1) Compete to Win: Being aggressive or assertive to get one's own way
2) Avoidance: Withdrawal from decision making process
3) Compromise: Work as mediator among extreme opinions
4) Accommodation: Seeing issue as more important to others than yourself
5) Collaborating: Real bargaining and negotiation among group
During my management class, we all had to come up with a proposal to request some changes on our future exam methods. We also had to reach to an agreement to improve our grades for the first exam. As soon as the professor sat down and allowed us (and only us) to start a discussion, there was CHAOS.
Everyone started putting their ideas on the table and it was just chaotic, I couldn't hear anyone clearly. Then naturally, leaders-or rather a mediator-stepped out and took charge. I sat down and followed "accommodation" method which means I'm allowing others to discuss and decide for me, not because I was lazy but because I thought in that way, we will come up with a solution quickly. But with 73 people in the classroom, it seemed almost impossible to come up with an idea to satisfy everyone.
Then I just got confused and lost during the decision making process. I wanted to know what was going on, so I stepped out and followed "compromise" method. I tried to listen to others and talk to other people in front to figure out what we should do.
It was very challenging to finally come up with the solution, because we were all under the time constraints and uncertain if our proposal will be approved by the professor. Maybe we could have not made any decision like someone said in our class. We can try to avoid making choices by doing nothing, but even that is a decision! So I think we did the right thing in the end. It may not be the best decision for all of us, but at least it is better than nothing :)
I absolutely agree with Maimonides' quote on top. It is, in many cases, better to make a wrong decision than no decision at all. When we think about the decision that we made as a class, it is true that no one was truly happy with the final results of the whole struggle. However, it is clear that whatever decisions we made, it was much better than not reaching any agreement because we did end up creating a better version of the first test, and curve the first test grade to most people's benefit. Of course, this is subjective...
ReplyDeleteI also agree that whatever decisions we decided, it was better than doing nothing even though the decisoin we made was not the best. Anyway, we could improve our scores and would help us somehow. Also, If we have a same situation, we could make a better decision throught this experience.
ReplyDeleteI was happy that in the end we finally had a solution. The process was indeed very painful, but each of us was somehow benefit from the proposal.
ReplyDeleteIt was definetly a fun experience, none other like I've ever had before. Leah, just like you I sat down and just kept to myself in the beginning. However I didn't stand up to try to frame a conclusion with everyone else only because of the fact that the class had already decided on the extra credit and the curve. The format of the next test didn't really matter to me so I followed the professor approach..'feet up in the air, smiling.'
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