Shannon Hawkes

COMM 2110

Personal Change Project Proposal

February 12, 2022

Goal:

My goal for this assignment is to stop multitasking when engaging in conversations. I often find myself,
usually at work, start looking through emails, etc. while someone is trying to talk to me.

Rationale:

My current communication habit is ineffective because I am missing important information throughout

those conversations. I often find myself asking the person to please repeat what they just said, which is
extremely rude and probably offending the people in my life. I think I find myself doing this more and
more, because I don’t think that the conversations are productive, are drawing on but I need to
remember that I am not the only person in the conversation and if I give them my full attention then the
conversation would probably take less time for both of us, rather than me giving half effort and asking
them to repeat things.

Strategies:

1) Stop being a self-absorbed communicator (Beebe, Beebe & Redmond, 2018, p. 123), and stop
assuming that what I have going on in my day is a higher priority that the conversations in front of
me.
2) Be a better responder (Beebe, Beebe & Redmond, 2018, p. 119) throughout my conversations
and make sure they can see I understand what they are saying.
3) Have better attendance (Beebe, Beebe & Redmond, 2018, p. 118) in my conversations, and show
others that I am engaged in the conversation.
4) Utilize look (Beebe, Beebe & Redmond, 2018, p. 127) and hold eye contact with the person I have
having a conversation with, which in turn will help with less multitasking as I won’t be scrolling
through emails, etc.
5) Have more empathy (Beebe, Beebe & Redmond, 2018, p. 129) to those and their situations
rather than getting frustrated.

Implementation:

I plan to start implementing these strategies as soon as I get back to work on Monday as I see this
happening more in those conversations than my personal life. I am constantly in conversations with
coworkers so I think I will have ample opportunity to work on bettering this still. I plan to motivate myself
with the hope of better relationships and being a better co-worker. I want to be a better listener and
communicator, and have my team see that so they know that my door is always open. I think this bad
habit is subconscious and gets overrun by my heavy workload and not enough hours in the day.
Regardless, that isn’t fair to the people around me, and they deserve better from me.

Works Cited

Beebe, S. A., Beebe, S. J., & Redmond, M. V. (2018). Interpersonal communication: relating to others. (9th
ed.). Boston, MA: Pearson.