Growing My Communication Skills

Here are two communication skills I am excited to grow in this class and throughout my time at the GSB:

Managing stage fright when engaging with these cases in the cold-call environment, and growing to actively seek out (and find joy in!) these growth opportunities. I found our first class to be really invigorating - but also intimidating - because of the pace of the discussion and the diverse perspectives shared by my classmates. I'm on the younger side and coming from a nontraditional business background, so I didn't think I had much experience related to the case and many of the points made in the discussion were completely new ideas for me. This class is a wonderful opportunity for me to stretch out of my comfort zone and become more comfortable with being "wrong" in public - or, more accurately, being willing to share my ideas and the reasoning behind them with this group, and learning from my peers how their backgrounds and experiences may lead them to a different conclusion. I'm working with Hilary, our section's communication coach, to adopt strategies for feeling more comfortable and coherent when contributing to class discussions. 

Becoming more concise when speaking off the cuff. When put on the spot, I tend to jump into speaking right away without taking a moment to organize my thoughts. As a result, I am prone to rambling and using way too many filler words. I even find myself filling silence with disclaimers saying things like "well, I'm no expert…" and "… but then again, it could go the other way, too", which takes away any value I was adding with my actual thought! Going forward in this class, I'm committed to taking a breath before speaking and using that moment to organize my thoughts. Also, I'm trying to speak more slowly, which should help me keep my thoughts more organized as I translate them into speech.