Farewell...

I cannot believe another 8 weeks have come and gone.  As much as I am glad to be finished with this course, I am a little sad to move on to the next course without such a wonderful group of people.  I look forward to working with you all again in the very near future.  Good luck on your future endeavors.

I also want to take a minute to wish everyone a very Merry Christmas!!  Enjoy the time with your family and friends: hug them a little tighter, laugh a little louder, and cherish each moment together.  God bless you all.

Adjourning...

The adjourning phase of the group process is always the hardest for me because I typically hate ending things and saying goodbye.  The hardest goodbyes come when the group dynamics flow well.  Relationships are formed and bonds are made.  When it is time to say goodbye, it feels like you are not only saying goodbye to the project but also to the people you worked with.  On a side note, I found it interesting to learn that the meaning of adjourning is to suspend until a later time or place.

I went to a private school and graduated with people I had been going to school with for 10 or 12 years.  There were only 7 of us so the relationships that had formed were strong.  We were more like a family than classmates.  When it was time to graduate, we did the normal graduation ceremony and party but what was more meaningful was that we kept in contact after we went our separate ways.  13 years later, we still communicate with one another, share pictures of our families and pray for one another.

I am amazed by relationships I have formed while working on my Master’s degree.  I did not expect to become friends with so many people along the way.  By forming relationships with my colleagues, I have been free to open up about myself, my family, and my career in ways I never imagined.  I would love to stay in contact with people I have met through my journey with Walden University.

Conflict Resolution

This week's assignment was to think about a conflict, whether personal or professional, and apply some of the conflict resolution techniques we have been learning about.

Last night, my dad and I got into a little conflict.  I had arranged for my kids to be with sitters so I could attend a conference.  I was going to do a little Christmas shopping afterwards since I had already arranged for someone to watch my kids.  I don't get out often, maybe once a month, so I wanted to take advantage of the time I had away from my kids.  My dad had two of my kids, and two other sitters had the other two.  I called and checked on the kids after the conference around 5 and everything was ok.  About 30 minutes later, my dad called me and told me to come to his house because his Christmas tree fell over.  I asked if he could wait a little while because I wanted to do a little shopping and wasn't planning on getting the kids until closer to 8.  He got an attitude and yelled at me before he hung up on me.  Needless to say, I stopped what I was doing and went to help him.  In the end, neither of us were happy.

The first thing we could have done to resolve this more peacefully would have been to communicate our needs.  I understood his need to get the tree back up but he did not understand my needs.  If we could have communicated better in the initial conversation, I think the negative feelings we had could have been avoided.  The other thing we could have done was respect the other person.  He could have not hung up the phone on me and I could have been more willing to change my plans in order to help him.