Friday, June 19, 2009

Week 3 Blog Post #2 Chapter 5

Socialization

I think socialization is a very important characteristic that one needs to accomplish when becoming a part of any sort of organization. The book defines socialization as a process by which people learn the rules, norms, and expectations of a culture over time and thereby become members of that culture (p. 146). I am a very social person. I find it very easy to socialize with people on a daily basis, whether they are new acquaintances or people that I deal with everyday. I am very friendly, outgoing and easy to have a conversation with. Because of all these traits I think is a good reason why I am majoring in Public Relations and like the communications field.

There are three stages in the learning process of socialization: anticipatory socialization, organizational assimilation and organizational turning points or exits. The first stage has to do with learning about work through communication. Vocational and organizational are two stages of anticipatory socialization, with vocational beginning at childhood learning about careers and work and organizational which is learning about a specific job. The second stage involves surprise and sense. A new employee is always trying to fit into a new job by attempting to make sense of the new job. The last stage involves the turning points for example, when a student starts college with no clue of what major they would like to study, they take their G.E. courses and usually from there figure out where they belong and in what department.

After completing my G.E. at West Valley College I discovered I enjoyed communications courses and would like to join the Journalism and Mass Communications department at SJSU.

1 comment:

  1. I like the idea of the broad stages of the learning process for the individual facing a new organization. I remember hearing as one grows up their are stages in someone's awareness and how they communicate: first it's a focus on themselves which then expands to the family then that of the social good. I say because I have a sense of expanding my awareness to social understanding that are relevant. When dealing with an organization where we have to socialize on different levels, anticipatory, assimilation and the turning points helps if I were to go into an organization. I am not as outgoing so I think public relations as an interesting field. I do try to make sense of my expectations of others, how I begin to learn about the rules and norms, and how my relationship with others evolve. I try to look for cooperation rather than quickly calling it quits.

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