Interpersonal communication class reflection essay

Self-reflection Essay: Interpersonal Communication

This essay is a self-reflection analysis of my communication skills based upon information generated

from the five diagnostic tools presented hereafter and focusing on two communication issues drawn

from the results of the diagnostic tools. The two communication issues in need of my personal

communication development are public speaking anxiety, more precisely giving a presentation and

low tolerance for disagreement. Moreover, this essay consists of literature review focusing on key

concepts and theories related to the communication issues. Through this process of reflection, I have

gained knowledge of activities I can implement to tackle the communication issues. These activities

are reflected in an action plan after the literature review.

I have used five different diagnostic tools to analyze my communication in various communication

situations. First tool was a Self-Perceived Communication Competence Questionnaire which is an

indicator of how people analyze their own communication competence when confronted with a

plethora of communication situations with an array of receivers (McCroskey & McCroskey, 2013).

The second tool was a Personal Report of Communication Apprehension which measures an

individual’s feelings towards communication by asking the individual to analyze diverse

communication situations and how one would behave in them (McCroskey, 2007a). The third tool

was a Personal Report of Public Speaking Anxiety which gives, as the name entails, an estimate of

individual’s level of anxiety towards public speaking (McCroskey, 2007b). The fourth tool was the

Willingness to Listen Diagnostic with which one’s orientation towards listening can be examined

(Richmond & Hickson, 2001). Lastly, the fifth tool was a Tolerance for Disagreement providing

information on how well people can tolerate disagreement and conflicting ideas which one believes

to be true (Teven, Richmond & McCroskey, 1998).

The results from all the questionnaires where quite accurate and I recognize my communication style

and preferences from them. As the results from Self-Perceived Communication Competence show, I

am at my most comfortable when talking with friends and having interactions on a one-to-one basis,

whereas, I am somewhat uncomfortable talking in public, in large groups of people or meetings. The

results from the Personal Report of Communication Apprehension further verifies that I have a slight

apprehension when it comes to public speaking or speaking in meetings. My overall communication

apprehension score was 70 which falls in the category of a moderate level of communication

apprehension. The public speaking anxiety score of 115 demonstrates that I experience moderate

levels of anxiety when giving a presentation which is aligned with the scores from the apprehension

report. The fourth diagnostic tool, Willingness to Listen provided me with a score of 72 indicating a

moderate level of willingness to listen. Lastly, the tolerance for disagreement score puts me also in

the moderate scale with a score of 42.

Although the scores for public speaking anxiety and tolerance for disagreement fall in the category

of moderate, I perceive myself needing to improve those areas of communication and I strongly feel

that by doing so, it will be beneficial for my business communication to reduce the level of anxiety

from moderate to low. When it comes to tolerance for disagreement, I have always had the tendency

to avoid conflicts and disagreements in my interpersonal communication and try to solve any issues

as diplomatically as possible. However, I believe disagreements are inevitable in business context

and especially in decision-making and finding the right way to communicate when disagreeing

opinions arise, is crucial.

Reflecting on the public speaking anxiety, giving a presentation in a meeting, I would like to provide

the following example of what happened six months ago while I was working as a Legal Assistant in

one of the business law firms in Finland. I was given a task to present finding