How understanding concepts from communication course would help Targeted Case Managers

Introduction 

This paper will include four parts. The first part will include a description of the job that I would like to have and a description of the skills needed, including the duties and responsibilities. The third section will involve a thorough discussion of how understanding concepts from different modules in this course will help me do the job better. 

The job I would Like to Have 

The first job posting is Targeted Case Managers. The job was advertised on the Indeed.com job website. The job post, a full-time position as an experienced Targeted Case Manager, has been advertised. The job has been advertised by Puzzle Pieces Support Services, Hillsborough County, Florida. The targeted case managers will be responsible for managing adults or caseload children through monitoring services, coordination, or linking to the needed services. Targeted Case Managers will also be required to carry out a diverse evaluation and assessment of the participation of individuals using appropriate assessment tools in various programs. Lastly, the Targeted Case Managers will serve as advocates for the individuals who will be served. The candidates must have a bachelor’s degree in psychology, criminal justice, social work, counseling, special education, rehabilitation, nursing, health education, or any other major course that may include the study of human development behavior. Candidates with skills in related human services fields will have an added advantage. At the same time, successful candidates must have at least one year of experience working full time in the field related to the job with evidence. I would like to have this job because it is related to my field of expertise. 

The second job application is a Victim Services Assistants (VSA) for a company called the City of Mesa, Arizona, United States of America. The successful job applicant will be required to work full-time with victims by aiding them to understand the current criminal justice system and to provide them with potential referrals where possible. Some of the duties and responsibilities of the job posting include performing a liaison role between the prosecution, the victims, the Court staff, and accompanying victims to court sessions. Additionally, the successful job applicant will be required to advise victims on various aspects of the criminal justice system and keep them informed about their statutory mandated rights. The successful job applicant will also advise the victims on the available economic recovery options, victim impact statements, requests on processing restitution, victim assessment. The successful candidates will also be tasked with assisting the victims in securing orders for Injunctions against Harassment, assessing Orders of Protection, giving referrals for various community services, and engaging the victims in follow-up contacts, especially for violence victims. 

More duties of the VSA will involve attending to details, data entry, case documentation, operating automated case management systems, keeping statistical records for the services provided to victims, collaborating with staff, and prosecuting attorneys for service improvement to victims. The VSA will also be required to help in the training of volunteer staff for victims’ services and train them on the rights and other victim-related issues. At the same time, successful applicants will need to facilitate the victim-related community outreach activities, such as the performance of all duties assigned to them. The minimum requirements for this job include any combination of educational training, and experience in any related degree from an equivalent university or college, with a Bachelor’s degree in Psychology, Social Work, Sociology, and Criminal Justice. Additionally, the successful applicants will be required to have a minimum experience of two years in either a full-time job or internship in a busy institution. Other duties will be assigned according to the need at hand by the supervisor. 

The third job post that I considered is an Intern Psychologist – Counselor –Nurse Practitioner for MedE Recruit company in Johannesburg, South Africa. The roles and responsibilities of the successful job applicant will be to report to evaluate the needs of patients and accommodate them appropriately, interacting with friends, and encouraging their personal growth and positive mental health. Another role will be counseling and research differences in behavior patterns over a person’s existence, attempting to correct disorders caused by improper development, and examining societal trends. The minimum requirements for the job post include an undergraduate degree in Psychology, knowledge of psychological theories and practices, possessing research skills, listening skills, and interesting people’s thinking processes and information processing. 

How Understanding Various Concepts Would Help Someone Do this Job Better 

You Cannot Not Communicate 

“ You cannot not communicate” is a popular quote by Paul Watzlawick. Paul Watzlawick was a psychotherapist, philosopher and sociologist, Paul Watzlawick. Watzlawick developed this concept to help him explain some concepts in the Schizophrenia field. Watzlawick came up with five hypotheses to help in explaining some concepts in the theory of communication. According to Watzlawick, communication happens all the time, even when we are not expressing ourselves verbally. In our day-to-day life is made up of delusions and reality that shores up, even to the extent of forcing facts to fit into the human definition of reality instead of vice versa. The most dangerous delusion is the fact that there is only one reality” ( Watzlawick & Beavin, 1967). 

According to Watzlawick, human communication can only be explained according to its paradoxes. Watzlawick further opines that humans can only communicate once they get to know each other well. After this, what follows is all kinds of communication. Watzlawick’s first axiom includes content and relationship. According to the hypothesis, all types of communication have different aspects of relationship and content. On the other hand, relationships determine the type of content in a particular communication ( Watzlawick & Beavin, 1967) . Understanding this concept will help me to do this job better because the major roles and duties of the successful job applicant will be to communicate knowledge and other fundamental information to victims. At the same time, a good understanding of the concept will help me know when and how to communicate with my clients well. 

The second axiom suggested by Watzlawick opines that communication depends on the non-verbal cues, such as crying or smiling, and the spoken language ( Watzlawick & Beavin, 1967) . Therefore, this component will enable me to have efficient communication with my victims. At the same time, I will know when to separate analog communication from digital communication. The last hypothesis of this concept entails complements and symmetric. It defines the relationships between the parties in communication as equal or unequal ( Watzlawick & Beavin, 1967). Understanding this concept will help me find a balance when communicating with different parties and partners. For example, applying this concept, I will know when a conversation is headed in the right direction and when it is not. Lastly, through this concept, I will learn something from my victims even when they are not saying anything to me. By studying their non-verbal cues, I will quickly know their disposition, which will help me find the best approach to meet their psychological need. 

Facethreat and Facework 

The concept of Face threats is based on Brown and Levinson (1987). The notion of “face” is derived from the idea that when one is humiliated or embarrassed, they lose their “face.” Because the face is invested with expressive emotions which can be lost, gained, or maintained, people tend to pay attention to the face of their interlocutors. Therefore, both the speaker and the hearer must collaborate in maintaining each other’s faces in the course of their interaction. I believe that this concept will be relevant to my preferred job’s duties and responsibilities, including carrying out liaison roles, including meeting the prosecution team, the court staff, and the victims. In all the circumstances of interaction between the litigation teams and the victims, there will be close interaction that might involve the need for individuals to watch over their emotions (watch their faces). Understanding this concept will further help me perform this job because the concept will enhance my communication skills. 

Face threats can either be positive or negative. A positive face threat tends to restrict the hearer’s self-image, including protecting them from expressions that negatively depict the hearer’s positive face. Utterances such as “no” may easily threaten positive faces because such responses tend to confront an individual to his or her errors or misconceptions ( Jucks et al., 2016). This may include criticism, complaints, disapproval, disagreements, and accusations. One example of a positive face threat is criticism: “I think your speech was biased.” In this statement, the hearer’s positive face is threatened because they are blamed for not having done according to certain expectations or standards. Another example of a positive face threat includes the expression of emotions in a harmful way. For example, in this statement, “You are angry because your boyfriend was mad at you.” In this statement, the hearer’s emotions will be injured because the speaker addresses a topic that involves their current state of emotion. In other words, the speaker is not careful about the hearer’s “public self-image.” Therefore, the speaker tends to threaten the hearer’s face. 

According to Goffman (1967), all individuals want to be in their “right” face so that they would be prepared to manage their faces when attacked. Facework represents one of the most significant mediations for various intersections between an individual’s self-conception and the need for the individual to cooperate or not with society (Fletcher, 2016). The concept of facework is based on the notion that a “face” represents how a person is viewed in society ( Fletcher, 2016) . Therefore, face works refer to an individual’s strategies or interpersonal skills that will either hinder them from earning the respect they deserve in society. In society, this goes as far as a specific culture’s dictation on whose face individuals should be concerned within the course of an interaction exchange ( Fletcher, 2016) . In most cultures, various social interactions contain different risks based on the anticipated social impressions of the communication parties. For example, when threats occur, individuals tend to employ different strategies to remedy damages accordingly ( Guan & Lee, 2017) . Facework is closely related to the communicative process of managing an individual’s impression ( Guan & Lee, 2017). Some facework strategies include withdrawal and topic avoidance, apology, justification, aggression or retaliation, denial, and humor ( Guan & Lee, 2017). The various facework strategies are classified on a continuum, beginning from mitigating to aggravating strategies. While mitigating strategies tend to lessen social damage by appeasing offenses, aggravating strategies raise more threats to the hearer ( Guan & Lee, 2017). I believe that understanding the concept of facework will help me perform the job better because understanding it will allow me to control my emotions and to have composure and confidence when interacting with people. At the same time, understanding the concept will encourage me to develop virtues such as attention, mutual respect, and pleasant interaction. Therefore, I am confident that I will perform this job efficiently by fostering a sense of positive relationships with others. 

Stages of Relational Escalation 

Knapp and Vangelisti developed the stages of relational escalation to explain how relationships change over the years. The Stages of Relational Escalation model assumes that relational communication entails ubiquitous day-to-day encounters and that communication is a communication process that fundamentally involves negotiation ( Burgoon & Hale, 1984) . The Knapp relationship escalation model incorporates five stages. The first stage is initiation. This is the shortest stage that involves the making of an impression. In this stage, judging would not be the best strategy. Individuals will be more concerned with making more favorable impressions. Therefore, the physical appearance will play an important role in making impressions, such as an individual’s dress and their overall appearance. The next stage involves the process of individuals exploring or knowing each other well for information. The second step is referred to as experimenting. In this step, the main activity is exploration, which involves knowing each other well. This stage also includes some probing, whereby an individual analyzes another individual for specific information or for a common interest to make a decision that will maintain a relationship with someone. However, in this phase, most relationships tend to wind up because of differences in interest levels. 

The third process is intensifying. In this phase, relationships tend to intensify and grow less formal. At this stage, individuals start to show their personal information and take a keen interest in other individuals. In other words, people tend to find ways of nurturing relationships to strengthen interpersonal developments, including time, gifts, making dates, and fostering commitments. The fourth step is known as integration. At this stage, people begin to make their relationship as much close as possible compared to previous times. For example, people may begin to fall in love or try to strengthen their friendship ties. The last step is known as bonding. At this stage, an individual will announce their relationship to the world. This will honor their relationship with honor and legal commitment. 

Understanding this concept will help me to maintain good relations with various individuals. Furthermore, by having a good rapport with various personnel, I will be more efficient in executing my job assignments. 

Conclusion 

The assessed jobs are related to psychology and the understanding of criminal justice. Understanding various concepts from different modules in this course will help me perform better in my preferred job. The first concept, “You cannot communicate,” was developed by Paul Watzlawick. The concept will help me become better in my job because its five axioms will increase my communication skills. At the same time, the concept will enable me to study my hearers’ non-verbal signals to know what they are communicating. Another concept is the face threat and the facework concept. This concept will make me better in my job because it will equip me with skills to control my impressions and mind other people’s emotions. Lastly, understanding stages of relational escalation will allow me to make more favorable impression’s during conversations. Overall, I believe that a proper understanding of the concepts in my course will make me a better employee in my preferred job. 

Links to the Job Postings 

https://www.indeed.com/viewjob?jk=0aca99579475f9c6&tk=1f5atpq5us7h2800&from=serp&vjs=3 . 

https://www.governmentjobs.com/careers/mesaaz/jobs/3069105/victim-services-assistant-grant-funded?utm_source=Indeed&utm_medium=organic&utm_campaign=Indeed .

INTERN PSYCHOLOGIST - COUNSELLOR - NURSE PRACTITIONER - Johannesburg, Gauteng - Indeed.com 

References 

Burgoon, J. K., & Hale, J. L. (1984). The fundamental topoi of relational communication.  Communication Monographs ,  51 (3), 193-214. https://doi.org/10.1080/03637758409390195  

Fletcher, V. (2016). Facework and culture. In  Oxford Research Encyclopedia of Communication . 

Guan, X., & Lee, H. E. (2017). Fight and flight: A multilevel analysis of facework strategies in intercultural face-threatening acts. International Journal of Intercultural Relations, 58, 69-81. https://doi.org/ 10.1016/j.ijintrel.2017.04.008  

Jucks, R., Päuler, L., & Brummernhenrich, B. (2016). “I need to be explicit: You’re wrong”: Impact of face threats on social evaluations in online instructional communication.  Interacting with Computers ,  28 (1), 73-84. https://doi.org/10.1093/iwc/iwu032 

Watzlawick, P., & Beavin, J. (1967). Some formal aspects of communication.  American Behavioral Scientist ,  10 (8), 4-8. https:// doi.org/10.1177/0002764201000802