Communication skills
I want you to understand that communication is the key to the successful completion of the project. Of all the students who have a bad experience with me there was only one problem "communication". Some of them didn’t have access to internet and couldn’t communicate on time, some didn’t have enough time to commit to project, some were frustrated with problems.That’s y I want to make it clear in the beginning itself how much time u can devote and how often u can communicate. So far most of the communication has been through email but if u want to save time voice chat will help.
Also, it’s very important that u keep communicating to me because If you have a problem I might already have a solution. but if I don’t know what problem u r having then I cant guess what’s your problem and I cant help. So please communicate your problems to me. Thumb rule is if you have a problem, devote 1 hour to it and if you are still stuck mail me with your problem and your attempt so that I know what u tried to solve and u will hear from me within 12 hours about the solution. If i don’t know I will let u know that i will get back to u.
Your attempt is very important to me so that I know that I am not spoon feeding u and making u dependant on me.
So please dont
think that its just your project and that u have to
solve all your problems by urself. I believe in TEAMWORK..sharing problems as well as solutions. the project should be a fun experience where we learn from
each other and have fun doing something innovative. There is lots u r going to
learn and I am sure I will be learning few things from you too. No one is
perfect and its ok to do mistakes as long as we dont
keep repeating them. As I said earlier please consider me as your project
partner where I work with u and not someone above u. So please if u have
problem just mail me. if u r going to be busy one particular week and not be
able to devote 10-15 hrs a week thats fine. But again
mail me so that I know u r going to be busy and I wouldnt
expect anything that week then. If u dont mail me I
am not an astrologer and I wouldnt know that u were
going to be busy with some work this week and I think probably u r not that
interested in doing the project or u r lazy... I am extremely flexible with the
schedule. If u have problem with
Meeting Deadlines: I will be settings periodic deadlines for you. Some of them are rolling and some of them are fixed. Its perfectly OK to miss a deadline provided you inform me well in advance and communicate your problems to me. So lets say you have a deadline to finish a task in 1 week. On the 3rd or 4th day you come up with a problem and we decide that its going to take time to fix that problem I will extend your deadline. However, if you mail me 2 hours before deadline or mail me 2 days after deadline with “sorry”, my response is going to be that in fact I am sorry that I cant work with you any longer. You have to be responsible and communicate your problems on time. You have to work hard with consistency. If you procrastinate your problems u will keep missing your deadlines all the time. I will give you 3 warnings before I decide to quit. So when you get a warning please take it seriously.
Communication with Internal guide: I maintain transparency in my communication and keep a log
of all your communication and i would suggest u do
the same. Save all the emails. I suggest you use yahoo or gmail
where you have huge email storage of 1GB and u would never have to delete my
emails. Also at some point u will have to give me your internal project guide's
email. I usually have a project status report which I mail the guide on a
weekly basis so that they know how hard and consistent u r working. As
soon as we finalize the proposal I would like your internal guide to sign it as
well. I would appreciate if you can give me his phone number and email number
as well.The internal guide is most welcome to join in
our chat conversations and our weekly meetings. However, if the internal
decides to remain dormant that’s fine with me too. But nevertheless I have to do
my duty and keep him informed.
Another communication skill suggestion. Please acknowledge when you receive email so that I know u received it and If u have a task assigned to u please reply with an estimated time.
That will help u to work as a consultant in future. So u will be working like a professional. Thats how this project will get u industrial experience. If you want to be successful in future remember the 2 magic words "Please" and Thank you".
My point is keep your interaction with me to the maximum. My past experience is that students who interact with me a lot are the ones who really had fun with the project because they get to discuss their problems and they do learn a lot. don’t worry about my time. I love what i do and I do it because I love doing student projects. U can find me online on MSN all most all the time.
However, if you wish not to communicate that frequently and think its more of a waste of time thats fine too. But i expect a weekly report once a week ATLEAST. The format of the weekly report is given on the WSIPL website. I am strict about the format if u wish not that communicate frequently. Bookmark it because I will ask u to refer to it for info.
The way WE do the project is break it into
smaller tasks or assignments. Only and only after u finish
CREATIVITY:
Keep you assumptions to the minimum. Go to ridiculous extremes of your
imagination. Remember no question is a stupid or a silly question. I encourage
you to ask as many questions you have in mind. I enjoy working with students
who have a curious mind like a child and ask me WHY? We are doing something in
that particular way. Read biographies of great mathematicians like Fourier,