Communication Skills Assignment 1 [Case Study]
Submitted by:
Yashi Seth
22BAV10053
22BAV-2 [B]
Submitted to:
Ms. Rashi Srivastava
Analyse the following case and answer the questions:
Rohit is a 35 years old Manager in a Chemical distributing firm. He is responsible for
supervising and managing all the employees in the office. Employees working in the office
are between the age of 18 years old to 55 years old. In addition, the employees come from
diverse cultural and ethnic backgrounds. For some of the employees, English is not their
primary language.
Rohit always works hard and tries to keep up with the safety issues in the office while
dealing with the packaging or delivering chemicals in the office. He keeps the safety of the
employees as his priority but he admits it’s not easy while dealing with chemicals. Employees
receive the training sessions about chemical safety basics as how to keep different
chemicals in different temperature zones, and hygiene, cleanliness and sanitization. The
employees respect and appreciate his support and efforts towards his employees. The
owner of the firm is also very supportive of Rohit in his efforts towards safety because he
knows any kind of chemical leakage or outpouring from the packaging can cause a huge
trouble in the office. Still, the owner knows that there are additional costs for training and
making sure all the stuff is handled safely.
One day Rohit comes to work and is rather upset even before he steps into the office. He
seemed to have a really bad time at his home as he kept murmuring about some problems
with his family. When he went into the store room of the office, he notices that there are a
few bottles of a particular diluted acid dripping on the floor due to reckless handling of the
packages on the same shelf. And, he also notices that some of the packets which need to be
kept at a lower temperature in the fridge are still lying on the storeroom cupboards. He
feels extremely frustrated and doesn’t know what to do. He feels like casting pearls before a
pig when it comes to getting employees to practice these safety measures while dealing with
chemicals.
Rohit has taken many steps to get employees to be safe in how they handle chemicals
especially the concentrated ones. He has huge signs and posters posted all over the office
and storeroom with different words like: CHECK CHEMICAL TEMPERATURE, KEEP ACID
BOTTLES SEPARATELY, DO NOT MIX ACID BOTTLES, WEAR GLOVES ALWAYS, WASH YOUR
HANDS AND SANITIZE, ETC. All employees are provided with body-suits and gloves so that
when they start their work they do not harm themselves by spilling liquid acids on
themselves. Hand sinks, soap, and paper towels are available for employees so that they are
encouraged to wash their hands frequently.
QUESTIONS:
1. Mention the apparent gaps in communication which you find prevalent in the above case
study.
Ans. The apparent gaps in communication which you find prevalent in the above case study are:
• The communication gap between Rohit and employee has led to the disturbance in
the office, that is when Rohit found that there were bottles of particular diluted acid
dripping on the floor and packets lying in the storeroom cupboards which were
supposed to be kept at low temperature.
• Rohit used posters and signs to give directions to the employees in which different
words like: check chemical temperature, keep acid bottles separately, do not mix
acid bottles, wear gloves always were written.
2. What are some ways that Rohit might use effective communication as a motivator for
employees to follow safe chemical handling practices?
Ans. The ways in which Rohit might use effective communication as a motivator for
employees to follow safe chemical handling practices are:
• Rohit should not take his personal problems to the professional environment
because it would affect his mind and work both.
• Rohit instead of giving directions using posters and signs must take up the initiative
to teach his employees how the work is done by himself. He should teach how the
chemicals are handled and if any employee finds any difficulty he should be the one
to teach him and show him how it is done. This would help to reduce the
communication gap.
• When he found that chemicals were not handled as was mentioned instead of getting
frustrated he should teach them how to do this.
Analyse the following case and answer the questions:
Sofia works for a company. Her head of quality, Mr Liam, suggested that the company
needed to improve the planning and scheduling of the machining and tooling department. All
companies that have machine production must do this. They had appointed Mr. Mason, to
schedule this department but they needed someone that could do it much more in detail and
ahead of time.
Eventually, the supervisor of the machining department, Mr Samuel was elected to be the
best person for this job, so the CEO of the company decided that Mr Mason. Had to train Mr
Samuel. And explain the method he followed for the planning. Mr Mason. Is known to be
someone that likes to work the way he wants to work! In other words, he is not known for
being someone that listens to other people’s opinion, so Mr Samuel who was much younger
had some difficulty getting information out of Mr Mason.
This problem had been planned. In fact, before this project started there had been at least
two separate meetings, one together with Mr Mason. In which the steps of the projects were
planned and agreed upon, and one meeting without Mr Mason. Where the relationship issue
was discussed with the CEO. Mr Samuel was not satisfied with the training received by Mr
Mason. And more than once explained that he could not start scheduling the machines if he
had not received more information from Mr Mason.
After he explained this simple point to the CEO, he almost lost his job and was told that
“there are other people out there that can do your job!”. Mr Samuel. Almost left the
company, but eventually decided to continue and asked for help from other members of the
company and understood that there were important elements missing. He had very poor
tools that could not help him understand what had to be scheduled, there was no method and
the MRP (Material Requirement Planning) was missing. Without this basic information there
was no way that he could receive the correct data from the MRP and start planning.
QUESTIONS:
1.How could Mr. Samuel have communicated with Mr Mason for better outcome?
Ans. According to me Mr. Samuel should communicate with Mr. Mason like a student does
with a teacher. As Mr. Samuel have a little idea about his task and Mr. Mason is well
experienced in the field there is no problem listening him as a student, then he would be able
to understand everything properly and do his task better in the given period of time.
What are the common communication issues presented in the case study above?
Ans. The arrogance in Mr Samuel can be a common issue in this case. He may be best in his
work but he should listen others opinion too who are more experienced than him. Even In the
poem ‘Decidereta’ also Max Ehrmann has said “listen to others, even to the dull and the
ignorant; they too have their story.
