coyopa tribe has it easier with so many couples, already creating a bond not only within the individual couples but as a group of couples with one singular person being left out creating a sense of vulnerability. Despite the false sense of securities among the couples in Coyopa different sets of couples have different agendas, having trust issues with most of the new tribe. Jon and Jackyln go around getting the opinions of all of the other couples individually in order to decide where there vote will lie, listening before they leap to a rash decision without supporting comments from all sides.

Throughout the tribal council with Coyopa there was only defensive listening happening, more and more people not listening but only defending themselves and their loved ones when they felt attacks were taking place. Most of the time there was no listening in order to interpret meaning but only to create more attacks against any tribe member. Ultimately the attacks against each other worked out to no one’s advantage but instead created tension that will last through the coming episodes. In the end the defensive listening, although did not work, did have a close vote between Baylor, Dale, and Kelly who were the main focus of the attacks.

This week on Survivor we were presented with the connecting the episode to Chapter 7-Listening. Listening is defined as “the ability to understand, analyze, respect, and appropriately respond to the meaning of another person’s spoken and nonverbal messages.” This ability to listen, or lack there-of; was displayed most obviously with contestants Jeremy and Natalia. Jeremy had very valid information to share with his team about the trade they conducted with Jeff. Because he didn’t, his team gave up all of their comfort supplies for a bag of rice….and then his team won the prize of a delicious dinner which included beef. Jeremy was not expressing what he was thinking but his team might have not given him the inviting opportunity to do so. Natalia also clearly used the WIIFM (what’s in it for me) mentality. Although it seemed like she was being kind and looking over Baylor as a favor to Missy, she took the time to be excluded and gain trust with this opposing tribe member to help her get the inside scoop and strengthen her strategy before the merge. I look forward to watching the merge and discover if Natalia’s strategy was worth being on exile island.

Is Jeremy still on the Hunahpu tribe? It definitely doesn’t seem like Jeremy wants to be a part of his tribe at all and would rather be in his own tribe. He is completely disgusted with his tribe’s decision to make a trade in order to gain the rice that they are in desperate need of. This trade to get the rice may seem like the smartest thing that Hunahpu could do, or maybe they weren’t really listening to Jeff Probst or were using selective listening when Jeff told them that the penalty for their rice would be very stiff. Jeremy was definitely listening. He knew that Jeff was going to clean them out and that’s exactly what he did. The tribe lost almost the entirety of their shelter in turn for the bag of rice. The rest of the tribe seems pleased and content with the trade, while Jeremy can’t believe that they could be happy about the trade. Listening in groups is much more difficult because there are so many different ideas and perspectives being discussed and listened to. Perhaps Jeremy’s idea and perception was too different than the consensus of the tribe and couldn’t get the attentive listening that he obviously deserved. On the next challenge, the Hunahpu tribe won a Survivor BBQ. I’m sure they sure wish they hadn’t made that trade now, as the rain absolutely pounded them all night while they were stuck huddling in the rain with almost no shelter.

Heading towards Coyopa’s tribal counsel, it seemed that Dale got John listening pretty good when he told him that he had an immunity idol and would give John that idol given he survived the tribal counsel that night. Maybe John was pseudo listening to give Dale the impression that he really was listening, although he did seem pretty convinced by Dale’s claim. However, I think John’s girlfriend had him listening and thinking much more critically, as she seemed skeptical about Dale’s claim to have an idol and obviously did enough to convince John to vote out Dale.