Page 165 - Communication in Organizations Basic Skills and Conversation Models

Appendix A 154

Role of Reina
You cannot see a way of graduating within a few months. In the first place you have the
problem that your student grant will be cut. You must therefore find a way of getting the
money. That already takes up much of your energy. Finding a job, working and studying
all at the same time seems horrible to you at the moment. You shrink from the task of
having to write your thesis. You have always found writing reports difficult and up till
now you have made it so far because you have always worked in groups where you had
to write a report together. Here you were always lucky that you had fellow students who
could do the job. However, this final report has to be done by you and you actually don’t
have a clue what to write about, since in Milan you really did more bits and pieces of
tasks than a whole task in itself. You really don’t want to think about the final research
project yet; you don’t even have a clue about the subject.
Besides these study problems you also have another problem that has been bothering
you very much lately. (Choose for this problem one that you are able to relate to easily, a
situation that you have experienced or a situation that you know from a friend or
acquaintance.) Touch on this subject too when you are having the talk with your student
counsellor, when he or she turns the conversation in such a way that you feel comfortable
discussing it. You do not feel that the student counsellor has anything to do with this or
that he/she will be able to do something about it. It will depend on the situation whether
you want to get into the subject or not. Do not act excessively closed and secretive so that
the student counsellor does not get a chance to discuss it with you.

Role of observer
Evaluate this conversation according to the guidelines of Appendix B on role play. Take
note: if there is no additional personal problem, the conversation can reach its objectives.
The lack of motivation, the problems with writing reports, the financial limitations and
the bad experience during the training period are Reina’s personal problems. If all
participants prepare both the roles of student counsellor and Reina, roles can be switched
within the group.

Chapter 9 Handling complaints

Exercise 9.1 Complaints
In this exercise first a list is made of students’ personal situations where they had
complaints to make (e.g. about a travel organization, a cold dish in a restaurant, etc.).
Then these situations are role played in subgroups of three students.
Step (total group) Students are asked to write down a personal situation where they had a
1. complaint.
Step The trainer makes a list of these situations on the whiteboard.
2.