Workplace Miscommunication: The EpiPen

Whether its a job, sports team, organization or group there always needs to be open lines of communication. The importance of the easy and use of communication is paramount in conveying every one's ideas, setting up meetings and accomplishing the tasks at hand. Without communicating people may be unaware of deadlines or even jeopardize the safety of others. This became the case in one of my experiences in the past.

Although I have held many jobs, the biggest miscommunication in my workplace experience was when I was a camp counselor for TTS sports, a local day camp for kids. The one thing that is stressed when looking after children is always their safety. Above all it is vital to be on the look out for harmful things that may happen.

Numerous children have allergic problems these days and require the use of an EpiPen if an allergic reaction should arise. The situation began at camp one day when there was a miscommunication on who would take control of a child's EpiPen. Children who have such severe allergy problems must always have an EpiPen near by in order to ensure their safety. Furthermore at camp, it was the responsibility of the counselor overseeing the child for the day to have the medication at all times. As a matter of fact this did not happen one day at camp and the medication was left inside the field house for the entire day!! The miscommunication was a result of one counselor thinking the other had it and vice-versa. Obviously, this was a simple mistake; however it put the child's safety at risk.

Thankfully, the ramifications of the situation did not affect the child, but provided a valuable lesson for all of the TTS Sports staff. Our director really advised us that situations such as this one are very important to avoid and we must do everything in our power to ensure the safety of the kids. I think this situation could have been avoided by simply double checking with one another. For example, who is responsible for Jacob's EpiPen today? Which group of counselors is he participating with today? Also, we could have prepared a checklist of the items we need before leaving the field house including first aid kit, cell phones and of course specific medications for the campers. All and all, the miscommunication did not have detrimental consequences, but the result was a valuable lesson was learned.

Online Portfolios

As technology continues to increase, even college students will have to learn more about using the world wide web and online resources effectively. I am not completely computer literate, but I seem to be able to figure things out by trying and using them continuously.

My past experience with online portfolio work is somewhat limited; however I am now in the process of creating my own web-page to display my course work and my experience as a Clemson undergraduate student. I am using my Google account to create the portfolio page and it is very self explanatory so far. Therefore, the experience is definitely coming along, I just have been really particular when creating the pages. It is rather difficult sometimes to add the certain details to a page that make it look professional. Despite these challenges, it is a matter of time and effort and the experience has been good for me.

Since the main objective of Business Writing 304 is to create our own portfolio, I will certainly need to know details before combining and displaying my portfolio due on March 23rd. The main questions I have are as follows: Will the portfolio need to be displayed electronically or is a hard copy appropriate? What sites or programs will be most effective for this type of project? Mainly, I just need to know what students have done in the past and what is the best way of displaying our course work for the draft. I do know what needs to be included and I look forward to combining all of the work I have done to date. The best part of the portfolio is we will be able to use this in the future and creating it only helps us in the end.

Routine Maintenance Review

Despite the snow day on Monday, We were finally able to finish the presentations earlier this week. I really enjoyed all of them, but the one I liked most was the "Benefits of Doing Routine Maintenance." Simply, the presentation hit close to home.

I thought this was a great presentation because it took into account the audience, and the topic is something college students rarely think about, myself included. As a guy, I really should know more about cars and this presentation hopefully will begin my future learning. With gas prices the way they are students are always looking to save money, and routine maintenance is a simple option to accomplish savings. I haven't had my oil changed in forever, and the presentation has really motivated me to go out and get it changed asap. Also, I learned four main benefits to doing routine maintenance. By not ignoring your vehicle it will have a longer life, you'll have a better knowledge of your car (which I need), it is less expensive doing the maintenance yourself and of course it will increase fuel economy!

All and all, I was able to take a lot away from the presentation and plan to continue to learn more about my vehicle and take care of it the way it should be taken care of.