Competency M ~
Demonstrate oral and written communication skills necessary for group work, collaborations, and professional level presentations.
Statement
"No member of a crew is praised for the rugged individuality of his rowing."
Ralph Waldo Emerson
I give credit to my parents for teaching me to always take pride in my accomplishments, to always put everything I have into the work I set out to complete, whatever that work is, and to know that everyone will make mistakes, and that those mistakes shoule be considered invaluable learning experiences and nothing less. Throughout my coursework I have had many opportunities to collaborate with classmates, and each experience has taught me something new about myself and my ability to communicate with others. These are the experiences that I will remember best as I set out to build my professional platform. I begin my explanation of my understanding of this competency this way because I believe that having confidence in your own abilities, and knowing that within each of us there is room for improvement, is one of the most important aspects of successful collaboration. Teams that can communicate well will achieve great things. Team members who encourage each other help build an environment conducive to individual and professional growth.
In the professional discipline of librarianship collaboration occurs daily. It can take the form of one librarian helping another to answer a difficult reference question; a group of librarians working together to plan and carry out library programming; librarians working together to publish research; libraries working together to improve interlibrary loan services; or librarians from around the country working together to plan a professional conference. Collaboration is necessary not only for professional development, but it is necessary to give our patrons the best service, programming, and community resources we can. Working together to benefit the greater good is one of the most selfless acts there is.
Evidence
The evidence I have chosen to present here will demonstrate my oral and written communication skills necessary for group work, collaborations, and professional level presentations. The assignment was to collaborate with classmates in the creation of a virtual time capsule and to present the time capsule (in the form of a wiki) to the class using the Elluminate Live! presentation platfom. This assignment is a product of LIBR 284 Seminar in Archives and Records Management: Archivists Meet Web 2.0 instructed by Professor Patricia C. Franks. The group consisted of five individuals and holds the record of being the largest group that I have collaborated with in SLIS. Together, we had to decide on a platform to use for the creation of the wiki, we had to choose a topic to research, we had to decide who would be responsible for the different portions of the project, and we had to present our contributions to the class. Each team member had to research a compoent of personal health and write an essay explaining a specific aspect of the digital archiving and records management process.
By communicating through email, discussion boards, and synchronous online meetings, the group was able to successfully complete the project. In fact, because one of our group members was unavailable on the date scheduled for class presentations, we worked together to schedule a day on which we could pre-record our presentation so classmates would still have the opportunity to view and comment on our work. This allowed us to complete the project early, which brought a great feeling of accomplishment for everyone in the group. The group demonstrated flexibility and the ability to work through unexpected obstacles which is an important component of successful collaboration.
My written communication skills allowed me to convey my own ideas as well as assist my teammates with understanding concepts that were difficult for them to grasp. As a group, we helD several brainstorming sessions where we were able to verbalize any concerns and receive feedback and constructive criticism from everyone. In the presentation I demonstrate my ability to speak clearly in fronT of a group, and I also demonstrate my ability to lead a group during a presentation.
Conclusion
Revisiting this assignment has given me the opportunity to recognize areas that I need to improve in. For example, during the presentation I use the utterance "um" often, and I realize now how much of a distration that can be for the people listening to the presentation. As professionals we need to communicate precisely and clearly in order to successfully share ideas, so I will work towards removing the utterance "um" from my speech. As I mentioned earlier, there is always room for improvement, and collaborating with others often allows us to recognize our weaknesses, as well as our strengths, as we grow in our professional and personal lives.
Evidentiary Material
http://team1wiki.wikispaces.com
https://nexus.sjsu.edu/play_recording.html?recordingId=1247636839348_1248743624106
Recording Password: team1
Time Slots: start of recording to 4:20 minutes; 20:25 to 31:20 minutes
"No member of a crew is praised for the rugged individuality of his rowing."
Ralph Waldo Emerson
I give credit to my parents for teaching me to always take pride in my accomplishments, to always put everything I have into the work I set out to complete, whatever that work is, and to know that everyone will make mistakes, and that those mistakes shoule be considered invaluable learning experiences and nothing less. Throughout my coursework I have had many opportunities to collaborate with classmates, and each experience has taught me something new about myself and my ability to communicate with others. These are the experiences that I will remember best as I set out to build my professional platform. I begin my explanation of my understanding of this competency this way because I believe that having confidence in your own abilities, and knowing that within each of us there is room for improvement, is one of the most important aspects of successful collaboration. Teams that can communicate well will achieve great things. Team members who encourage each other help build an environment conducive to individual and professional growth.
In the professional discipline of librarianship collaboration occurs daily. It can take the form of one librarian helping another to answer a difficult reference question; a group of librarians working together to plan and carry out library programming; librarians working together to publish research; libraries working together to improve interlibrary loan services; or librarians from around the country working together to plan a professional conference. Collaboration is necessary not only for professional development, but it is necessary to give our patrons the best service, programming, and community resources we can. Working together to benefit the greater good is one of the most selfless acts there is.
Evidence
The evidence I have chosen to present here will demonstrate my oral and written communication skills necessary for group work, collaborations, and professional level presentations. The assignment was to collaborate with classmates in the creation of a virtual time capsule and to present the time capsule (in the form of a wiki) to the class using the Elluminate Live! presentation platfom. This assignment is a product of LIBR 284 Seminar in Archives and Records Management: Archivists Meet Web 2.0 instructed by Professor Patricia C. Franks. The group consisted of five individuals and holds the record of being the largest group that I have collaborated with in SLIS. Together, we had to decide on a platform to use for the creation of the wiki, we had to choose a topic to research, we had to decide who would be responsible for the different portions of the project, and we had to present our contributions to the class. Each team member had to research a compoent of personal health and write an essay explaining a specific aspect of the digital archiving and records management process.
By communicating through email, discussion boards, and synchronous online meetings, the group was able to successfully complete the project. In fact, because one of our group members was unavailable on the date scheduled for class presentations, we worked together to schedule a day on which we could pre-record our presentation so classmates would still have the opportunity to view and comment on our work. This allowed us to complete the project early, which brought a great feeling of accomplishment for everyone in the group. The group demonstrated flexibility and the ability to work through unexpected obstacles which is an important component of successful collaboration.
My written communication skills allowed me to convey my own ideas as well as assist my teammates with understanding concepts that were difficult for them to grasp. As a group, we helD several brainstorming sessions where we were able to verbalize any concerns and receive feedback and constructive criticism from everyone. In the presentation I demonstrate my ability to speak clearly in fronT of a group, and I also demonstrate my ability to lead a group during a presentation.
Conclusion
Revisiting this assignment has given me the opportunity to recognize areas that I need to improve in. For example, during the presentation I use the utterance "um" often, and I realize now how much of a distration that can be for the people listening to the presentation. As professionals we need to communicate precisely and clearly in order to successfully share ideas, so I will work towards removing the utterance "um" from my speech. As I mentioned earlier, there is always room for improvement, and collaborating with others often allows us to recognize our weaknesses, as well as our strengths, as we grow in our professional and personal lives.
Evidentiary Material
http://team1wiki.wikispaces.com
https://nexus.sjsu.edu/play_recording.html?recordingId=1247636839348_1248743624106
Recording Password: team1
Time Slots: start of recording to 4:20 minutes; 20:25 to 31:20 minutes