University of Maryland, College Park

Pearl Diving Assignment 1

Sophia Averza

Communication for Project Managers: ENCE424

Dr. Shana Webster-Trotman

September 24, 2022

Introduction

As an architecture student I work with mostly arts and humanities related classes that
include instruction on drawing, modeling, architectural history, and sustainability. Within these
classes we draw, read, and present projects. Although we read many architectural analyses, we
rarely discuss them in a collaborative manner to demonstrate our understanding and increase our
communication skills. As an architecture student I have been exposed to public speaking in front
of my peers. However, we were not taught the fundamentals in public speaking or how to
translate our overall message in projects effectively. When presenting architectural studio
projects, professors demand concise language which represents your overarching theme and
concept in under five minutes. We are then judged based off our quick spoken project description
by our professors to be critiqued on. Within the industry we are demanded to communicate all
the ideas within our design, which is a lot given all architectural typology has intention. So,
although in architecture we must communicate to peers and critics a message with each project, I
still do not know the proper techniques to do so effectively. Throughout this paper, I will
demonstrate my understanding in how an effective communicator speaks, listens, and engages. I
will also analyze how I have implemented these communication skills in my professional and
personal life already and evaluate how my communication skills could improve. So, in this
essay, I will talk about what concepts I have learned from the readings, how I have grown in
networking, how I am seen as a communicator, how I deal with conflicts, and how my
personality relates to my communication style.

Concepts from Readings

The most interesting concept from the readings is the understanding of speech anxiety,
how to identify it, and how to manage the stress it induces. In the reading, A Pocket Guide to
Public Speaking, the authors describe in chapter 6 how public speaking anxiety (PSA) is caused
by either lack of experience, being sensitive to criticism, and being the center of attention
(O’Hair et al.). Firstly, upon this reading paired with the in-class discussion, I realized that my
PSA source is from being the center of an audience’s attention in part with my lack of experience
with public speaking. I do not have anxiety in how my audience perceives me because I do not
waver to criticism. Even though I have spoken in front of peers before in presentations plenty of
times, I have done so solely in groups, so I feel more anxiety when everyone is solely listening
and watching me. With my newfound awareness of my PSA style, I have been trying to confront
public speaking by reassuring myself that when I am by myself it is no different than when I
present in a group. I am still speaking on my own and trying to communicate ideas in the same
fashion. Additionally, the reading mentions how the nervousness of the anxiety occurs either in
learning that a speech must be performed, in writing the speech, when rehearsing the speech, or
in the beginning of giving a speech (O’Hair et al.). By categorizing when anxiety for a speech
can occur, I can identify that my speech anxiety occurs at the beginning of a performance. I think
that giving a speech does not overwhelm me until I am physically standing in front of an
audience. In the future, since I know my fear occurs when I am beginning to speak, I will be
mindful when approaching my speech, so my anxiety does not feel blindsiding. Lastly, public
speaking anxiety can be alleviated with practice, seeing the speech as a communication tool,
anticipating the speech’s success, and using relaxation tools involving moving and breathing
(O’Hair et al.). Through this class I have tried to practice seeing my speech as a communication
tool and visualizing its success which I believe has improved my public speaking. However, I
think that I need to focus on applying the tool of preparing and practicing because I feel more
comfortable when know my presentation points without faulter. I will use my understanding of
PSA and when I experience nervousness to apply the confidence boosting techniques to speeches
within this class, for interviews, and in other group projects in the future.

The second pertinent concept addressed in the readings and lectures is that rhetoric and
pathos play an important role in communicating arguments effectively and stimulating people’s
brains. Within chapter 3 of Five Stars, The Communication Secrets to Get from Good to Great,
Gallo presents Aristotle’s rhetorical proofs that describe how logic, credibility, and emotion are
all necessary requirements in an argument (Gallo). However, pathos plays the largest contributor
because without the instinct of emotion, there is no source of guidance in our decision making
(Gallo). This formula for persuasion has been used in some of the most important documents and
speeches in American history including “I Have a Dream” and Declaration of Independence
(Gallo). In these situations, logic and credibility alone could not create a call to action to inspire
people to fight, there had to be an appeal to their emotions for equality and freedom. In my
speeches I will apply this technique to inspire my listeners to understand the importance in what
I am saying. Granted that my speeches are not intended to inspire many to fight for their
freedom, I can apply pathos to create concern from the audience. Additionally, Gallo mentions
how emotion can penetrate the brain faster than reason (Gallo). Neuroscientists tested that words
and images that trigger strong emotions such as happiness, surprise, anger, or sadness, are
recalled better than events that have evoke no emotion (Gallo). This shows how emotion can
attract someone’s attention and leave an imprint by creating a response out of them. It was even
concluded that when studying the neurological patterns of people in a conversation, if a listener
is engaged, they will ‘neural couple’ to exhibit similar brain patterns to the speaker (Gallo). This
type of coupling was deemed only to be applicable in stories that display emotion (Gallo). I will
apply the technique of engaging my audience’s emotions by telling stories to connect to our
biological nature of feeling.

The last pertinent topic covered by the readings is revealing the competitive edge that
good communicators receive in the workplace. First, in the reading Five Stars, The
Communication Secrets to Get from Good to Great, Gallo describes in chapter 2 the
communication skills gap that distinguishes good communicators from bad ones (Gallo). Even
though one may be the smartest in the room, that does not mean he will hold the highest position
in the workplace if they cannot communicate well. This was the case for an employee at Intel,
who’s superiority in intellect exceeded his coworkers in the eyes of his vice president, but it did
not outweigh his unstimulating communication and presentation skills (Gallo). Being a
successful worker does not just mean knowing the technical skills demanded for a particular job,
but requires one to communicate, manage, and solve issues with people. In my future I will apply
this principle of communicating with my coworkers and gaining confidence in my presenting, so
that I will not be held back from reaching my career’s potential. Additionally, the reading
mentions how good interviewing and storytelling about oneself is the key to expanding
employment oppertunities (Gallo). We learned about a man who despite his resume consisting of
being only a professional poker player with little coding experience, was offered jobs by
companies throughout Silicon Valley because he perfected his interviews (Gallo). By learning
how to tell his story, he altered the interviewers’ views on him and made him irresistible as a
communicator and character to have in their workplace (Gallo). Throughout this course I aim to
improve on my story telling, gauge my audience into my development, and perfect practicing
telling my story to better present myself to interviewers.

Networking

Our Communication for Project Managers class has allowed me to step out of my
comfort zone. For classes, I am not one to get other students contact information through
numbers, emails, and even LinkedIn’s, especially not on the first day of classes. By exchanging
information as our first task within the class, there was a culture shock to my standoffish habits.
Ten members of the class that I connected with on LinkedIn are Crystal Robinson, Jainee Shah,
Paul Schatt, Pablo Capellari, Angela Pina, Christine Merdon, Shyam Ardeshna, Albert
Christenson, Andrew Vogelpohl, and Grace Falcone. I additionally connected with a few other
peers from the class in addition to these which made me feel successful in building relationships
with other University of Maryland College Park (UMD) students. Additionally, I sent requests to
both Shana Webster-Trotman and Gouri Thampi to further my network to professionals with
more experience that I can learn from and reach out to. So, through this class I have already
connected with at least 15 people in some form, which is more than I have within any class.

Besides using LinkedIn, I have been trying to grow my network through expanding my
social circle and putting myself out there. This means I have been meeting new people through
exploring new clubs, meeting people through mutual friends, and talking with new friends more
intimately about their goals and aspirations. So, I have expanded my connections to reach more
people through these group clubs and gatherings while also getting to know acquaintances better
to develop one-on-one relationships. Two weeks ago, at UMD, there was a First Look Fair to
showcase clubs, Greek life, and organizations that are open to be attended for the semester which
I attended for two hours. I joined the GroupMe’s and Discords of many clubs that I was
interested in that I had not had the courage to join in my past semesters which I had known
about. This past week I had attended a few of the clubs’ first meetings and met some new people
of different age brackets and various majors and got their social media handles. By being in a
group setting shared by a common interest with other students made it easy to connect with my
peers and share my information. Additionally, I have been connecting with my acquaintances to
develop deeper relationships. The first day of this semester I had the spirit to spark a
conversation with a classmate who I had talked to freshman year but had little relation with.
Since then, she has recommended me to one of her bosses to work under and has shown me other
UMD organizations to join. This relationship formed over the course of a few weeks has proven
my fears wrong and showed me not only why I should be more involved with peers but showed
me that what could come out of these relationships. I realized how unintimidating it was to talk
to people in group situations and individually to get to know others better. So far this year, these
acts have helped me decrease my fears and anxiety in networking and expanded my network
among people in and out of my major of all age groups.
DISC Personality Assessment

The DISC Personality Assessment is designed to show one how they are viewed as, as a
communicator. With this assesment I received 35% influence, 30% steadiness, 23% compliance,
and 12% dominance. I will address each factor of the personality from highest to lowest
percentage and evaluate how I agree with it. I agree that ‘influence’ is my largest component in
communication because I am approachable, understanding, open to people, and always try to
form relationships with those around me. I try to be agreeable with people and want to make
those around me happy and comfortable as well as myself. This model suggests that I care most
about how people feel around me which I feel is true because I want those around me to feel
comfortable with me. Secondly, I agree that ‘steadiness’ is a large portion of my communication
style because I am not a person who raises their voice or lets emotion get in control of me. I tend
to be patient with people and be trusting in situations with peers like group projects, friendships,
or coworkers. Even when I could be at the height of anger in personal relationships with family,
friends, and romances, I have never been one to lose my temper or even show inflection in
change in tone because I know how it can trigger other’s emotions. Next, regarding ‘compliance’
I agree that it should be of a smaller percent scale than my ‘influence’ and ‘steadiness’ because
those are prominent in my communication style. I think that I primarily like to take on the lead
role in situations with my peers in group projects at work and in school by divvying up the
workload and making sure that everyone has an equal portion and that they are on the right track
for their research. My ‘compliance’ shows through my role or organizing information through
education and professional development. Lastly, I don’t fully agree that ‘dominance’ is only
twelve percent of my role as a communicator. As I mentioned in my ‘compliance’ portion, I like
to assign roles to people in projects that separates work equally among member which shows my
role in ‘dominance’ and what would make me a good project manager. I think that in situations
with problems where there are higher authoritative figures, I tend to back down to allow people
with more knowledge to speak up and take command with their more experience, for example
during my internship at a project management company this past summer. I think that the
‘dominance’ portion did not come out correctly because when given the choice between an
‘influence’ trait and a ‘dominance’ trait I resonated more with the first, even though they are
both apparent in my communication style. I think that referring to the ‘dominance’ characteristic
in referring to resolving conflicts especially between people is not my strong suit in being a good
communicator, so I agree with it in that aspect. Overall, I think that the DISC Personality
Assessment was pretty accurate in the proportionality of the characteristics of influence,
steadiness, compliance, and dominance. However, I do think that ‘dominance’ and ‘compliance’
could be a little bit more equal in percentage to average to around 17% each.

Conflict Management Styles Assessment

Communication does not simply involve the fundamentals of sending and receiving
information but can confusing to navigate in situations where conflicts arise. Conflicts occur in
personal life and business and should be managed differently according to the individual. Unlike
the DSIC Personality Assesment, the Conflict Management Styles Assesment enlightened me in
how I react and communicate in situations of conflict. This Conflict Assesment indicated that my
most to least commonly used strategies are in the order as follows: collaborating, compromising,
accommodating, avoiding, and competing.

I think that my conflict style helps effective communication because it is based on

working on my relationships with others. ‘Conflict’ within communication typically involves
more than one person professionally and personally. So, it is helpful that my strongest conflict
styles are ‘collaborating’, ‘compromising’, and ‘accommodating’ which all involve hearing
another person, responding, and reaching toward something together. With these conflict styles
there is a sense of reaching one common goal and working together on it. The other aspects of
conflict management styles relate less to bringing parties together and chose the role of
seperation as managing conflict such as within my least common strategies of ‘avoiding’ and
‘competing’. My most used conflict management styles allow me to reach agreements faster as
well as strengthening and maintaining relationships. First, my ‘collaborative’ and
‘compromising’ style helps me to effectively communicate by making my peers, coworkers,
group members heard and validated by reaching a consensus among people. I do not like
situations when one team member disagrees with the rest, causing the majority rule to win. As
seen in the judicial system with a court jury, I think that all members should find one common
ground to decide on because sometimes there are conflicts of subjectivity where there is no right
and wrong. My ‘collaborative’ and ‘compromising’ style allows me to reach an agreement
among a team or party that people can be content with. Additionally, when I have disputes with
family, friends, or partners where someone ends up upset, I try to communicate through it to
reach the core issue. From there we ‘collaborate’ and reach an agreement together than will help
us improve our relationship in the future which has resulted in setting boundaries, avoiding
actions that trigger individual’s emotions, and setting other customs to avoid conflicts in the
future. This allows me to maintain my relationships and allows both parties to not hide issues,
bottle them up, or accumulate them, which could build resentment or distrust with time. It also
strengthens them because it allows open dialogue without sense of attack, but there is a mutual
knowledge that the conflict being addressed is to strengthen the relationship by reducing the
tensions. My conflict style helps effective communication because it values the roles of all
communicators, allows agreements to be reached, and helps in strengthening relationships.

My conflict style can hinder effective communication because although I work well with
coming together with people, sometimes I prioritize agreeability over loss of relationships and
my own opinion. Firstly, within my classes we are forced to work on group projects with people
within our major who we see on a normal basis throughout our entire undergrad career. So, when
there are disagreements within group projects, I am forced to see this person in countless other
classes for four years. The architecture program has a small undergrad student body. This
presents me with my internal dilemma of when there are disagreements among group members
where I feel like if I disagree there could be malice feelings toward me when I know that we will
have to interact or encounter each other in the future. For example, in my ARCH428F course last
semester, we had to work on group projects every other week, where partners were assigned at
random. I typically led the group and assigned roles to make sure everyone had equal distribution
of the work. However, one member would never respond to me and my other team member
about completing the work and staying on course, which led to me having to do the work for him
because he had hardly completed his portion. In this situation I did not want to bug this other
team member more than I had already done and get upset with him because I knew I would have
to face him in other classes. I let my ‘avoidance’ take charge of the situation because I was
anxious and worried about what that person might think of me and how I might encounter them
in the future. In the future, I will overcome my avoidance in addressing underperformance of
team members by realizing that it improves our success as a team. As mentioned in Crucial
Conversations chapter 1, success for a company or team is determined by delivering crucial
conversations to address areas in safety, productivity, diversity, quality, etc. (Grenny et al.). So,
when a teammate underperforms and does not contribute, it is my job as a productive team
member to address the problem quickly in future group projects (Grenny et al.). Secondly, I had
exhibited ‘avoidance’ in my professional life when I was working on the construction site. This
past summer, I was working with a coworker would has more experience than me and was not
following the safety requirements of wearing his safety gloves. I did not want to speak up and
feel like I was correcting someone in higher authority than me, especially with the coworker I
had the closest relationship to. I was worried that he would feel anger or annoyance toward me if
I had spoken up about my opinion on safety. In the future, I will enhance my ability to address
conflict with higher ups in my professional life by realizing that it is better to speak up than to
resort to silence. In beginning of chapter 2 in Crucial Conversations, a man named Kevin spoke
up on behalf of his employees to their boss who was making an unjust decision on behalf of their
company in which no one spoke up (Grenny et al.). Kevin did play a game with the boss, but
simply addressed the injustice (Grenny et al.). The boss appreciated the honesty and transparency
which would not have happened if he had not spoken up to avoid a difficult situation later down
the line (Grenny et al.). So, if I spoke up about the threat to my coworker’s safety, I could
prevent injury or other complications down the line. My conflict style can hinder communication
because it confuses my mind into thinking that crucial conversations with team members and
employees will result in tension, when it is to work for what is best for everyone.

Yung Personality Assessment

The JUNG personality test is meant to analyze one’s personality, and not solely in
situations of communication and conflict. This test is meant to see how you act, interact, and
think. I agree with my ENFP results from the Yung Personality Assesment because I have taken
it in the past and received the same results, so there were no insights to me personality that I
found surprising. I have taken this test every year of high school and received either ENFP or
ENFJ without faulter. The ENFP results indicated that I am an Extrovert-Intuitive-Feeler-
Perceiver. Firstly, addressing the personality results in order, I do think that I am an ‘extrovert’. I
always like to be talking to friends, and especially meeting new people. I tend to talk to the
people around me I do not know within class. Not to say that I do not like my alone time, being
an extrovert, but I do try to go out of my way to talk to people around me. Secondly, I think that
I am ‘intuitive’ because I am very observant of what happens around me regarding what others
saying and even in my built environment. I am a dreamer who constantly changed dreams of my
future because it gives me something to look forward to, which is a big component in ‘intuitive’
personalities. I feel like doing things in the day to day get mundane and repetitive so looking
toward the future allows myself to work toward something. Next, I believe that I have a strong
‘feeler’ personality. I am a highly emotional person who wears my heart on my sleeve. So, in
turn, since I have sensitive and varying emotions, I am hyper aware of how I can inflict emotions
onto others. So, this means that I become conscientious of the things I say and the tone that I use
toward others because I do not want to rub people the wrong way. Lastly, I agree that I am a
‘perceiver’ because I am like to deal with the situations as they come. When I attempt to plan a
life and a certain path I want to take even going as far as to say I want this job working for this
company, having this many kids, by a certain age, my thoughts always change, and I eventually
form a different dream. This shows that I am flexible with my paths of life and that I am not
headstrong on keeping one vision to my future and holding myself to it. I enjoy adapting what I
want out of life as a result in changing and maturing as a person. Overall, I agree that I have a
strong ENFP personality, so the results of the JUNG personality test are accurate.

I find that my JUNG personality assesment and DISC assesment are similar in results
regarding how I interact with others despite being tests being slightly different in their analyses.
Both assesments show that I communicate with others whether its being extroverted or through
my ‘influence’ as shown in the DISC personality test. Also, I think that my DISC ‘steadiness’
trait relates to my ‘feeler’ trait in the JUNG test because they both show how I relate to emotion,
keep my temper, and am thoughtful toward others. I think that the JUNG ‘extrovert’ personality
however differs from how I scored a lower percentage in the ‘dominance’ portion of the DSIC
test. I think that extroverts are commonly associated as being outspoken and dominant people
who assert themselves in any situation. I scored low on the DISC scale in ‘dominance’ but the
JUNG assesment determined me an ‘extrovert’. So, there was this dissimilarity in assistance
between the assesments, but there was a common theme of attention to communication with
others and in sympathizing with others through emotions.

Conclusion

Communication skills are imperative in delivering ideas as an architect and collaborating

as project managers. Despite having never learned these skills in the past, I hope through this
course to gain this asset of public speaking and communication. Main concepts that I learned in
the readings were how to identify and manage public speaking anxiety, deliver speeches with
pathos, and use communication to give me a competitive edge in future employments. This
course has also allowed me to expand my network and create new connections already whether it
just be through adding people on LinkedIn within the class or giving me the courage to talk to
talk with people in group settings and one-on-one. Also, this essay allowed me to examine
myself to see what my strengths and weaknesses are in communicating, so I know what to work
on in the future. The DISC Personality, Conflict Management, and Yung Personality Assesments
were accurate in its categorization of me as a people-focused, sensitive, and understanding
communicator who experiences anxiety in conflict. In the future, I strive to reach success in my
personal and professional relationships by effectively communicating in presentations, conflict,
interviews, and daily routine.
 Works Cited

Faulkner, Michael, and Andrea Nierenberg. Networking for College Students and Graduates.

Pearson Learning Solutions, 2017. Print.

Gallo, Carmine. Five Stars the Communication Secrets to Get from Good to Great. St. Martin’s

Press, 2018. Print.

Grenny, Joseph, Kerry Patterson, Ron McMillan, Al Switzler, and Emily Gregory. Crucial

Conversations: Tools for Talking When Stakes Are High. 2nd ed. McGraw Hill, 2011.

Print.

O’Hair, Dan, and Hannah Rubenstein and Rob Stewart. A Pocket Guide to Public Speaking.

Bedford/St. Martin’s, 2019. Print.

DISC Personality Assesment Results
Conflict Management Styles Assesment Results
Yung Personality Assesment Results