Category Archives: My Research

How about sharing your opinion!

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Data Collection Woes of Scholars

Having been a doctoral student for the last 30 months, I figured out data collection is indeed the toughest job in all the work I am set to do. Blame the kind of rotten surveys that  fly around which present senseless questions with insane options; our people have grown intolerant of responding to junk. I am hoping that my survey doesn’t fit in there! However bad the situation is for me to enter and pull you into, I still need to request your opinion in my study too. Honestly, I would have preferred talking to you to learn more, but am limited in options when it comes to submitting my thesis.

Unlike most other surveys, at least I have taken precautions: discussed this with a few of my smart students who nitpicked certain things and had let me refine the survey. Also, I am asking for your suggestions if you find a part (or the whole) of it can be improved. Also, unlike surveys that eat away tens of minutes in reading and understanding, this one I have designed for my study takes roughly around 3 minutes to respond to. You can participate in the study here.

Am I presenting reasons why you should consider responding to my survey? Yes!

My study is on communication style (not skill). I seem to be of the opinion that lots of trainers and irate managers out there lay unnecessary emphasis on the word communication skill, where as they actually refer to possessing good english. Even otherwise, I do not see communication as a skill that people can be trained for, because if at all, it is communication that separates one from another; so, training people and prescribing the right skill wouldn’t always work. The notion of skill is not apt for something like communication, unless we can be more specific of the communication act we are referring to. For example, if you talk about being able to deliver bad news to a client, probably I would say it is a specific communication act for which someone can be prepared (made a scapegoat/trained/whatever!?). Alternatively, I stumbled on a long forgotten theory of communication style which seems more pragmatic in its argument and conclusions. While we all have the language necessary for communication, it is style that gives us a unique identity. And the study of styles is appreciated in diverse fields such as psychology too. Putting all that allegedly scholarly stuff aside, it is still common sense; that calling someone as having lesser skill may not really make sense, when you can alternatively think of the candidate as not having appropriately spoken in a given situation. Appropriate here refers to the style match between you and the one talking to you. Just think of it; how often would we want to talk to someone (anyone) if they are passive, unfriendly, and frowning, however logical and intelligent that person is.

So, here I am. I have reviewed literature (which means I read about 300 published articles, 20 different books). I have gone through the rubbish that people could write, and found pearls of wisdom in between (hoping I had the eyes to catch them rightly). And then I have carefully designed my survey to keep it straight, simple and short. You can participate here.

If differentiating my survey from others’ is not a reason sufficient, let me share with you what some of my study participants have shared in their comments.

The study is very impressive as it tries to find out how good a communicator you are and also how you would like to communicate with others and try to improve or change it. Moreover it was interesting. cheers!!!

~ Software Professional

Thanks for making me understand my communication style. I had not thought about it before! Best of luck.

~ Teacher

To think that I am changing my communication depending on who I am speaking to is uncomfortable, but at the same time I can also think of the efforts others have put in to adapt their communication style to suit mine. This survey made me reflect into how we converse.

~ Sales Manager

And there are more comments which said, ‘good study‘, ‘nice research‘, ‘looking forward for the results‘ and so on. There is hope that such comments and responses are building in, while there is also fear that I may not be able to reach my data collection targets. I am looking for a really big sample to make my study more credible. Every response I get is now treasured. I appeal to you to see if you can find three minutes to respond to my survey here, at least.

Have I done enough to convince you to respond to my survey? I do not know. But if you are participating, I must have done something reasonably good. And thanks for being my friend in the study. :)

An assumption that you know…

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After my post on the keep-quiet syndrome, I had a fair share of experiences which prompted me to write about them. But curse the unavailability of internet, I am back writing about the same class of students who taught me something today. If it was ‘keep quiet‘ last time, it is ‘hats-off if you never really knew it‘ this time. This was to come; I think now in retrospect.

The keep-quiet syndrome was a result of communication leak, or so I hypothesized in my last post. And when someone believes that there is a communication leak, I think, it results in how the affected party looks at the world. They would perhaps begin thinking like, “He is smiling because now I became a joke“, whereas the intention behind that someone’s smile may be completely different and as simple as just a warm greeting.

The point I am trying to make is about the consequences of a communication leak. Wikileaks must have taught us the bigger picture but its effects were overwhelming and must have consumed lessons that we were supposed to learn about leaked communication (or I might work on it some other time!). But one of the points I want to make is that it tends to push the affected people into a kind of ego-defending mode where they begin to assume that everyone in the world knows about what happened with them. The problem with staying in that mode is a significant change in the behavior which itself reveals that the person is affected; even to those lots of others who never really knew what happened.

My free suggestion to those who are affected is this: IGNORE. Easier said than done, but that is the best option available, unless one could consider repairing the damage done. But again, be cautious! This is communication, and the more you try and repair, the more you can actually damage.

I guess, I can start another line of research — the effect of communication leaks on attitudes. How is that for an idea! ;)

Keep Quiet Syndrome

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In a class today, I observed that the mood of the students for taking a class was not in a receptive mode. Upon asking the reason, one student tried explaining, while another immediately cut the student trying to answer and shouted, “Keep quiet. What if this leaks too?“. It hurt me! And it may not really tell me what happened, but if I were to consider the reaction rationally, it definitely tells me there was a communication leak, and that students are really not happy about that. The student who tried explaining actually murmured, “It was misrepresented too!“.

There are two levels at which this throws me off. First, if there was really a communication leak, then it represents a system that lacks professionalism. Second, if it was misrepresented, then there are two issues to be understood: one, that someone is functioning as a message carrier, a not-funny-job, and second, that that someone adds his own flavor to the messages he carries; part of it might be natural, but part of it might be deliberate too. I am cornered to believe the deliberate part of the story because of the extreme reactions I saw on the faces of students.

This keep-quiet-syndrome from students may have been a result of communication leak followed by hurting communication. However, their communication with me was sufficiently hurting for me to consider staying quiet for the hour, introspecting how I can safeguard my professional self. I guess there has to be a change in the way institutions expect students to be; treating them like slaves or kings may not be the right approach. That apart; solution might be closer to how the institution oils and runs itself, how professional it can be in presenting itself. On the other side, I wish students had the maturity to understand that their actions and reactions tend to push a part of the institution too into this keep-quiet-syndrome.

PS: I may be talking without appropriate evidence. But this post is only a reflection of my feelings and introspection than a representation of my rational abilities.

Identity Concerns

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Earlier, I had shared my concern about online identity, especially sharing phone numbers. You can read that post here. Yesterday, I was reading this article which mentioned that there are an average 1,40,000 students affected by identity theft each year. In a few related posts, I identified that annually there are close to 1.8 Million Britons falling victims for varied forms of identity thefts. Another report woes that there is a thirty-two percent increase in identity theft in UK alone for 2009. If you think these reports don’t have anything to do with India, and that we might be safe, read a fellow blogger here. He claims that the telecom companies sell their customers’ data (and blames a reputed company, which I might not buy on its face value!). On a more credible note, read this article from The Financial Express; it says that India has two major problems, one being too much identification, and the other being too little privacy. I am amazed about how the latter can be such a big problem in a nation that gives personal privacy as a constitutional right.

Why am I saying all this? Simple! Look at a mail I have received in my inbox today.

Whoever (I do not believe the person is actually using his/her original name, because there is too little identity on that name on internet) has written this mail, claims that they are about to get the data of all students who have given their entrance examinations. A huge database that can be for sure! But, isn’t it then silly to think of ideas like a Do-Not-Disturb registration in that case. Thinking of it, I am pushed to believe that DND is just a game to postpone the act of not-breaching-our-privacy. If not, why does it take forty-five days for a mobile number to be registered in that list, while any offer by the telecom company can be activated in a matter of seconds.

A few questions are keeping my mind busy now. First of them, is personal privacy really a constitutional right, and if so, can I claim it is breached in cases when companies like these push spam into my inbox? Second, are there legally promoted ways of hacking personal information? Because the mail in context claims confidently that they would be getting the information soon, but does not mention how. I would be shocked to learn if the respective organizations, like the ones who conduct these mass entrance examinations, actually make the data available for buying. Because, again I might want them to give me an option where I can ask them to keep my information confidential–by the way, where are the covenants about confidentiality gone in agreements which I might be able to use for any legal furtherance. All this is just so disturbing!

By the way, my intention in posting this is not to attack someone personally, or blame the system completely, but an honest beginning in understanding how data gets leaked.

Where is your phone number

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Revealing their contact details is common for aspiring business. Among aspiring businesses, government business always takes the first seat. My father is a principal of one of those government institutions. His contact details too are revealed on what might be called as a non-communicating website. The problems with having the contact details on such a website is it hikes the inflow of calls.

Over the last couple of months, my father’s office phone has so many incoming calls in the non-office hours, that he has begun to respond more professionally. Prior to that he was more considerate. Future students and their parents ringing the phone at 10 PM to the principal of an institution to ask about the examination dates is really not entertaining, even to watch/listen. I think he has taken a right step in cutting the office calls in non-office hours.

Makes me think for a while, all what I have been seeing these days with communication over mobile phones. Just imagine calling to customer care for anything; what we might experience there is not really communication but mere information exchange, something that is spiritless, lifeless. I think of it and I tend to say to myself, ‘Ah! That is not how communication should be‘. On the other side, customer care doesn’t want to be relational because some moronic customer might come at them blasting for no real reason.

Perhaps, anonymity breeds a sense of safety. In large groups, when identifying who is who is difficult, people do not hesitate to call up anybody and say anything, because there is no significant risk. But in small relational groups, one may have to risk one’s reputation before saying something. I guess, I figured out a reason for not making my phone number (may well be the other forms of contact details too!) available in public domains. But is that a sufficient reason to do so? I am not sure, but I am learning.

Woes of being a Scholar

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I just received a thrashing on phone from my uncle for my poor listening skills. The complaint, more specifically, was that I listen only to what I want to, or what I have called for, and then just cut the call. This is definitely not a unique problem. What was unique was the tag that is added afterwards; that ‘You are a scholar in communication, and how could you do these things‘. Ooph! I knew I was ending up here with the burden of carrying the scholar tag. I take this post to explain two things; first, the listening problem, and second, my unique problem. I think I need to make things more explicit; so one can say I am trying to defend who I am.

That we call someone is essentially because we need some information/assistance. I am referring to communication that treats the person on the other side as ‘instrumental’. Treating someone as explicitly ‘instrumental’ (like for example, call-take information-cut) seems to be a strongly masculine/task-oriented behavior; the reason why I got that thrashing is thus justified as I see. However, this might just work fine if the one who I called on the other side is engaged in other activity and has a precise communication style. But again, that might be the only condition when such short calling might work.

In another category, there are calls we make to engage people in a discussion that works as a cohesive factor for relationships. Credit to a little sister in my family who taught me this; that in this category, the ones who receive the calls are the ones eager to cut it, however slightly hesitantly. The fun part in this is, it is not about treating others as ‘instrumental’, but this is an inability to handle communication that targets only relationship building. What I have just found is not something new, but it is something common and wise which has struck me through a random logic deduction! Both extremes–task-directed/relationship-directed communication–are really not subtle enough to be manageable.

That is all about my observations on the issue I saw/experienced. Now, that is what I think scholars do. But, as I see, there is a heavy weight expectation that a scholar is a practitioner too. Sorry to admit, but if scholar were to be practitioner, world would see no difference between academicians and entrepreneurs. I am a scholar, one who observes and reads the world, reflects on the nature of human behavior, and reports his findings. But even before I am a scholar, I am human too! Might sound funny if I say this, but I am not an object alienated from my subjects. I am one of them. I am prone to making mistakes. In fact, I make them, like everyone else. If I did not make mistakes, frankly, life would be boring, forget being a scholar.

Life is fascinating. All I believe is that. I am learning and so is the world around me changing. Experiences are good, for they carry lessons for those who take them in the form they want them.