Johari Window Article Review

HRES1101 - Assignment 1: My Profile

Name: Meaghan Mahon

Instructor: Douglas Scotney

Course Code: 18MAYMNAT44

Date: 02 June 2018

When we look at the Johari window, there are four distinct areas, open area, blind area, hidden area, and the unknow area, with crossing sections of what is know to self and known to others. Using these areas in the Johari Window, we are able to look within and assess ourselves which will help us as individuals better understand our relationship with others and ourselves. I believe that it is important to have a deep understanding of ourselves, as it will impact our presenting selves and effect how others see us.

I decided to take a look at two articles, Johari Window article published on the Business Jargons website and Source of Insight, The Johari Window: Know and Share Yourself with Skill, to better understand how we can use the Johari Window as tool to have a better comprehension of our relations ship with ourselves and others. If we can establish a core understanding of how we can better foster trust within ourselves and others and we can have a more organic and natural expression of ourselves, and hopefully an understanding from others. By pinpointing qualities within ourselves, we can categorize. In the open self we can look at “behaviours, motives, attitudes” (Business Jargons, Johari Window, para. 4) and more that are recognized by the individual and those they are interacting with, things as simple as your name or your hobbies could be categorized here. Once relationships grow, this window should grow too. Next there is the blind self; This area is what individuals are unaware of about themselves, but others can see, a common example I can think of is bad breath. You might not be aware that you have halitosis, but those you speak too would be very much aware of it. The third quadrant of the Johari Window is the hidden self, this is where the individual is the only one who is aware of what is going on. This would be your secrets or wishes, these are not things you broadcast to others, but keep to yourself. As relationships grow, this window can become smaller and we share the intimate parts of ourselves with others. Finally, there is the unknown self. This is the window that where the information is unknow to both ourselves and others. This could be thoughts, concerns, or wishes deep within our subconscious. Items in this quadrant wont necessarily stay there forever. As we grow ad individuals, and as our relationships grow, new feeling and thoughts may arise and find there was into a new part of our Johari Window.

With a better understanding of the Johari Window, I was able to sit down and compile a list of things I keep in my hidden area. A big item in my hidden area comes from my upbringing. I was raised by two Irish Catholic parents with deep roots in the Irish Republican Army (IRA); my childhood was not sheltered from the horror stories I would hear of how the British and Protestants would come into our Catholic areas and how people would be killed based on their religion. I couldn’t understand how people could come into the communities and homes of my people and kill them, this created a strong hatred and admitted ignorance towards the British and those of Protestant faith. It is not something I often speak of with those outside of my family, and nothing I ever share with those who I maintain a professional relationship with, but it is a part of who I am and a part I keep to myself. I have an understanding that prejudice and racism is looked down on in our society and I do not want to be labelled as one of the aforementioned. There are many things in all of our hidden self windows, and I believe that you need to be selective with how much you open this window for others.

As for the blind area, I recruited my husband, my best friend, and a co-worker to complete a quick questionnaire on the Kevan website (Kevan, Johari). I completed the assessment and then asked my 3 volunteers to also complete it. The task was to select qualities from a list that they feel best describe be and I get a notification once completed. I found it very interesting to compare my list with theirs, my open area was quite different from my blind self. Known to myself and others were confidence and intelligence, but unknown to myself were the following:  brave, friendly, independent, loving, observant, powerful, proud, responsive, self-assertive, sentimental, and trustworthy. Some of these are definitely qualities and characteristics I can see in myself, but only in certain situations. I realized that based on these qualities, each of these individuals have different relationships with me and get a different side of me. Where I am loving with my husband, my co-worker sees me as friendly; both are positive attributes, but different levels based on the different relationships. When I asked my volunteers to elaborate further on the reasons why they made the selections they did, again their answers were all different, “You are so giving of yourself to our daughter and family” (Felix, 2018), “You are brave and loving, you always make me proud and have a great sense of pride and have grown up to be an amazing woman” (Mayberry, 2018), “You are the most self-assertive and confident woman I have ever met – you walk into a room and command the attention without even saying a word. You are knowledgeable and compelling, and a joy to work with.” (Desousa, 2018). I believe that everyone’s perspectives of me were based on our different styles of relationships and the way I present myself within them.

I like to believe that I am very sure of who I am, when looking at the list of qualities on the Kevan website to develop my own Johari Window, I was able to pick a top six that I feel best describe me: complex, confident, dependable, intelligent, knowledgeable, and logical. I realize looking at the list created by my three volunteers that some of the words are closely related and possibly interchangeable.  I realize that I am a caring and loving wife, mother and daughter, I have a tremendous amount of pride in myself, my family and the work that I do, I am both book-smart and street-smart and feel confident about who I am and what I am doing with my life. I appreciate that others see positive qualities about me like self-assertiveness and observant; these are qualities that I occasionally recognize in myself but wouldn’t necessarily add to my list, I love the fact that others see my confidence and attention to detail and I want to continue to add to my open self and continue to grow.