Hunter Campbell
BCOM 276
02/02/2013
Assignment 1.1

Misunderstanding #1
The first misunderstanding is the most recent. I am a commercial insurance agent and I was speaking to a farm owner on his farm policy. The misunderstanding happened when I was trying to explain was co-insurance is on a building. In this example, I was the sender and the farmer was the receiver.
The farmer had always been under the misunderstanding that a building should be insured to what the value he wants out of it is. In insurance, if a building is on a Replacement cost policy, this is not entirely true. I explained to the farmer that a building needs to insured to at least 80% of what it would cost for someone to rebuild the building brand new, with the same square footage. The way I explained it is that if a building you think is worth 100,000 dollars would actually cost 200,000 dollars to rebuild, you would only have it insured at 50% co-insurance. Therefore you would not be at 80% and you would be penalized in case of a loss. The building would need to be insured for at least 160,000 dollars. He started to understand, but he did not understand why the company would do this to him when he only wants 100,000 dollars of insurance. I knew I was going to have to take a different stand.
I said to the farmer that just like him, the insurance company is a business. They do not want to cut corners nor have people take advantage of them. It would be the same if someone didn’t want to pay you full price for your corn. They have to get by just like you, and they also need to make a profit otherwise they would be a charity.
Honestly, there wasn’t much that could have avoided this misunderstanding. I felt that for the situation, I handled it the best way I could have. I had to read the farmer and encode the message properly so he could decode it in way he would understand. Farmers like to here that they are not being taken advantage of and you are working with companies that understand that. It worked out well and I got the account.
Misunderstanding #2
The second misunderstand is a lot easier to explain. During my drill weekend my team leader, in this case is the sender, came up to me, the receiver, and asked what time I was supposed to give my class. I was under the assumption that I would not be giving the class until the next month. My team leader saw the baffled look on my face and asked if I was prepared. I obviously replied that I wasn’t.
Instead of making me give it, he asked me why I did not think I had to give the class this month. I stated that two days ago, he asked me if I was ready to give my class next month which I inferred as the following, not the drill in two days. We cleared it up, and I was to just do it the next drill.
I should have talked to my team leader beforehand and clarified the dates, but it was a learning experience for next time. From now on I will ask that we are on the same page.