Interpersonal Communication
One interpersonal miscommunication that i recently experienced in my workplace would be when I was working at a hotel as a concierge. My supervisor and I received a bouquet of flowers that was meant to be collected by a guest who is having a wedding at the hotel.
My supervisor, a very dominant, strict and expressionless individual, gave an instruction to make an update for a reservation. The task given to me was to include a note saying “pick up bouquet of flowers once check-in” for the guest to pick up the flowers from the concierge desk upon arrival. The bouquet of flowers was valuable as it was a gift from a friend of the guest. Therefore, it became my responsibility to ensure that the flowers ended up with the guest. However, in my perspective, the instructions given was not clear enough. In addition to that, my supervisor looked rather fierce when conveying the message which led myself to misunderstand it as a scolding and did not do the task as instructed.
This actually caused the guest to be very disappointed and angry with the incompetence of the service that we provided and did not deliver. The hotel also had to pay for the flowers as it was kept with the concierge for a few days after the wedding reception. By then, it was too late for the hotel to fix the problem. The reason why I thought my supervisor was angry was because of his body language, tone and the choice of words he used. If you were in my shoes, what would you have done? Would you approach your supervisor to clarify the instructions given?
Commented on:
Shu Ling
Tricia
Nadiah
Swathi
My supervisor, a very dominant, strict and expressionless individual, gave an instruction to make an update for a reservation. The task given to me was to include a note saying “pick up bouquet of flowers once check-in” for the guest to pick up the flowers from the concierge desk upon arrival. The bouquet of flowers was valuable as it was a gift from a friend of the guest. Therefore, it became my responsibility to ensure that the flowers ended up with the guest. However, in my perspective, the instructions given was not clear enough. In addition to that, my supervisor looked rather fierce when conveying the message which led myself to misunderstand it as a scolding and did not do the task as instructed.
This actually caused the guest to be very disappointed and angry with the incompetence of the service that we provided and did not deliver. The hotel also had to pay for the flowers as it was kept with the concierge for a few days after the wedding reception. By then, it was too late for the hotel to fix the problem. The reason why I thought my supervisor was angry was because of his body language, tone and the choice of words he used. If you were in my shoes, what would you have done? Would you approach your supervisor to clarify the instructions given?
Commented on:
Shu Ling
Tricia
Nadiah
Swathi
Hi Zakiyah,
ReplyDeleteI definitely know how it feels to be afraid of your bosses. However, one thing that I have learnt during my internship is to always ask if you're unsure. Therefore, if I was you, I would have clarified with my supervisor on the instructions given. I'm quite sure that bosses are all alike. They prefer it when you ask if you're unsure instead of committing a mistake. However, as it has happened, I would apologise to my supervisor immediately.
I appreciate you sharing this incident with all of us. It is a common problem faced by many of us and I hope this serves as a learning point for all of us.
This comment has been removed by the author.
ReplyDeleteHi Zakiyah,
ReplyDeleteThank you for sharing your incident on your blog. I understand how you felt at that point of time as I faced similar incident during my internship. I remembered committing many mistakes when I did not clarify my doubts with my colleagues.
Hence, if I was you at that point of time, I would have taken the courage to clarified with my supervisor on the instructions given. Although he might be dominant, strict and expressionless, I believe he will be willing to answer any questions if you ask.
Since the incident has happened, I believe you can take it as a lesson learnt. Do not take this incident to heart and take it as a learning curve. Do not be afraid to ask any questions as I believe supervisor is there for a reason to guide you and help you as much as possible.
Best Regards,
Tricia
Hi Zakiyah,
ReplyDeleteThank you for sharing your experience and I understand your circumstance whereby you are constantly fearful of your supervisor which led to you to being resistant in clarifying the instructions when required. If I were you, I would be equally intimidated by the supervisor and be reluctant to approach him/her as well. Therefore, I will firstly approach my colleagues who might be able to guide me, if I am still unclear about the instruction, I will approach the supervisor and apologise to him/her that I did not manage to catch his instructions and would appreciate if he could repeat. In my opinion, it is inevitable that we meet individuals who we might not be comfortable working with, therefore it is critical that we are able to overcome the fear and able to find the right approach when we are working or communicating with the individuals.
Nevertheless, I believe that you have learnt from the incident and will be able to approach the problem more effectively when you encounter similar situation. Once again, thank you for sharing your experience as I have learnt from it as well.
Cheers,
Cheryl
Hello Zakiyah,
ReplyDeleteThank you for sharing this with us.
If we did not get to deliver the flowers to the guest, we would also feel upset and affected as we were not able to deliver joy to the guest's special occasion.
We believe that you should not have made assumptions that he was angry with you just by his facial expressions and his tone of voice. Rather than taking it negatively, you can treat it as an authoritive and firm instructions given.
Instead of being afraid to sound out, you should actually re-confirm his instructions to prevent any mistakes that could potentially create more tension.
Nevertheless, we would like to praise for your professionalism and ability to continue your shift despite being 'scolded' by your supervisor.
Regards,
Syairah and Xenia
Hello everyone!
ReplyDeleteThank you for your comments and words of encouragement. I guess it is partly my fault for using my clouded judgement to assume that my supervisor was angry at me. I should definitely have approached him and clarify the instructions given. I learnt from my mistakes and did not let it repeat again throughout the course of my internship programme.
What I could have done was to stay composed, look at the situation again, understand my supervisor, and clarify. After working with him for a few months, I realised that that was his way of working and conveying a message. It was an eye opening experience for me as I have never worked with anyone like him before. What I learnt from this was that everyone has their own unique way of working and communicating. Maybe if I approached him and told him that his way of conveying an instruction may confuse people as a scolding then things could have been different and mistakes could be avoided.
I hope you all have learnt something from this too! Thank you again for your comments.
Best Regards,
Zakiyah
Thanks, Zakiyah, for your sharing in this interesting yet demanding conflict situation. As I understand the original scenario, your boss gave you instructions to fulfill but you were not sure of what the insructions were, and so you didn't accomplish what was expected of you, delievring the flowers. What is a bit unclear to me in the original telling is why you failed to deliver.
ReplyDeleteThe final result in the situation seems to be that you were guilty of not completing your assigned task.
I wonder what the result of that was. Were you scolded further?
In the end, as you and Syairah and Xenia have suggested, you should not have made a faulty assumption and you could have clarified the request. This is definitely a problem that many of us have in communicating with others: We fill in the blanks in our head with regard to what the other person intends, and when that proves to be wrong, our result and the relationship itself can suffer.
As you have stated, this was a learning experience for you. I hope you have moved forward in a positive way.
Best wishes,
Brad