Relationships and Conflicts in Interpersonal Communication - Essay Sample

Introduction

Relationships are of various forms and play a fundamental role in shaping interpersonal communication. They range from the most intimate relationships to the typical casual relationships with co-workers. However, relationships have their ups and downs, which at times impact interpersonal communications fundamentally leading to unprecedented outcomes that may entirely alter the nature of the relationship. Effective interpersonal communication leads to healthy relationships.

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Case Background

This paper will focus on the co-worker relationship that John and I had two years ago while working at a hospital. Our relationship, like any other, got affected by confusion arising from the delegation of duties as stipulated by the responsibilities policy for the hospital employees. I prefer this conflict because it was the first conflict witnessed in life pertaining working environment. My relationship with John started immediately; we joined the company as entry-level workers because we were in the same department sharing some responsibilities. It was a coincidence that we became friends so easy only to find that we came from the same area/town. After working for one year, we were frequently communicating about the job and other personal topics.

However, after a conflict existed between us, we rarely communicate because I resigned from the job and left him still working because the problem was overloading me with more duties because we were friends. That negligence in taking his responsibilities because of my presence triggered both our conflict and transfer to another company. This conflict reduced our communication because prejudice could interfere with excellent communication as a result of the incident. Currently exists because we never met and resolved it with the help of a mediator, resulted in resigning from my first job.

Theoretical Grounding

There are essential terminologies that drive this case, especially in the context of our conflict with John. They comprise of teamwork, accountability, dependability, motivation, conflict, and interpersonal communication (Barreiro & Treglown, 2020). Collaboration in interpersonal communication is essential because it leads to joining efforts associated with different fields of expertise to bring quality work. Accountability is the ability for everyone to take the delegated roles to obtain a useful contribution to the task performed. Dependability is the action of depending on the extraordinary skills that co-worker while giving back your excellent skills to make it two-way traffic (Barreiro & Treglown, 2020). Motivation by the co-workers reduces monotony in performing tasks given leading persistent working conditions. Conflict is an action where two or more people get into disagreement or misunderstanding in interpersonal communication.

Case Analysis

The conflict between us triggered the desire to be far from my colleague because this was the only that could help me forget about it and cure quickly rather than continuing to work together in the same department. The conflict that existed in our relationship resulted as a result of much dependability to one party. My fellow friend and co-worker failed to take his mandate in accomplishing the assigned duties in the work policy due to much trust in me that I could perform his duties due to our healthy friendship. The friendship bond still existed because we had started a business partnership that earned us some extra income even though it was not as strong as before this conflict. I changed the working environment and had a rare meeting with him.

This disagreement between us killed our passion for conducting business together even though we had a business partnership. It destroyed the trust we had to each other, and it was a risking factor to continue conducting our operations like before the conflict. The only business connection remained between us was continuing the business partnership since it consisted of more extra two people that could help us reconcile at times of disagreements on business views.

Ethical communication implication existed in our interpersonal relationship, and it was evident that each of us was in a moral dilemma in this conflict. The bond and trust that emanated from our friendship could signal a lousy reputation to our co-business partners in the current partnership we initiated after getting viable business ideas. They could lose faith in both of us and lead to the deterioration of our profitability that was forthcoming for a short time elapsed. The second ethical dilemma was the possibility of violating our partnership policies in terms of income sharing that came from our trading activities. This action could raise loopholes in our majority agreement policy because the other partners could suggest that our conflict was coming from the partnership earnings hence enabling the resolving of our partnership.

The two negative responses that were difficult to handle during this conflict included the high-income loss that had to undergo if I both quit our job and withdrawal from the business partnership. These two options could lower my payment for sustenance and hence had to forgo one and retain the other.

Team competency in the organizational structure must employ interpersonal communication as one of the necessary skills that the team members selected should portray. The interpersonal communication skills will help them to solve issues arising from a misunderstanding about roles and responsibilities. The collaboration that exhibits personal commitment but not over-reliance on one individual's extraordinary talents. This approach will assist in evading conflicts like our case that developed from over-relying on my expertise skills that diminished motivation and collaboration morale. Generally, effective interpersonal communication will make proper channelling of information to the team members about their roles while managers can get feedback for best management.

The communication concepts applicable in our conflict manifested themselves by revealing the feeling that we had towards each other. The condition of our interpersonal relationship breakage in communication and made everybody notice our conflict situation existence. They acted as indicators of hidden bitterness that existed between us at the moment.

Applicable Communication Concepts

The two communication concepts that applied in our conflict included face-to-face communication that comprised of bitter words. We blamed each other about the mistakes that occurred in the department, and we were the only parties that were accountable and, in the end, interfered with the safe social distance we always kept when conversing essential matters. The second communication concept was non-verbal communication that entailed profound gestures signalling information or bitterness that each had to the other person. Face-to-face communication refers to the direct exchange of words that involve convincing abilities between the communication parties (Scannell, 2020). Non-verbal communication entails the use of communication aspects like gestures. These facial expressions exclude communicating verbally but at the same time, including non-verbal features that portray the real speech.

For instance, consider two people who find themselves into conflict after one of them violates the other rights. If one of them fails to get his right to inherit his father's property through equity sharing, he/she must get angry. It then leads to confronting the other person with bitter words through face-to-face communication and similarly exposes these upset feelings through non-verbal communication. These two concepts of communication tell from a distance that these two are in disagreement whenever they are close to each other.

Recommendations

It could be recommendable to get a neutral mediator from outside the working organization to avoid the worse results of our conflict. He/she could have resolved our situation before getting to the worse conditions though helping us reach a neutral solution that never favoured anyone. It was preferable to make our conversation official by tabling the aspects that lead to conflict and discuss on the way forward before exchanging bitter words because no one wanted to come down and help solve the situation peacefully. The essential recommendable action to entirely avoid conflict should entail translating the slight mistake made by the co-worker to avoid big mistakes that could impact the existing interpersonal relationship negatively.

Mediation through face-to-face in interpersonal relationships must embrace continual face-to-face communication in problem-solving. This approach could help us solve our disagreements rather than exchanging messages over the phone (Scannell, 2020). Face-to-face communication has convincing power and could help us convince each other to resolve this matter.

Bias avoidance in communication is recommendable to any parties in interpersonal relationships because they can cause significant problems (Jones, 2013. These comprise of likes of conflicts that result in destructions that could not be recoverable. This strategy will help the parties to eliminate prejudice that results in a negative attitude towards the activities taking place between them and finally lead to conflict. Avoiding biasness in communication will help solve the slight mistakes made at the early stages before they attribute to more significant issues.

Reflection

The reflection of the primary communication concepts in interpersonal relationships and the review of the previous conflicts witnessed in real-life situations indicate the benefits of considering practical ideas evading conflicts in daily life. Respect is a two-way principle in communication because it impacts whenever delivering a message to the other party to avoid disagreements that lead to disputes. Sharing this paper to John could automatically lead to a prompt meeting for complete resolving of our conflict because it analyzes all the possible options for making peaceful negotiations.

References

Barreiro, C. A., & Treglown, L. (2020). "What makes an engaged employee? A facet-level approach to trait emotional intelligence as a predictor of employee engagement." Personality and Individual Differences, 159, 109892. Published on 1st June 2020, https://doi.org/10.1016/j.paid.2020.109892, accessed on 15th September 2020.

Jones, R. (2013). Communication in the real world: An introduction to communication studies. The Saylor Foundation. https://open.umn.edu/opentextbooks/textbooks/communication-in-the-real-world-an-introduction-to-communication-studies

Scannell, P. (2020). "Media and communication." SAGE Publications Limited. https://books.google.co.ke/books?hl=en&lr=&id=Bm72DwAAQBAJ&oi=fnd&pg=PP1&dq=best+co-workers+interpersonal+communication+concepts+in+2020&ots=tDk3cdaoKG&sig=bsYYZUXMBOMIa5xXnvBGgAo89IE&redir_esc=y#v=onepage&q&f=false