Question

"Midterm Report Card"

Compare your understanding of professional communications at midterm with your understanding of the topic before you started the course. Share something from the last five weeks that stood out to you - or surprised you. Will this realization change the way you communicate? Communication is a skill that develops over time. Where do you envision your professional communication skills at the end of this course? What goal will you set out to achieve by Week 11? Looking at the next several weeks, what aspect of the class are you most looking forward to learning?

Answer 1

1. Compare your understanding of professional communications at midterm with your understanding of the topic before you started the course. Share something from the last five weeks that stood out to you - or surprised you. Will this realization change the way you communicate?

Before starting the course: I was not completely aware of the importance of the subject called Professional Communications. As I am from work-ex background having 3 years of experience incorporates, the only way I learned how to communicate while at work is through observing my boss and colleagues and learning the way they communicate and got the work done.

At the midterm: Now after attending numerous sessions and getting some idea about the subject, I understand that communicating professionally while working has its own importance as other aspects of your work relationships also depend on it. I have learned the concept of data-ink ratio, various ways to represent the data in the minimal number of words and importance of reading. I have learned writing has its own steps to follow and reverse engineering approach works here. The steps of Thinking through, ideation, structuring and finalizing of a text has helped me better writing and presenting my thoughts.

2. Communication is a skill that develops over time. Where do you envision your professional communication skills at the end of this course? What goal will you set out to achieve by Week 11?

Near the end of this course, I wish to be able to understand and use many inherent variables of effective writing for my professional communication. I wish to use data-ink ratio in order to minimize the number of words put in a text and rather show graphical representation effectively so that it does the work of communicating the meaning. I wish to be able to write the business memo, professional analysis reports, and email writing communication while working with higher management of the company. By week 11, I should be able to see myself read and write thoughtfully (better than before) so that I can start my new state of professional writing which shall help me in the professional career.

3. Looking at the next several weeks, what aspect of the class are you most looking forward to learning?

I wish to work on my weak areas. Some of them are - reading effectively and reporting using not too many words, representing the data in the most easily consumable way so that reader is able to read it without explanation, be communicatively sound while writing and reporting the facts. Most importantly, I wish to able to work with cases which shall be coming handy in real life problem solving while working for an organization.