Welcome everyone to the master class this week, September 7th.
We do have a few great presentations for everyone.
Tonight I'm going to go ahead and put the list in the chat for
everybody and we'll see who will become available to go ahead and
do the chat.
I mean, do the presentations and we can start with.
Alex, Are you ready?
Yes, Marjorie.
This will be your second one and you'll be all done.
Yes, yes.
Alright, let me get things shared.
It.
Can you guys see that?
Yes.
OK.
All right.
Well, great.
Thank you, everyone.
Appreciate everyone being here.
My topic chosen topic for tonight is an I'm calling it the
art of conflict resolution and cuz it really can be an art.
Umm, sometimes in the professional work space it's
called conflict management.
And really, if you don't know, this is a a skill or a set of
skills that can be an art form.
When the employed correctly and using conflict resolution skills
can aid managers, teams and individuals to work steadily
towards joint goals, create cohesive teams and it can allow
them to quickly resolve concerns.
And so we're gonna dive into conflict resolution tonight.
And as we begin, I wanted to 1st recognize that there's a rapidly
expanding literature on the topic of conflict resolution,
and for good reason.
Right conflict and differing opinions in life is inevitable,
but to narrow things down, and again for the purpose of this
presentation, I wanted to specifically focus on
considering conflict resolution from the perspective of a
professional environment.
Right.
A team with neighboring departments, with clients,
stakeholders, all working towards joint goals and the
joint Mission and strategic goals of the of the business.
And so, umm, so while the elements that I'm gonna
highlight tonight are are really specific to the professional
realm, I think it's gonna be very easy to see that they can
be used in other areas of 1's life.
Life and just to be clear, conflict refers to a
disagreement or argument which can arise in in various
circumstances and settings, and especially in the workplace.
And when there's conflict, it's important to understand how to
navigate through those tense moments towards an amicable
solution.
So to successfully resolve conflict, you're going to need
to read and understand both verbal and nonverbal
communication cues of your coworkers and colleagues around
you.
To remain calm, you're gonna have to also control your
emotions and work to understand the position of the conflicting
parties.
And there's many reasons causes for conflicts in the workplace.
But some of the main ones are perhaps caused by unclear
responsibilities.
Conflicting goals right when you were working on a project, your
goal might be a little bit different than your, your
vendor, and so there could be conflicting goals and conflicts.
There definitely personality clashes caused by different
interests, different approaches, different techniques.
Also, misunderstandings can be a big cause for clashes and
conflicts in the office and then also conflicts often arise for
competition for resources.
And so just as some quick background, back in the 1970s
there was two, umm researchers, Kenneth Thomas and Ralph
Killman, who developed 5 conflict resolution strategies
and they identified that these strategies that people use to
handle conflict and some of those strategies are avoiding
tending to avoid the conflict, defeating, compromising,
accommodating or collaborating are the different categories
that they group them into.
And they based their work on the assumption that people choose
how cooperative or how assertive to be in in different
circumstances, in different conflicts.
So their work suggests that everyone has preferred ways of
responding to conflict, and I'll say that again, their work
suggests that everyone has preferred ways of responded
complex.
So you might ask yourselves, how do you respond to conflict?
Umm, most of us use all of these messages methods under various
circumstances, but it's also helpful to understand in general
the five methods, particularly when you want to resolve a
conflict in a team environment and you wanna move the group
forward.
So to quickly highlight a few points on these different
elements, avoiding is when people just ignore withdraw from
the conflict.
Umm.
They subconsciously may choose this method because there may be
not comfortable with the confrontation and maybe the
confrontation exceeds the potential reward of what they
see.
The resolution of the conflict could be so they don't see that.
It's really that and that that useful for them to really get
into it because they don't really feel like it's gonna be
worth it in the long run.
So people that that's one strategy is avoiding another
strategy is competing right where people go into a conflict,
maybe planning to win, maybe they're assertive and they're
not as cooperative, you know, type A personalities.
They might think that they're right.
And so obviously that's just a recipe for butting heads.
Accommodating, accommodating as a strategy where one party gives
into the wishes or demands of the other, they're willing to
be, you know, cooperative that maybe not as much assertive, and
so this may appear to be kind of a gracious way.
Umm, but you kind of have to watch out that you know you're
you're well balanced and that you're not just completely let
letting someone step all over you.
So another element is is collaborating right?
This is a method when people are both assertive and cooperative,
so you're equally willing to maybe, well, obviously,
collaborate.
You're willing to voice your concerns and cooperate and try
to work through the problem.
UM compromising.
Is is the last strategy here that they that they that they
discovered and wrote about and it's where participants are
partially assertive and also cooperative and the concept is
that everyone kind of gives a little bit and I kind of feel
like obviously that's probably the best balance to try to find
in a conflict resolution situation.
So, umm, talking about a conflicts, I wanted to highlight
that it's really important to find a a private comfortable
place to discuss whatever the topic is, whatever the more
sensitive topic is.
It's really great way to try to discover the reason for the
conflict and to try to understand the root issue is the
key to finding a suitable solution.
So if you're in a situation, whether it's with your colleague
or you're a manager, or you need to talk with your manager, often
using open ended questions kind of helps the parties express
themselves and following up, maybe with more clarifying
questions kind of helps get down to kind of more of the root of
the problem.
And in this situation it's good to be open and honest and
humble.
Recognize that you know you might be part of the issue as
well.
And of course I put that lovely picture in there.
It really takes 2 to tango, so you have to kind of always
remember that.
I'm I couldn't really put together this presentation
without highlighting active listening, which I think is a is
perhaps one of the skills that I feel has so many applications.
And so, I mean, it's really just a huge life skill and it's the
ability to focus completely on a speaker, understand their
message, comprehend their information and respond to what
they're saying thoughtfully.
Umm, this means that you don't allow yourself to be distracted
by incoming text messages, other speakers, other phone you know,
phone calls, other distractions.
You're choosing very consciously to be focused on the speaker,
and unlike passive listening, which is just the act of hearing
a speaker without really retaining there, what they're
saying active listening is highly valued interpersonal
communication skill and it really ensures that you're able
to engage and then later recall specific details without needing
to to go back and and ask them For more information.
So umm, active listeners when you you were employing active
listening skills, you use verbal and nonverbal techniques to show
and keep their keep the attention on the speaker.
This not only is supports your ability to focus, but also helps
ensure that the speaker sees that you're focused on, then
that you're engaged on them, and instead of thinking mentally
thinking about and and mentally rehearsing what you might say
when that speaker is done, an active listener will carefully
consider the speaker's words and really commit the information to
memory.
So you're really focused on that person.
So there's a few I'm just gonna highlight a few verbal active
listening skills and also some nonverbal skills.
Umm paraphrase right?
Just kind of summarize the main points you may ask open ended
questions.
You may ask more specific probing questions just to
further focus in on what they're seeing.
You might use short verbal affirmations like positive nods
or say yes, or that's interesting.
You know, just small little verbal confirmations you made us
display empathy.
You might also share similar short similar experiences, and
then of course later on you know days later, weeks later you'll
be able to remember what the information that was previously
shared with you, and so there's also nonverbal active listening
skills.
Those are when you nod, you're looking at someone.
You're nodding.
You're looking in their eyes.
You're smiling.
That's a big part of it.
You're also avoiding distractions that I mentioned
earlier, which if you, I would challenge almost everyone to try
to do this.
Try to consciously avoid distractions when you're talking
with someone.
Umm.
Avoid, you know, fidgeting movements, looking at your
watch.
You know, tapping your pen, you know, looking over your
shoulder, you know, things like that.
I think of course I mentioned it just a moment ago, but
maintaining eye contact.
It is is a huge thing and in in many aspects, but definitely
when you're when you're wanting to employ active listening.
So now, and as far as conflict resolution as you're working
through conflict, you should really be working towards some
sort of goal or middle ground, right?
A solution that works for all those that are involved.
Umm.
And once you identify the solution, and of course it has
to be in line with the business strategic goals and.
But you could always there's tons of different solutions.
You can find some solution that's gonna work best for all
parties and then you wanna swiftly move towards
implementing that solution so that everyone can get past it
and move forward and not dwell on it anymore.
So another big element that I wanted to highlight as part of
conflict resolution skills is managing your emotions.
A conflicts if you don't already know this, but conflicts have a
way of writing people's emotions.
So it's a good idea to take a break, take a breath, walk away.
However, if you do walk away from a person or conversation,
it's good to communicate that maybe you just need some time to
think or discuss.
Maybe you need to discuss it at a better time, and you might say
something like hey, this is important to me, but could we
talk a little bit later or could we talk tomorrow?
I'm choosing the timing of the conversation helps you to not
say something that you might regret, and that can ultimately,
you know, cause make the problem even worse.
And it helps you to stay calm.
It helps you to collect your thoughts, and as you're doing
that, you can ask yourself some introspective questions, such as
what is my goal here?
What are the issues that I'm having?
Or, you know, the team is having, you know, what do I
wanna see happen?
And are my expectations reasonable?
So just to recap, and again there's like I mentioned
earlier, there's a huge expanding literature and
conflict resolution and conflict management type of skills.
But I wanted to recap and.
Recognize the main elements here.
So when there's a conflict, you want to identify and realize
that yes, there's a conflict and you want to take action.
Umm you you should really understand the conflict
resolution strategies like I mentioned before.
Some people, though again the way that they deal with conflict
is they avoid it or they might be more assertive and more
aggressive, or they might be more willing to compromise and
and everyone has those different skills, whether they know that
they're using them or not.
So understanding those skills can help you as a manager or as
an individual in that situation, really employ your skills and
and and work forward to finding a good resolution there.
So and of course that's that's the next step is you want to
discover the root issue and you can do that by asking great
questions, employing active listening and and working
towards what is really the main problem that's happening.
And then you want to find a mutually agreeable solution and
implement it.
And throughout all of that, you need to work to manage your
emotions.
So conflicts are inevitable in life.
So knowing how to work through them is a highly desirable skill
that many organizations look for, and it it's really a life
skill.
So not just in your professional life, but also in other aspects
of your life, you'll find that these different elements of
conflict resolution will benefit you greatly.
So thank you everyone for listening.
That's the conclusion of my presentation.
So, Marjorie, back to you.
Awesome.
What a great job that was.
A really cool one.
Thank you.
Does anyone have any questions for Alex?
OK.
Have not heard from Nick or Landfrey so.
I'm not sure what's going on there.
I'll talk to you later about Landry.
OK, so let's go on with Rebecca, which is a recording which I
need to go to.
Umm OK yeah.
You find your spot here.
Right.
OK, this is on.
Betsy.
So.
Pleasant and see how it goes.
Let me know if you can hear it and if you can see it.
Rebecca's here.
She just said that she's with the baby.
So but if we have questions, you can answer them.
Yes.
This is the baby's rather vocal.
Totally understand.
They usually are.
Yes, they usually are.
Alright, let's see if this works.
Let's go.
Hello, my name is Rebecca Martinez, desktop support
technician at Lexicon, a legal services and technology provider
for Cordell Cordell and Tucker Allen.
Law firms across the country.
This is technology assisting the human hearing.
My stepfather has tonitrus and hearing loss, which is so severe
he has been diagnosed as legally deaf at age 26.
His issues, although unfortunate, are not unique.
Around 2:00 to three out of every 1000 children in the US
are born with a detectable level of hearing loss in one or both
ears.
Nearly 15% of American adults and incredible 37.5 million
individuals aged 18 and up have reported some trouble hearing as
well.
Today I will be discussing some of the incredible advancements
that have been made with technology against hearing loss.
Yes.
Improvement of life thanks to technology technology has made
so many improvements to the entire world and all the people
who reside in it, that it is easy to miss, improve crop
yields which reduced hunger were made possible thanks to the
advancement of agriculture technology, access to energy,
electricity, sanitation and clean water are all attributed
to the innovations technology has provided.
Plus, with transportation and communication allowing
communication at a global scale, there is nothing out of reach
within this world.
Technology's influence on medicine technology has
increased accessibility, efficiency, accuracy, and
personalized experience and cost effectiveness in healthcare
technology has been an integral part of medicine for an
incredible amount of time.
Starting with simple products like quills and ink for writing
prescriptions to complex inventions like X ray machines
and Mris.
For accessibility, health care is now more accessible than
ever, with tech new technologies like telemedicine.
Telemedicine is the distribution of health related services and
information through electronic information and
telecommunications technologies.
It can allow remote diagnosis and treatment for patients
without needing to go into the their physicians office.
The access to information is another great achievement for
it, as anyone who can access the Internet can access an
incredible amount of information.
It is useful for choosing a physician or doing research on
their individual ailments.
Follow allowing them to be more prepared and informed for their
discussion with their provider for efficiency.
Many tasks have been automated thanks to IT or technology,
including prescription refills and lab tests, which increases
the rate of care.
A great example of the efficiency for of medicine
through technologies and electronic health records.
They are the collection of patient and population data
stored electronically, which are real time patient centered
records which allow information to be available instantly and
securely for authorized users.
Electronic health records make it possible for physicians to
order prescriptions, drugs, set appointments or transfer data
quickly and securely.
You might notice in the medical field you don't really see paper
charts around, but you see more of tablets and iPads.
For accuracy, doctors and other medical professionals now have
new ways to diagnose and treat patients with technology
including Mris, CT scans and much more.
Technology has created a way for us to see inside the human body,
which in turn leads to much more accurate diagnosis.
Another way technology has made diagnosis and treatments more
accurate is through the use of handheld devices.
Physicians and nurses are able to record patients data in real
time on the personal side, health care has become more
personalized through technology, as online tools help patients
track their own data, health data and communicate directly
with their physician or other provider online without the need
of an appointment.
This develops a closer relationship between the
provider and patient.
Plus, with the new tracking apps and smart devices is possible
for the provider to monitor the patient's heart rate and blood
pressure from miles away.
Having tailored care specific to the individual is one of the
many boost technology has brought to the medical field on
the cost effective side, medical practitioners are able to
perform complicated medical procedures at a fraction of the
cost due to the involvement of technology.
Medical imaging innovations are just one example of the
reductions in cost storing the diagnostics process, allowing
patients to receive medical consultations, remotely assist
individuals to not have to pay for transportation, time off
work and other general expenses.
As well, technology has opened a door to the human body that was
never even a consideration in the past through the use of
technology, quick and accurate diagnosis have been made
possible over the implementation of technology, and medicine has
been an incredible advancement that will continue to affect our
lives for the better.
History and cause of hearing loss.
As I stated in the introduction of this presentation, I will be
discussing the incredible advancements that have been made
with technology against hearing loss.
Let's start with a dive into hearing loss itself.
Hearing loss to day is said to affect nearly 48 million
Americans and is expected to increase to one in 10 people
within the next 30 years.
But let's go back.
It is very difficult to identify how much we have achieved
without looking at the past first.
Earliest findings as wild as it is, the earliest findings of
hearing loss were discovered in skeletal remains dating over
10,000 years ago in the Shenandoah Caves in Iraqi
Kurdistan, the archaeologist found.
Exostosis, which are Bony growths and ear canals that can
cause conductive hearing loss.
Each and Egypt each in Egypt, banned for 30 centuries between
3100 BC to 3332 BC.
In the Ebers Paparis he medical journal from 1550 BC described a
remedy for ear that hears badly via injecting olive oil, red
lead, and eggs, back wings and goat urine into the ears.
And ancient Greece in the early 10th century, famous
philosopher, philosopher, excuse me, Plato and Aristotle both
discussed hearing loss.
They suggested that a person's hearing ability was linked to a
lack of intelligence.
Burgundy, also in the 10th century, monks from ancient
Burgundy committed to a vow of silence, developed developing
hand signals to communicate, eventually becoming the Cluniac
sign language.
This was the inspiration for modern sign language hearing
aids.
Then it now will be next.
The hearing aids then versus now in the 17th century ear trumpets
made from animal horns and sheet iron were the earliest form of
hearing aids.
And they were mass produced by the 18th century in 1876 with
the invention of the telephone by Alexander Graham Bell.
Individuals began attempting to incorporate that technology into
amplified electronic hearing AIDS 1889.
The first electronic hearing aids were invented by Miller.
Reese Hutchinson, 1913 those large and cumbersome electronic
hearing aids were introduced at the World's Fair 1920 vacuum
tube technology, improved the portability and function of the
hearing aids mid 1940s.
The translator technology was developed for World War Two and
with more improvements mid 1970s and 80s, they were made even
faster, lighter and more powerful with the use of analog
technology.
1990s, the first digital technology continued to shrink
while adding power and reducing feedback.
The digital technology today addresses specific hearing loss,
suppresses background noise, mask Tina tennis links
wirelessly to phones and media, and uses artificial intelligence
to adapt to surroundings.
The anatomy of the year.
The year is an organ that provides hearing, and it is also
the has another function balance the external or outer ear
consists of the pinea or Oracle.
The external canal or tube and the type type panic membrane, or
eardrum.
The middle ear consists of obstacles and the use ustation
to the inner ear includes the cochlea vestibule and
semicircular canals.
I know anatomy and Physiology is very interesting.
I hope you are all still awake.
The real question is how do we hear hearing begins with the
outer ear, when sounds are made outside the ear?
The sound waves or vibrations move down the external auditory
canal, which then strike the eardrum.
It causes the eardrum to vibrate, and those vibrations
pass to three tiny bones in the middle ear.
Yeah, schools.
They amplify the sound and send the sound waves into the ear and
fluid filled hearing organ, cochlea, after the sound waves
are in the inner ear, they are then converted into electrical
impulses which the auditory nerve sends to the brain,
wherein the brain translates them to sound.
Current technology function.
There are various ways to support hearing loss at this
time, including hearing aids, cochlear implants and more
hearing AIDS.
Hearing aids are what most people think of as a solution to
hearing loss.
Put simply, they make sounds louder.
They can be used at any age, including infants, to help with
hearing loss through the unique styles that can assist various
levels of hearing loss as well from mild up to severe or
profound hearing loss.
Plastic ear molds are connected to behind the ear hearing aids
for children's ears to direct sounds from hearing aids into
their ear canal.
Earmolds are made individually to fit anyone's ear unique ear.
Cochlear implants have two main sections, the portion that is
placed inside the ear during surgery and the portion worn
outside the ear post surgery.
They helped those with severe to profound hearing loss and are in
an effective method when hearing aids are not enough, contrary to
hearing aids.
Cochlear implants do not make sounds louder.
They instead send sound signals directly to the hearing nerve,
FM systems or frequency module modulation is commonly used for
babies or young children with hearing loss.
It is the same type of signal used in radios.
FM systems sends sound from a microphone by the person
speaking to a child wearing a receiver captioning.
Many people don't realize that captioning is a tool for those
with hearing loss.
Television sets made post 1993 are made to show captioning, and
many TV programs, videos, streaming services and DVD's are
also closed captioned.
There are even more tools to support hearing loss, including
telephone amplifiers, flashing or vibrating alarms, audio loop
systems, infrared listening devices, portable sound
amplifiers, and more.
Tech breakdown of hearing aids.
Thanks for staying with me.
It's time to take a deep dive into technology that makes up
hearing aids.
Hearing aids are made up of four basic parts, a microphone,
processor, receiver and a power source.
The microphone picks up sounds in the environment and passes it
to the processor.
The processor enhances the signal, then delivers it to the
receiver and from the receiver the amplified signal goes to the
ear canal.
The power source assists the system function.
The Superfecta features that is recommended for all hearing aids
to have includes a telecoil Bluetooth discrete design and
rechargeable batteries, hearing aids process, sound and and in
order for the individual individual to hear the sound.
The sound that enters the hearing aid must be sectioned
into bands of sound and digitized before it can be
amplified.
Bluetooth compatibility is a wireless function that enables
hearing aids to connect to mobile phones or other devices
that possess Bluetooth capabilities.
The Bluetooth technology is able to improve the signal to noise
ratio while eliminating feedback from the microphone as the
signal bypasses the microphone directly.
Entering the hearing AIDS processor artificial
intelligence is also a function that certain premium hearing
aids have.
It allows access to a deep neural network to process sound
and by logging volume control settings and program preferences
that the hearing aids are able to automatically change when
specific environments are detected.
A deep natural network, or DNN, is a type of machine that learns
and mimics the brain the way the brain learns.
Part of me in the case of hearing aids, it mimics how the
brain would hear sounds if the individuals hearing was not
impaired.
Cell phone applications are commonly used in coordination
with hearing aids as they allow the user to make adjustments,
contact the provider, and monitor battery life.
The application also makes it possible to use the phone as an
assistive listening device by routing phone calls or other
sounds, speech to text or translating languages directly
to the users hearing aid.
Other premium hearing aids have features that make it possible
to program it to emit sound, which masked tonitrus.
We're ringing in the ears.
Wireless technology allows two hearing aids to operate together
as one complete system, as opposed to acting as to
independent devices.
Binaril processing is when sound input to both hearing aids is
shared and decision decisions about the digital sound
processing are made through combined information.
This mimics the brain ability to process information through both
ears, reducing manual adjustments.
A T coil or telecoil is a wireless feature that picks up
electromagnetic signals from compatible telephones or looped
rooms.
Telecoil is able to improve the signal to noise ratio and
eliminate the potential for feedback.
Directional microphone systems are designed to boost sounds
coming from the front of the where and reduce sounds coming
from other directions.
Digital noise reduction system analyze signals to determine if
they contain unwanted noise and reduce the level of noise that
is identified as unwanted impulse.
Noise reduction improves listening comfort by by
detecting any transient loud noises and softens them
instantly.
Wind noise reduction is very beneficial for those outdoor
hobbies.
Like the name suggests, it reduces the impact of wind
blowing across the hearing aid microphone and avoids or reduced
the amplification of it feedback management system.
Fight the inevitable feedback or whistling that occurs in a
hearing aid.
The feedback loops can create an annoying whistling sound, but
throughout feedback management algorithm algorithms that can be
used directly it reduced.
Excuse me, can be used differently.
It reduces the overall amplification to remove the
whistling data.
Logging is the process of storing data regarding the
listening environment references for programs, volume levels, and
other features.
The information is able to be used by hearing by the hearing
health care professionals during follow up appointments and the
practitioner can use the information to customize their
hearing aid fitting.
Imagine you suffer from severe hearing loss.
You are at a restaurant with your friends and sounds are
coming in all directions.
Voices.
Clangs of dishes.
Laughing and much more, your friends are speaking back and
forth.
They look at you and they ask you a question.
Now imagine this scenario with and without hearing aids.
The amazing capabilities that technology has made for those
with hearing loss is ever changing and ever improving.
Thank you all for listening to my presentation.
Once again, I am Rebecca Martinez and I hope you all
learned about how sophisticated hearing aid technology can
improve people's lives.
Here are my references.
Thank you all for listening to my presentation.
Once again, I am Rebecca Martinez.
If you have any questions, comments or concerns about the
topic I covered, please feel free to reach out to me, to my
PGIP email at rebecca.martinezpgiptech.com.
And assist him.
But first of all, I love prezzy.
And that was really good.
I was excellent. Yeah.
Excellent, excellent job.
I mean, well, that was great.
I do.
I love crazy.
Yeah, that was a great presentation.
So pretty and you know Caleb, you're talking about the hearing
and certain frequencies.
My son is like that.
When he got checked his lowest sound, he can't hear and he can
hear everything else.
Umm.
And then I go in his room and he can't hear me yelling for him.
And so I tried to go loud, higher pitched for.
But then, of course, he's got everything so loud in his
headphones.
You know, I know why my I have.
What do they have in the ear?
I don't know if you can explain that, Rebecca, when we have the.
Constant ringing in our ear.
Ohh tendonitis.
Tendonitis.
10 tonight is.
Tonight is.
One.
Yeah, Tonitrus wouldn't where it is?
I mean, how is it?
I've never been checked for hearing loss or anything, but I
have a constant ringing.
It doesn't bother me.
I'm just kind of ignored it by now and it it is due to many
Hmm.
years of loud, very loud music and continuing in my car so.
Ah, you need to learn some sign language, Marjorie.
Right.
And now I can hear everything.
Still, just in case.
Wow, you're Becca says to get checked.
It can.
It can actually mess with your brain.
So that's what's messing with my brain.
Gotcha.
Ah.
Right.
I think it's already messing with my brain.
Umm.
Sounds good.
I really I should get it checked.
That's true.
Umm.
The army's fault?
Ohh yeah, blame it all on them definitely.
Umm.
Well, I have a.
Well, yeah, all those grenades going off all around us.
Of course it is.
Seriously.
Or getting yelled at.
And there was there was a lawsuit, I think, against the
ear protection that they used to have.
It wasn't correct.
Oh yeah, that's true. True.
Umm, right.
That's right.
Yeah.
Well, when I was young, they thought, well, you know, the
teachers thought that I had a hearing problem, but it ended up
not being being that.
Uh.
Yeah, because I had a speech.
UM speech thing.
Right.
I wasn't saying the correct sounds for a lot of my my
Right.
letters, and so they thought I was having a hearing problem.
It's very right.
So I remember sitting in this booth all alone with these big
old thing monitors watching me, and I hated it.
Did not like it at all.
Right, right. Yeah.
Yeah.
Yeah, but then of course then, yeah, anyway.
So Rebecca.
Rebecca says that also, if somebody has a hard time hearing
you on the phone, put a paper in front of your mouth because it
focuses the sound more.
Ohh hmm.
Umm.
Maybe you can try that when you're yelling at your son
Marjorie.
Right.
Oh yeah, you should try that, definitely.
Or I can always get a bullhorn, and that might work too.
Oops. See.
Yeah, because my husband was hard of hearing, very hard, of
Right.
hearing.
So a lot of times I speak loud, but I think it's because it's,
you know, I had to umm.
Yeah, he just used to doing it, sure.
Can.
Can you guys hear me OK?
Is there any background noise?
I hear you.
Yeah, I can hear you.
OK.
OK well I have I have.
Well, I have peace and quiet.
I figured I wanted to share something really quickly.
Oh, there you go.
Just just be quiet when you speak.
Ohh so I don't know if if you knew, but if someone is hard of
hearing yelling at them to try and get them to hear you, it
makes things so much worse.
Mm-hmm.
So just talking at a decent volume, clearly moving your
Yeah.
mouth as much as possible is the best way to help those with
heart hearing loss when you raise your voice, it gets all
drowned out and muffled.
Mm-hmm.
Yeah, it's more garbled.
Yeah.
And UM.
When I when I do have my bouts of hearing loss with the
manners, it's it's better not to hear screaming because it does
get garbled.
Right, right.
Yeah.
And don't over exaggerate your mouthing of the words.
Yeah.
Because if they're watching your lips, you can't really guess it
Yeah, exactly right. Yeah.
makes sense to them.
Yeah.
Mm-hmm. Yeah.
So we should use more body language.
Yes, but it's hard to do that on zoom though or you know it
through teams because you can't see the person.
Yeah, exactly.
You'll you'll you'll have to get your webcam set up just right.
Yeah, that's true.
So you can do it all.
Yeah.
So you can mouth everything exactly.
Like I don't have to worry about that anymore though.
Umm.
OK, so I'm looking for.
Learn the voice response.
So when are we gonna get the electrical implants?
So it goes right into our brain.
Yeah, right.
Huh.
I don't know if I want it.
Looking for tamra's?
Tamra did you?
Is tamra here?
You think she's here because she?
But I I know she sent me.
I didn't see her.
Looking for her present patient.
Which I don't see.
That's why she sent it to me.
Neural link.
No, I don't think so.
No, that's not familiar at all.
Virtual reality.
Alright, let's do this.
Let's go ahead and go with Michael.
If you're ready and I will find Tamra's presentation, it's
recording.
So I have to have it around here somewhere.
Yep, I am.
Let me share my screen.
Sounds good.
Can you guys see that?
Yes.
Sure.
Alright, good afternoon.
Good evening everyone.
My name is Michael.
Folks, I'm Eddie Masters intern in the Cyber Security Management
program, and tonight we're going to discuss a threat modeling.
The agenda is.
Introduction and then we're going to go through the
definitions.
Why use threat modeling?
The steps in threat modeling, common challenges, best
practices, common threats, then a summary and Q&A.
So the current state of IT in cybersecurity, most
organizations are are moving in the cloud.
Some still are on Prem, but she got the cloud combined with the
Internet of Things.
That means there's a lot of changes.
Umm.
Life cycles are met.
Uh.
Life cycles of technology is measured in months, not years
now, and so with those changes comes a lot of vulnerabilities
and a lot of threats.
And that's where threat modeling comes in comes into play.
The definition of threat money OWASP defines threat modeling as
a structured representation of all the information that affects
the security of an application and environment asset
information system.
The National Institutes of Standards and Technology.
They define threat modeling as risk assessments that models
aspects of an attack and defense sides of logical entities, and
when they say logical entities, they means applications, hosts,
systems and environments, and then crowd strike.
I like this one.
This one is pretty simple and straightforward.
Defines threat modeling as identifying risk and
prioritizing remediation of threats.
So why use threat modeling?
Umm.
And actuality threat modeling can be used in many different
industries.
The used in real estate.
It can be used in logistics.
It can be used in construction.
And our case, we're using it in savage security.
The first thing is you want to identify you want to identify
the security requirements and then vulnerabilities in your
environment and then two, you want to quantify the criticality
of those threats and vulnerabilities and it also
helps to prioritize remediation in the methods that you use to
mediate.
And when you do that, what you do is you drive the
organization, the organization, security, design and how they
are implementing security controls within that environment
and eventually it helps the security architecture and
improves the risk posture of the of the system in that
environment.
So the steps in threat modeling, the first is you got to
understand and document the assets in your environment.
So you got to know what data you have in there, what software,
what hardware with firmware that allows you to get a complete
inventory of all the assets that you have in having your
environment.
Then two, you need to understand the security impact of occur of
the architecture and the security boundary.
So in other words, you need to understand you know what's the
most critical pieces of your infrastructure?
Is it important to have database?
No.
Is it more important to resolve vulnerabilities on a database
that's hidden in the background somewhere?
Was it more important to resolve vulnerabilities on the firewall
that's maintained?
That's that's controlled the ingress and egress into the
environment.
So you got to understand the architecture so that you can
prioritize which vulnerabilities, which threats
you're going to resolve.
First three, you gotta utilize threat intelligence resources to
identify and prioritize threats.
It's always good to leverage your security operations center.
They have a threat, intelligence and now analyst in the
environment or you can subscribe to some type of distro like the
cyber and Infrastructure Security Agency.
They have threat distro so that.
Tips that they send out?
What is good to leverage, you know, threat intelligence in
order to in, in order to support your threat model?
4 You identify vulnerabilities and continuous monitoring.
Long gone are the days when uh, you did continuous monitoring,
continuous monitoring and vulnerability management on a
monthly basis.
Now this done 24/7, there's always someone working on some
aspect of remediating mitigating risk in your environment.
And of course, prioritizing correct and findings.
So those are the generalized basic steps for threat modeling.
Common challenges and threat modeling.
Lack of expertise.
Savage security.
Uh expertise is in demand right now.
Incomplete and outdated system documentation.
Lot of times documents are are require any what dates and some
of those annual updates fall behind time and resource
constraints.
Jumping from, you know, personnel and staffing are
jumping from 1.
Project to the next and sometimes continuous monitors
fall by the wayside, and then there's there's a lack of state
stakeholder input program managers.
They tend to want their users to have easy access into their
environment, but that's that's not always how security works.
And so you gotta make sure you balance security with with the
program managers needs and operational needs.
And then two data owners.
You want to make sure that data owners are engaged.
Sometimes you see data owners don't have uh service agreements
with the authoritative source of their data, and so you need to
understand you know how sensitive the data is so that
you can put restrictions around the data security controls
around the data to support your threat model.
And there's also organizational priorities.
Operations tend to take priority over security, and so you gotta
balance that.
With your senior management.
So those are some of the challenges that you face when
building out your your threat model and implementing it in
your environment.
Best practices in threat modeling it is always very
critical to have the stakeholders involved.
I just mentioned the program managers and and the data
managers.
This in critical to have folks from all different parts of the
organization involved in making sure you define your threat
model and having that consensus on how you're going to mitigate
risk in the environment.
Regularly update threat models.
We talked about documentation and policy a little bit, but
making sure that the tools in your environment are being used
correctly to to define what assets you have and feed your
threat model accurate information is important.
Using a structured approach to managing their environment and
then threats in the environment, a plan of action and milestones
is is always a good No2 for for managing sort of structurally
managing vulnerabilities and threats in the environment,
allows you to drive, drive the organization and track all the
findings that you have and prioritize them as well.
And then I leveraging threat intelligence and industry best
practices, we talked about that a little bit as well.
You know, just engaging in the industry and make sure that
you're doing doing your due diligence and and and following
some of those industry best practices.
So some of the common threat models I would jump right down
to #5 which is.
A CIA CIA method was confidentiality, integrity and
availability.
NIST has a risk management framework which is pretty much
geared around the CIA and and how you manage that and
environment.
A lot of DoD and federal agencies used in this and RMF
front risk management framework.
Umm.
Then these models stride.
Umm.
Dread, Octave and pasta, also some threat models that are
fairly common.
I don't have as much experience in in those top four, but umm,
there was a common threat.
Models tissues didn't wrong.
In summary, I threat models can help the organization reduce
risk and eliminate vulnerabilities and threats.
And as folks and organizations moving to the cloud and the
Internet of Things adopting the threat model and coming to a
consistency within the organization will help secure
their environment.
And that's all I have.
Questions or any discussion floors open.
Thank you.
Thanks, Michael.
That was great.
I do have a question.
OK.
Now back when Nate Wilson was with us, he was trying to get us
to do the nice model and I think it's based off of this list.
Do you?
Do you know anything about that?
Yeah, I do have some familiarity with nice.
It's it's for smaller organizations and they use some
of the.
Same.
Standards and security controls as well.
Margaret, I'm gonna use.
It's it's called the NIST 800-53. Right?
OK.
And so that's that's a huge control set that you implement
in large environments.
Nice is more of a condensed version of it, and so that's
helpful for smaller organizations that doesn't
necessarily have all of the resources to implement a full
set of controls.
All right.
Yeah, that makes sense.
And also, why aren't you on any of the quantum teaming projects?
Ohm, you.
You know, I've been trying to get on.
Ohm, I have more time, but it's it's really me trying to balance
out my work life and school.
And so in my in my seconds second I guess semester, I'm
definitely going to engage by the quantum teaming piece
because I I I've sort of gotten the battle rhythm of everything
that we're supposed to be doing now.
OK.
Yeah, because in ancient civilizations we were just
talking about cybersecurity in how to use models while building
the project.
Hmm.
Yeah, that's critical.
That's very important to make sure you build it right early on
and get the right people involved early on.
That way you don't have to.
You can bake it in versus bolting it on as what they call
it.
Yeah, trust me, this here tonight has been leading the
Better to bake it in.
Right.
Really, the bake it in?
charge on that.
Yes, but yeah, I just need to get some additional information
on on the quantum teaming and then I will get more engaged
than.
Send him an invite.
I will.
You've been volentold, Michael.
Yes, yes, yes.
You.
That's right.
You're hired.
You got the job.
Excellent job.
Absolutely.
Very good.
OK, now I just need to stop sharing.
It was awesome.
The stop sharing OK.
Yeah.
And I will share mine.
It had opened.
Hold on.
No talking.
No, no, no.
This going.
Alright.
Can everybody see this screen?
Yep.
Alright, I'm ohh.
During this presentation, I will discuss the show on topics
which.
Try this again.
Evening everyone.
My name is Teejay Mohammed and I'll be presenting you with
information pertaining to the controversial world of
Interactive Voice response.
We'll dive into a few things that highlight its value and
frustrations that have been identified by consumers.
During this presentation, I will discuss the Shawn topics, which
speak on a bit of history about IVR history of his predecessor,
DTMF and some pros and cons that come with IVR usage.
This is an area the pros and cons areas that I feel many may
have their own opinion on.
Lastly, I will discuss recommendations that have been
observed and sometimes implemented, depending on the
business.
How many times have any of you had to endure repeating a
command over the phone to a robotic system, only to have the
system misunderstanding you once again?
For example, you could be asking to go to the maintenance menu
and the system picks up main menu, so you have to start all
over again.
Welcome to the magical world of interactive voice response
systems.
Interactive voice response, known as in VR, permits
customers to interact with computer operated phone systems
via voice input in order to navigate with the host systems
for self service actions.
Avr has been around for ages actually.
It's original recognition came in the late 70s as it was used
in call centers.
At this time of year, I was seeing two complex and costly
for many organizations.
Plus, it possessed a limited vocabulary, so it lost its fizz
during this decade.
However, Ivar's true popularity occurred in the late 80s and
began to appear in numerous industries like financial
institutions, retail companies for credit card payments, as
well as healthcare systems.
Additionally, haviar, it can be deployed in a number of ways.
Is the equipment can be installed at a customer's
premises, installed in public switched telephone network and
it can be installed via an application service provider?
The current events IVR systems operate similarly to the way web
pages operate with dangerous like voice XML.
However, the older versions operated depending on the
programming language used.
It's still used today.
However, it may not be embraced by everyone due to the
aforementioned scenario.
Now, before I view our existed, there was dual tone
multifrequency signaling known as DTMF.
This process allow callers and users to make requests by
pressing a button on the phone.
The signal commands were number they would like to dial or an
action they would like to initiate.
DTMF sounds were identified within eight different tones
that range from 697 Hertz to 14177 Hertz.
Just as a IVR was the predecessor to DTMS, DTMF was
the predecessor to post dialing, which was known as a loop
disconnect.
Hold darling was also a slower process and sounded very similar
to that of Morse code electrical connections that were used on
word refunds, which I doubt people use in 2023.
Since I've discussed a bit of history from the past, it's time
to jump for once again to the present system by VR.
There are plethora of pros and cons within his performance.
As you can see on the slide, some benefits include reducing
wait times for callers.
The capability of offloading tasks speeding up service,
especially during the busiest hours or holidays, and this
controversial capability of keeping frustrated customers
calm as possible.
Some disadvantages include, but are not limited to, creating
more frustrations or potentially unhappy customers.
Way too many menu options within the system extend the whole
times in the queue.
The likelihood of being transferred from one department
or representative to another and the frequency of repeating
commands to the system overall at the end of the day Aviar is
around.
Some people love it and some people not so much.
Regard because of 1's viewpoint, subject matter experts have
created a recommendations to approve an organization system,
more so if there's system receives a large number of
negative feedback.
The recommendations include testing the IVR's usability
prior to it going live, obtaining survey and feedback
from customers, and embracing key metrics in order to track
users complaints that have been submitted.
Additionally, experts have also suggested that companies
implement a customer relations management system, as this can
store customers information and minimize the repetitive
responses needed to navigate and the system.
Based on previous complaints experts have you lay that
organizations should confirm that their system has an extra
route so the users are not lost in the menu just in case they
have navigated to the wrong department.
A few other suggestions pertaining to refrain from using
a system that possesses different voices with different
pitches, volumes and speeds cause this can all be
overwhelming for a listener and use well.
Don't use lengthy disclaimers.
The state compliance and regulatory measures, because it
can sound more like a commercial that speaks on a prescriptions
side effects.
Overall IVR systems are highly recommended to just keep this
simple and refrain from complicating a self service
system.
During this presentation, I've discussed the history of IVR,
his lack of love in the 1970s, and his popularity during the
1980s.
The ancient DTMF signaling that was used prior to IVR's
implementation, along with the Quick Walk down memory lane of
Rotary phones and post dialing.
Furthermore, I've highlighted the advantages and disadvantages
that come with IVR systems such as customer irritability or
comments with some to reduce wait times as well as expert
recommendations to improve systems that are used within
industries today.
I hope this information provided a better understanding of the
highs and the lows of interactive voice systems.
Lastly, here are a few resources to review if desired and I am
finished.
Thank you so much.
That was great.
And it's so funny that that she brought up the fact that, you
know, you may call sometimes when you talk to them and they
don't give you the right one like you ask for an agent and
they send you something completely different.
Absolutely happens.
Yeah.
That's true.
I happen to me all the time.
Yes, it's just ridiculous.
I just remember all about the dial rotaries.
It works.
Yeah.
I kind of missed those.
Alright.
Yeah.
Then you weren't sure if you put your finger in the right hole
and you're like, ohh, great.
I gotta hang up and start over.
Yeah, exactly.
Yeah.
Yeah, but those are the good old days.
That's funny.
It would.
It would not be good for Australia.
I think it's 000 for emergency services.
Ah yeah.
I take a while.
All the way around the Rotary?
Where your fingers out?
Yeah, that's true.
Wow.
Yeah, that's funny.
Well, that was a great presentation and I think I
believe that was our last one.
Umm, there are two missing, but what I'm going to have to do is
if it comes down to it where we have this, I'm just going to
have to grab the.
Presentation and then present it when we can, which is probably
going to be and some days of November we've got nothing open
in October or anything.
We are actually full until November 2nd, so.
Ohh.
Yeah.
We we might need to have two nights of master class.
I know or go from, you know, 8:00 to 10:00 o'clock or so I
get 2 hours of it.
I don't know.
I it just so happens that we've just had so many people in cyber
that that is what made it so difficult this time around, but
I got everybody in the timeframes that they needed to.
Some of them will miss out because I don't have their.
You know, if they're leaving on the 14th on the 12th of the 12th
is their last day, they're going to miss out.
But I've gotta be body fit into when they needed to.
This was the last day for it.
So Nick and Landry are going to be missing out on that, and
unless they send me and I did talk to Nick about it so.
Sending me a copy of their presentation and it should be
narrated.
That's all we ask.
So it's that pass or fail.
On the presentations.
Well, not, no.
They well for.
No, it isn't.
But it is part of the grade yet.
Ohh I I thought we were grading them.
Hmm.
I've got my grades written down now.
Oh, there you go.
Yeah, it is grated.
Yeah, we should grade them.
We should grade them.
Ratings five stars.
Yeah, definitely great.
But the it's not pass or fail because that is within the hours
and stuff like that.
But it is part of the grade on the other side and for this
Ah.
I was just curious if I failed that part.
side, basically no, no.
For being too short, it's my fault.
No, no, no.
No, no, no, no.
But I guess that's it.
Yeah.
That's all the presentations we have for this evening.
One thank everybody for joining and some wonderful
presentations. As usual.
Yes, another amazing presentation.
Absolutely.
And I thank you all.
Where the great work that you guys are doing and look forward
to next week.
So thanks everybody.
Have a great rest of the evening and a good weekend.
You too.
Goodnight everybody.
Goodnight.
Great.
Safe travels.
Have a good.
Don't fall asleep or going home.