I am actually working on my teaching philosophy, but was writing about communication in the classroom and kept coming back to a post I keep meaning to write.
I have interacted with a LOT of non-native English speakers over the past 10 years. Teaching English in China being the most intense period, but after that working with many non-native speakers, tutoring non-native speakers, mentoring and teaching non-native speakers, etc. So it is INCREDIBLY frustrating to me when non-native speakers feign ignorance about specific communications. Specifically email communications in recent experiences.
My fellow post-doc, as nice and smart as she is and in spite of the wonderful science conversations we have, just does not read emails. Seriously. Sometimes they are about things like the department retreat. Additionally, if she notices something is broken or not right, she often will not mention it to the lab manager. (I know this because if I find the problem and ask her if she noticed anything previously, she says yes.)
My boss had apparently initially intended to put the other post-doc in charge of coordinating with 4 people to have lunch with a speaker last week. I was in lab when the boss came in and ended up being the one doing it. Not a problem at all. In the email I gave the details and specifically requested people let me know if they could make it because of the limited space and extra people on the list. The day before the spots filled up and I had not heard from one post-doc. I specifically emailed her to say I had not heard from her and the spots were now filled so there was not room for her at lunch. And then she showed up. And we were short one sandwich. And it was awkward.
I have known firsthand how difficult it is to be in a country where you are not comfortable speaking the languages. I have done it three times. It does not make it okay to not try, especially when certain communication is critical for your job.
I am done venting. Back to attempting to write and going to bed...
3 comments:
How can a person get to post-doc and have such a flawed habit??? You would think she would have been burned by this flaw enough times to stop doing it by now.
Well, she didn't get her PhD in communication. ;-) Sometimes I blame stuff like this on the awkward scientist persona too.
Oooh, that is so frustrating. I work with someone who is above me in the office hierarchy, and he almost never listens to his voice messages. He looks to see who called on his caller display list and just calls back. I used to get bent out of shape because I'd leave him a long, detailed message and then have to repeat myself when he called back. Now the only message I ever leave him is "please call me back". And at least he reads his e-mails! (This is a native English-speaker.)
Post a Comment