INNOVATIVE WORKSHOP ON EFFECTIVE COMMUNICATION AND CAREER PLANNING.

1) WHAT IS COMMUNICATION.
Communication is the way or the mode through which we make people understand what we want them to understand. E.g.: By crying, small children make their mothers understand that they are hungry. By licking our feet and wagging its tail, dogs communicate that they like us and they want us to pamper them. Effective communication is to communicate in such a way as to influence others to our way of thinking. 2) TYPES OF COMMUNICATION. a) Oral communication b) Body language. 3) ORAL COMMUNICATION. a) Speaking skill. b) Listening skill. SPEAKING SKILLS. a) The intent: We should always have the intention to please the listener/s. We should derive pleasure in speaking to others. b) The content: We should know, what we are speaking about. c) Body language: We can be more effective by using our hands, shoulders, eyes etc, appropriately. 5) LISTENING SKILLS. a) The intent: We should be keen to understand and learn what others want to tell us. The speaker will loose interest in speaking, if we do not show any interest in what he/she is speaking. We can reflect our interest by asking relevant questions, by emoting etc. b) Body language: We can also show our interest through our body language like visible facial expressions, voice, etc.
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6) Ways to get rid of stage fearness Start speaking in a closed room imagining that you are addressing the crowd. Start speaking in front of a small group, initially known people like relatives, then friends and then you can easily speak to an unknown audience.

 Practice speaking in front of mirror. Observe your body language till you are confident and comfortable about your body language. Practice voice modulation by varying your pitch of the voice, first imagining that you are addressing a small crowd and then a big crowd. Practice emotional modulation by making speeches of different emotional topics.

PUBLIC SPEAKING
a) In a one to one communication, you can make a mistake and still get away with it, because you can always correct yourself and more often than not your listener will be a known person as well. On the other hand, when you are addressing a large audience you can never afford to do even small mistakes as there are hundreds of people keenly watching you. Even a small mistake will be noticed, criticized and you will end up in an embarrassing situation. Therefore it is necessary that you should be very well prepared for public speaking. b) How to be a powerful orator? As discussed earlier be careful about the intent, the content and style. Observe the excellent speakers but develop your own unique style. Use your body language for greater impact. Personalize the audience with remarks like, Dont you all agree to this? Is it not there for all of us to see? Given a chance, speak in different languages Use voice and emotional modulation to leave audience asking for more.

SOCIALIZING
a) Importance of socializing # Can develop contacts, and careerwise it plays to be well connected. # Can increase the knowledge, as we will be interacting with different people. # Learning about different culture, lifestyle, habits will help us to adapt to different circumstances easily.

b) How to be welcomed and appreciated in social circles # Being a team player: we should go with the atmosphere of crowd rather than being different. # Listening more and speaking less: If not called upon to speak or asked to give personal opinion, we should be an attentive and encouraging listener rather than a speaker. If speaking is silver, listening is gold. c) Be an asset not liability: Whenever we go to a party, we should always carry some present to the hosts. And we should not be demanding in any way. d) Remember people by their names: As we start socializing, it is quite obvious that we keep meeting same people at different places. People get offended when we forget them. And asking them about their family will certainly keep us in good esteem in their minds. e) Whenever you are among a discussion, make sure you contribute something concrete, but dont ever bluff or over brood. 2) SWOT ANALYSIS 1) STRENGTH: INTERNAL AND EXTERNAL STRENGTH; Internal strength is what we possess within us or what we are made of. This consists of our education, intelligence, knowledge, will power etc. External strength is what we possess outside in the physical world. This consists of our body language, the good will and the various influences we have, the soft skills we have acquired etc. 2) HOW TO DEVELOP OUR STRENGTHS? As each individual possesses different internal and external strengths. It is very hard to generalize how to develop various strengths. But, we can discuss some easily recognizable strength. a) Body language: Though we are born with a particular physique and it is tough to change that, we can always change the way we sit and stand, the way we walk and talk. By quantitative, qualitative and conscious effort these things and this helps in building our personality.

b) Communication: There was a 13-yr. Old boy, who could not open his mouth infront of his own schoolmates because of fear. But with lot of determination, hard and smart work, he became a world famous trainer in public speaking. His name is Dale Carnegie. 3) HOW TO USE OUR VARIOUS STRENGTHS? Each of us are blessed and born with different strengths and the most important thing is to find where our strengths lie. Once we find out our strength, we should go on developing the strength and make best use of it. Sachin found his strength in cricket at the age of 11 and he had not done anything other than playing cricket. Bill Gates found out his business acumen at 12 when he rented his basketball to his sister at 25 pence a day. Today he is more famous for his strategies than for software development. 2) WEAKNESS a) Types of weakness: Natural weakness: Some of us are born with natural weakness. E.g.: Short height, dumb & deaf, blindness etc. Acquired weakness: We acquire some weaknesses over a period of time. E.g.: 1) Children are not scared to speak infront of anybody, but start getting stage fear as they start growing up. 2) Children learn faster and better because of their enthusiasm to learn. But over a period of time, they start developing prejudice over some subjects, and before they realize, they start scoring poorly in those subjects. b) HOW TO GET RID OF VARIOUS WEAKNESS. Natural weaknesses are very hard or nearly impossible to overcome. But we can get rid of the acquired weaknesses with quantitative and qualitative effort over a period of time. E.g.: Communication: Many of us have acquired stage fear. By practicing, one can get rid of stage fear and can be an excellent speaker. Memory: We can improve our memory by following memory development techniques.

c) HOW TO USE NATURAL WEAKNESS INTO OUR ADVANTAGE. Many a times, we can use our natural weakness into our advantage. E.g.: a) Short batsman in cricket. b) The way Sylvester Stalloine used his twisted mouth into his advantage. C) Charlie Chaplin. 3) OPPORTUNITIES. a) Internal and external Opportunities. Internal and external opportunities keep varying from time to time, place to place and person to person. E.g.: Being a student, the internal opportunities are the knowledge, we can gain in our college, whereas external opportunities are gaining knowledge through inter collegiate competitions, guest lecturing etc. Being in a family, internal opportunity is what we learn within our family, whereas external opportunity is what we learn by attending a wedding, community meeting etc. In a company, internal opportunity might give us a chance for promotion, whereas external opportunity might offer a better job in an another company. b) Some types of Career Opportunities. a) Geographical. b) Timebound. c) Industrywise. C) How to use opportunities into our advantage. 1) Call centers 2) Microsofts marketing strategy for developing strategies. d) How to create opportunities. 1) Creating new products like selling coconut water in containers. 2) Creating new markets: F.m.c.g. companies releasing their products in sachets to cater low level income people. 3) Taking initiatives and creating favorable atmosphere for promotion in our company.

4) THREATS.
a) Internal and external threats. Internal threats, more often than not, are psychological and imaginative. They arise because of our own fears, doubts and weaknesses like can I do it, can I speak infront of large audience, can I reach the target etc. Because internal threats are psychological, they can be negotiated and negated. External threats arise outside our control and therefore tough to handle and cooperate. For e.g., at the time of promotion our superior might prefer a relative to us, our company might loose some major clients and company might lay off some people. b) Corporate threats. Even though, there are different threats like natural, social, governmental threats, because we are concentrating on career, we will discuss corporate threats. 1) The company, one is working, might be facing either internal or external threats. If union strikes, financial crisis etc form the internal threats, loosing clients, tough competition, govt.s new policies form the external threats. 2) We might be facing our own threats within the company. If the personal problems affecting our work, not discharging our duties form the internal threats, competition from colleagues, personal preferences of our superior form external threats. c) HOW TO PREDICT THE FUTURE THREATS. Even though, all the threats can not be foreseen and guarded, some threats can be predicted and preventive measures can be taken. 1) If the real estate industry is going down, we can be sure that the prices of products like cement, paint, hardware etc start falling. 2) If the company is on a computerization spree, we can be sure that the computer illiterate employees will have a tough time keeping their place in the company. d) HOW TO NEGOTIATE AND NEGATE THREATS. As we discussed earlier, most of the internal threats are psychological and therefore, by consulting counselors or psychiatrists we can come out of internal threats.

1) If one is in cement industry and facing problems because of slowdown in real estate, the solution is to search for the markets, where the real estate is booming or atleast stabilized. 2) If the company is getting computerized, the solution is to get the necessary computer knowledge. e) HOW TO USE FORESEEN THREATS INTO ADVANTAGE. a) Tendulkars famous outside the leg-stic guard against Shane Warne. b) Microsofts marketing strategy against Linux. c) Pepsis famous nothing official about it campaign.
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Importance of SWOT analysis in communication. a) Speak more on your stronger areas and less on weaker areas. b) Start working quantitatively and qualitatively over your weaker areas, so that over a period of time, your weaker areas start downsliding. c) Use all the public speaking opportunities as a brand image development exercise of your communication skill. d) There are on external threats in communication. To negate the internal threats, find out the weaker areas and work on them rigorously.

GOAL SETTING.
A) WHAT IS A GOAL? Goal is a point or a place or a destination, we want to be at a given point of time. 1) Goal should be specific- no doubts. 2) Goal should be realistic- it should be practical. 3) Goal should be reachable- it should be within a particular reach 4) Goal should be measurable- quantitatively or qualitatively. 5) Goal should be time bound- goal is when rather than how long.

WHY DO WE NEED A GOAL Even for a small outing like going to a movie or a weekend picnic, we always plan- which movie to go or which picnic places to be visited. Only after we finalize this, we start thinking about other factors like the mode of transport, the route, the cost etc. In the same way, in the journey of our career, we should always have a goal or different set of goals, we want to achieve at a given point of time. As we do not sit in a bus without deciding where to go, we should not start our career without deciding what and when to achieve.

CAREER PLANNING.
1.Difference between job and career Job is more a temporary assignment and a stepping stone where as career is the path through which we start realizing and reaching our respective goals. E.g.: Engineers working in call centers and BPOs Weekend and summer jobs 2.How to choose a career a. Analyze ourselves through SWOT analysis b. Observe and study the industry you want to get into # How it is behaving for past 5 yr. # Depending on this result how it might behave for the next 5 yr. c. Career counseling. 3) Why should we develop our career options? As the famous actor and director Raj Kapoor rightly remarked moving forward in life and you are dead the day you stand still, saturated, exhausted. One might wish to be a software engineer and might join a company as software engineer. Then the next goal should be reassessed to be either a team leader or the trainer. If one wishes to be a sales manager and becomes a sales manager for a state, the next goal should be to become the sales manager for a zone and then for the country.

INTEGRATED PERSONALITY DEVELOPMENT.

1) Positive self-esteem and positive attitude. Self-esteem is what we think about ourselves and attitude is our outlook towards life and more often than not, they influence each other a lot. By reading, listening, and speaking good things and through self-hypnosis orders, we can build positive self-esteem and this in turn creates positive attitude. We always create vibrations and the more positive vibrations we create, the more we can influence people positively. The road to success starts and ends with people and being self-confident and having positive attitude will certainly influence people. 2) Attire, body language and power of smiling. Always remember the old saying first impression is the best impression. Our dressing will certainly describe a lot about us. The attire should always be occasion-specific and we should complement the dressing with confident and positive body language. Even, the way we walk, the way we stand and sit tells a lot about us. By regular practice, we can develop a non-aggressive but positive and confident body language. Everybody knows the importance and power of smiling. Smile costs nothing but pays more. One warm and friendly smile gets more friends than 1000 words. 3) Be a team player. Many people hate to follow, few people hate to be followed but no one hates to be with each other. Always suggest and advice than ordering. 4) Encourage and appreciate. Words of encouragement and sincere appreciation yield more productivity than pushing, ordering and condemning.

MEMORY DEVELOPMENT.
1) Story development. 2) Picturization and visualization. 3) Co related words.

CONCENTRATION DEVELOPMENT.
1) Meditation.

2) Breathing.