Reflections

First i would like to apologize for taking so long to write the reflections. :P

Group work always require dedication and commitment in order for it to be a success. Working together requires a skill amongst all the members to able to coordinate, appreciate and integrate the work of each other. Also while doing the work, to ensure that there is good communication within the group such that every member knows what exactly he/she has to do and make sure they do not do repeated work as the other group mates.

And i must say that my ES group experience with Nuri and Chinhow was definitely a very good one. Everyone of us have our own other assignments, tests and other interviews to attend to and prepare. Even though ES2007 is not a compulsory module which in other words, "we can slack off and just SU". But NO, from the start, we have set our grounds and all agreed that we will put in effort for the module and do a good job rather than just minimum. This was definitely not just "Talk and No Action"! Throughout the project, the efforts each had put was evident. This gave me the additional drive to push forward together with the whole group. As the two of them would serve as a reminder to me to work hard if not harder than them.

I must say, the whole proposal was not an easy ride. We faced some problems through the whole project. Like at the initial stage, we were not able to conceptualize that things that we want to write. But with some consultation with Dr. Radhika, we managed to iron out some stuff and continued with writing the proposal.

Personally, I think the NUSwiki is a good platform for project work. Other than NUSwiki, the other wiki that I always use is google.docs and I think that google.docs do not provide a better organization of the documents as compared to NUSwiki. But I think the disadvantage of NUSwiki is that NUS students do not know much about it.

Overall, I think that this module is very interesting. And I don't think i am the only one who finds it interesting. Because from the fact that attendance for lesson is not compulsory, Dr Radhika gets almost full attendance every lessons! I think that what we have learnt from the lessons are very real and can be applied to our remaining school term and definitely in future during our professional career.

Finally I would like to thank my wonderful groupmates again. And Dr. Radhika for providing us with the knowledge of Professional Communications.

Thank you

Oral Presentation Review

Before giving reviews about my group's oral presentation, I must say that my learning experience with Nuri and Chinhow was awesome and fulfilling. They are two guys which i think i can safely trust my work with. At times even amidst our busy schedule, we still can be assured that things will be completed for the proposal. Really enjoyed working with them!

After the presentation, Dr. Radhika and the class gave me much valuable comments about how i should improve on my presentation And i think one that strikes me the most is me using Singlish. At times, i still use "lah" in my speech. Despite all the lessons about using proper English, i think it is habitual and out of convenience that I don't speak properly. This is one big aspect that I still have a lot of room for improvement.

When watching the recorded Mock Presentation, I personally realized one flaw that i have. And that is when I am thinking, I think "aloud". As I am churning out or recollecting some ideas, I tend to stutter on my words. It will not be obvious to the people listening to my presentation as they will not know what I am thinking in my mind. But I think this is a sign showing that I do not know my contents well. Because upon proper rehearsal and preparing of script, one should not be thinking so much and trying to churn out new ideas DURING the presentation. Which I must admit that it is true, that I was not well prepared enough for the Mock Presentation.

Realizing this flaw of mine, I decided to improve it by preparing a good script and reading through the Final Report a few more times to make sure I don't forget any of our contents. During rehearsal with my group mates, we run through the whole presentation over and over again to make sure that everything is well and good. And judging from the comments and reviews from Dr. Radhika and the class, I believe that our efforts paid off.

Finally, I think that communications and presentation skills can only improve through experience and practice. Learning to be a good speaker will never end. Thank you Dr. Radhika and the class for all your honest and valuable comments.

Intercultural Behaviour

In Singapore, we often identify ourselves as being a cosmopolitan and multi-racial society. Countries often label Singapore as the "gateway between the East and the West". Being the multi-racial country that we are within, we also integrate with the people that came from all over the world to work, study or live.

After knowing the context of cultural differences in Singapore, an individual will have to know and acknowledge the presence of the different people coming from different background with their own culture and beliefs. At times, compromising and a little 'change' might be healthy and beneficial for everyone.

Recently, a group of my friends and I decided to go for a short trip in Langkawi to enjoy the famous beach there. From past personal experiences in Malaysia, I realised that many Malaysian Malay locals are not fluent with English. At times when I go to places in Johor Bahru (which alot of Singaporeans go to), I have difficulty talking to the locals at hawkers or shops as they can only speak the Malay language. Knowing that, I started to learn some Malay phrases from some of my Malay friends in Singapore prior to the trip, hoping to have an easier time talking there instead of using hand signals or pointing to items all the time! So, as we were ordering dinner or purchasing items, I would approach the locals with my "broken Malay". As a result, the locals there also had a hard time trying to figure out what I was trying to say and at times I still resorted to using hand signals and pointing. When I seeked help from my friends and spoke in English, the locals realised that I know how to speak English and they started to talk to me in English.

Then I realised that the locals in Langkawi know how to speak English because tourism is their main national revenue income. So many of them actually picked up English to communicate with the tourists.

I think this is a good example of me trying to integrate into them and them trying to integrate to us. I think this spirit for trying to integrate others' culture is an important aspect as we are now living in a 'smaller' world with people from many different backgrounds.

Application Letter

Able to write a good application letter is definitely a very good skill to have. As it will grant you interview chances. Please feel free to comment and give feedback on my application letter for learning purposes. Thank you.

------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Lee Jun Han, Kelvin

Block 163 Tampines St. 12

#09-255

Singapore 521163

Mobile: 94882006

Residence: 67877993

Email: kelvinsps@gmail.com

8 February 2011

Human Resource Manager

Seamatch Asia Limited

Orchard Towers

400 Orchard Road

Singapore 238875

Dear Sir/Madam,

Application for Civil Engineer Position (Project Manager)

Job Ref. No. JSG100003000527036

I read from JobsDB.com that Seamatch Asia Limited has an opening for the post of Civil Engineer (Project Manager). I have enclosed my CV in response to my interest for the job.

I will be completing my Honors Degree in Civil Engineering from the National University of Singapore in April 2011 and will be ready for deployment anytime after May 2011. Being part of many important clubs and societies in my past educational institutions and National Service gave me an advance standing in planning various kinds of activities and leading a team. My various leadership positions started back since during my secondary education. I was the Executive Committee Member of my secondary school. Organizing leadership training camps for the junior Prefects in the school. Myself and my team of Senior Prefects had played an important role in producing and training the new Prefect leaders.

Moving on to my Junior College days, despite the busy academic schedule I was part of the Tennis Team in Meridian Junior College. Competing in the Nationals Tennis Competition, my team fought hard and brought back the honor of being Top 6 amongst the different Colleges. Tough training and heavy workload did not stop me from learning to be a good leader and planner. Together with a team of 5, we organized the school's InterHouse Games.

Such large scale planning activities carried forward to my National Service days. Being part of the National Day Parade 2008 was one that I took the most pride in. Taking up the role of The Evaluation Officer (Parade) had sharpened my leadership skills further. These soft skills I have acquired throughout my academic and military service days, coupled with my eagerness to learn and excel will definitely make me an essential assert to Seamatch Asia Limited.

It is without doubt that my passion to lead and knowledge in Civil Engineering will help to achieve project success in Seamatch Asia Limited. I look forward utilize my different soft skills and my technical knowledge in Seamatch Asia Limited. I would be looking forward to your reply. Thank you for your consideration.

Yours Faithfully,

Lee Jun Han, Kelvin

Resolving Interpersonal Conflict

Interpersonal conflict could arise in many situations, with many reasons and to anybody. People of different background beliefs and understanding of a certain situation could cause this to happen.

Story:
Two guys (A and B) were awesome buddies since the time they enlisted into National Service. They have been through thick and thin, shed blood and sweat for each other and be behind each others' back in many many occasions. This continued even after they left the Service and moved on to tertiary education.

Their friendship turned sour due to some incident that happened. Both guys sat down and have a heart to heart talk, both knowing that their friendship worth more than that of the small little conflict that they have. However, Guy A continued to give the cold shoulder to Guy B even after the talk. Guy B once again confronted Guy A and asked what is wrong. Guy A just continued being the petty one. So since then, the two of them made little or no contact at all. And thus, just like that, two awesome buddies became strangers over a short period of time.

If you were Guy A, how would you handle the situation to salvage the friendship?

Effective Communication Skills

Human interactions start from the very moment we wake up from our daily sleep when we greet our parents with a simple "Good Morning" over breakfast. Talking takes up a huge portion in the functionality of our lives. At home, at work, in the market, in fact everywhere we go, we have to communicate. It is thus very important for us to give the receiver the correct information that we want to put across.

Talking is definitely not the only mean of communication. With today's modern technology, we can cross the ocean in a matter of hours in a plane as compared to the past when we took months to travel on ship. Likewise today, with these changes, we sometimes do not have to talk to communicate and talking might not even be the MOST effective means of communication.

Letters, E-mails, Skype, MSN Messenger, BlackBerry Messenger (BBM), WhatsApp. These are some of the familiar platforms we use today to communicate with our friends and colleagues. This list also shows the improvement in the speed, quality and (maybe) effectiveness of how we communicate today. In the past when calls are expensive, we pen down our thoughts and messages in letters. When the Internet technology gets better with time, we send E-mails. With the improvement of mobile technologies, we mobile messengers like the BBM and WhatsApp. From such, we can observe that with such technological shifts, talking to convey messages actually gets a little obsolete. Because, talking (calling) requires one to pick up the dialer, dial, wait for response and then send the message. This takes up too much time! With BBM and WhatsApp, functions such as mass messaging is possible. For instance, a Manager of a team can send an instruction to his/her team of possibly 10 people with a mass messenger service, and can save the hassle of calling all 10 people of the team individually. In our competitive world, this is Effective Communication.

However said so, I still believe that talking is still the fundamental to all communications. In certain avenues, talking is still important. For instance, during a job interview, I'm sure the boss of a company would still prefer to have an interview in person rather than over Skype or MSN. Also it will not be effective if a counselor was to do his job over the phone. Talking in person brings about a certain kind of intimacy between the participants of the conversation. In such cases, only talking would bring out the effectiveness of the job.

Now with the understanding that different platforms of communications has its own pros and cons. It is then up to the sender of a conversation to decide which avenue is best suited for the type of conversation he/she wants to give. Upon deciding, the sender must ensure that there is no ambiguity in the content he is giving. With that, only then we can ensure effective communication.