Final Reflection on Learning

Being in my third year of school, I figured learning some resume-writing and job interview skills would come in handy. That was how I ended up taking ES2007S. I took the class not knowing what to expect, except having heard that the workload is really heavy. It turned out to be a great experience as I realised that there was still a lot more room for improvement in terms of my communications skills.

The open discussion style planned by Ms. Lim, who often chipped in with her own experiences and knowledge, was extremely conducive to learning communications skills. The environment encouraged people to give their opinions and this was evident as people in the class started to open up and soon every class was a lively sharing on the topic of the day. The various activities from the peer teaching to the mock interviews to the oral presentations were all good activities to put what we learnt into practice. What was best about this module was the fact that we got plenty of opportunities to speak. Contrary to my prior expectations, I learnt a lot from everyone in the class and not just from Ms. Lim alone. The open feedback and criticism were refreshing as they served as constant reminders that there was always more to learn and improve on.

My first major takeaway from this class is on writing resume and application letter. I realised how important it is to use keywords and a “you” approach in writing formal documents. I learnt that writing a formal document - be it a resume, a cover letter or a proposal- is not merely presenting the facts. Rather, it is more important for the writer to write it by considering the expectation of the reader(s).My second important takeaway is the oral presentation. I have revisited the basics of holding a meeting, building the team dynamics, liaising with external agencies, proposal writing and presentation management. It is very rewarding to synthesize a project that could really worked in the actual cooperate environment. My final takeaway is the interpersonal skills I may have inadvertently acquired through the formation of great friendships with everybody in the class. I am really glad I met all these people and I hope everyone had a great experience just as I did.

Reflection on Oral Presentation

Preparation

My team mates and I prepared our slides few days before the presentation. We reviewed and commented on each other’s slides for any mistakes before rehearsal. We have the luxury of having several rehearsals before the presentation and it helps in familiarizing me with the flow of presentation. I prepared supplementary slides as I foreseen that the audience might need me to clarify some of the parts in a clearer way, which I thought I would not be able to do it during the 5-minute presentation due to time constraint.

Delivery

For this oral presentation, I believe I appeared to be less nervous. I refrained myself from reading out from the cue cards, unlike my peer teaching session. Although my speech was not really very smooth, I have more eye contact with the audience and was able to pay attention to and observe their response and facial expressions. I was focused during Q and A session, and was able to answer questions tactfully with my team mates.

As I am a more Mandarin speaking person, my English proficiency has to be improved. I tried to be persuasive and assertive in giving speech and answering questions as well as to end the presentation memorably, but my speech could be more fluent and impressive if I improve on this area.

The non verbal cues that I transmitted during the presentation could also be better. Although I feel my gestures, expression and enthusiasm were better this time, there is still room for improvement. Probably because I am very introverted since young, I used to be more rigid when I am standing in front of the audience.

Use of slideware

We tried to use simple layout so as to keep our slides easy to be digested. Fancy layouts were minimized to avoid disturbance to graphs in the slides. I was really bad at handling the “clicker” and it must be distracting to the audience during my presentation. However, I carried on explaining to them without the slides while my supportive team mates were busy solving the problem for me at the back. After all, the slides are supposed to aid my presentation or my speech, but they should not be the main focus (I hope).

All in all, I did improve on some of the areas that I discovered and Ms. Lim pointed out after peer teaching but I believe I still need to improve on those areas. I feel that our presentation was generally okay and it is certainly an invaluable experience.

Evaluating Intercultural Behavior

Globalization has indeed encouraged migration of people from different culture to different parts of the world since few decades ago. This has also led to the emerging of different subcultures in different societies and nations now. A practice or ritual that was practiced by the people from the same culture, may change in its meaning that it brings to or the way it is conducted by the people in its group now.

When I was travelling in Hong Kong with my family a few years back, we actually noticed some cultural differences between us and the people of Hong Kong, although we are of the same race and practice almost similar culture.

I could remember vividly how their perception of time is totally different from that of ours. I always thought that probably getting not-so-on-time is a Chinese culture, but my perception has totally changed when I observed how the people of Hong Kong rushed to their destinations even when they were having a retail session during leisure time and how wisely they had used their time when they were waiting for public transport.

On the other hand, I noticed that they were also generally more suspicious towards strangers. When I was taking photograph or video when I was walking along the street, a few of them actually looked at me as if I was shooting them, and one had approached me and asked whether I was taking a photograph of him.

I understood that these cultural differences might have existed due to their competitive environment and hectic lifestyle. From this experience, I have learned that cultural differences may be due to other factors like environment and educational system, rather than just the race itself. I believed cultural differences could be overcome when both parties try to understand each other and the reason behind their actions, thoughts and behavior.

Application Letter Critique

Job advertisement:

Application Letter

Foong Mei Mei
#13-111, Block 54,
Cassia Crescent,
Singapore 390054

5th September 2011

Signature Programme in Health Service Research,
Duke-NUS Medical School,
8 College Road,
Singapore 169857

Dear Professor David B. Matchar,

Application for Research Assistant Position 

I am writing to express my keen interest for the above-stated position, which was posted on the www.jobstreet.com on the 15th of August 2011.

I graduated from National University of Singapore (NUS) with a degree in Life Science, majoring in Biomedical Sciences. I believe that I am equipped with the skills and qualities that you require for this position. As I have taken the modules Biochemistry and Immunology before, I am adequately experienced in techniques such as Enzyme-Linked Immunoabsorbent Assay (ELISA), Chromatography and Electrophoresis. Also, as an earnest learner, I am willing to pick up any new skill during the course of the job. Given my skills and ‘willing-to-learn’ attitude, I am confident that I will be of great help to your team.

I feel that a researcher should have patience, discipline and more importantly passion for the job; for he or she may have to perform the same long and laborious experiment several times a day. I was a student volunteer of National University of Singapore Red Cross Society for 4 years. My role was to provide first aid for any events in the campus or out of the campus whenever we were needed. These 4 years of invaluable volunteering experience have indeed transformed me into a more independent, disciplined and compassionate individual. With these qualities I posses, I am confident that I will be a good researcher.

With the above-mentioned traits, I believe that I can be a valuable asset to your dynamic team.

I look forward to meeting with you in person to have a more in-depth discussion on what my enclosed resume is not able to furnish. I can be contacted at (65)98882333 or u0903274@nus.edu.sg at anytime.

Thank you very much for your time and consideration.

Yours sincerely,




Mei Mei
Encl: Resume

Resolving Interpersonal Conflict

Interpersonal conflict is inevitable in our everyday lives. I have had conflicts with others, but have always tried to resolve the problem to avoid further misunderstanding and maintain relationships. However, I could vividly remember a conflict that I had, which leaves a big impact in my life. 

During one of the summer holidays in NUS, I joined my hostel orientation camp as a counselor. I aimed to assist the organizing committee to run the camp and the juniors to better accustom themselves to NUS and hostel life. Although I was a reserved person and relatively more introverted, I understand that one need to have different facets to adapt to different situations. Therefore, I tried my best to be more active to “fit” into the role of a counselor.

Things do not always happen the way one wishes them to be. When I was the day counselor, I got accused by the organizing committee for not following the schedule tightly.  I admit that I did cause some delay but we were indeed reminded to wait for the command from the coordinator before we take any actions on our own. I thought it was not really a big deal and led the orientation group as normal. Later, I overheard my friends from the same group backstabbing me for the delay without even knowing clearly about the situation. I thought of explaining to them but I held back as I thought they would have rather believed the organizing committee since they are of the same “cliques”.

My experience as a counselor during the orientation camp is, therefore, an awful one as I lost trust in my friends and gradually isolated myself from the group. I kept blaming myself for not being able to communicate well and thought it would be better for me to keep myself away from them.

Now that I think about it, I am aware that I felt bad as I was ruled by emotions then. I could have explained the real situation to them and probably gain their empathy, which might enable us to build a stronger relationship.

Dear friends, if you were in my shoes, what would you do? 

Importance of Effective Communication

Effective communication is the key of success to all relationships. It is inevitably important when we are interacting at school or workplace. On top of that, I do feel that it is equally important when it comes to maintaining personal relationships. Communication can be channeled through a few means in assisting the sender to bring his point clearly across to the receiver; be it face-to-face, or via the World Wide Web. As for me, a year 3 NUS Science student, communication influences my academic and personal life to a great extent.

Firstly, effective communication comes in handy during tutorials and laboratory sessions. We are often assigned into different groups with other students whom we might not know before to conduct an experiment or presentation. Effective communication helps to break the ice among us and avoid miscommunication, thus acting as a catalyst to hasten our progress in completing task (which is necessary as time is gold, especially for NUS students!). For an instance, when I was doing a biochemistry experiment with my lab partner, we always reminded each other of what to do and what we have done. It is crucial as skipping or adding steps in an experiment could lead to different outcomes. Hence, effective communication helps me to work with different people in completing a task as a team.

Secondly, effective communication also plays a vital role in fostering my personal relationships. It helps to reduce misunderstanding when we are communicating, especially with our loved ones. For an example, I used to misunderstand my mother as being over-protective as she set curfew and disallowed me to do things that she thought might be harmful to me. I came to know later that what she did was out of her care for me. It was the way that we communicated which created misunderstanding between us. Things might be easier if we understood each other and communicated more effectively. Therefore, I believe effective communication could enhance a relationship tremendously.

All in all, communicating effectively could leave a big impact in one's life and allow one to shine in professional and personal aspects.