Erin Brokovic

Analyzing Communications
“Erin Brockovich”

INTRODUCCION
“Erin Brockovich” is a film directed in 2000 by Steven Soderbergh and starred by Julia Robert (Erin Brockovich), Albert Finney (Ed Masry), Aaron Eckhart (George) and Peter Coyote (Kurt Potter). Due to her great performance Julia Roberts was awarded, among others, with the Academy Award and the Gold Globe for best actress.
The film isbased on a real life story of Erin Brockovich. Erin Brockovich is a single mother with three children that needs desperately to get a job. Erin has had a car accident, and has spent most of her money paying the medical bills. She loses the sue and asks for a job to Ed Masry (her lawyer). Erin begins to work and one day she stumbles upon a file related to a real estate case involving the Pacific Gas& Electric (PE&G) Company and its relation with some strange diseases. Erin starts to investigate, questioning people, and discovers that PG&E is using the town as a dumping ground for hazardous industrial wastes, resulting in the contamination of the ground water. Eventually, Erin and Ed with the support of a major law firm fight the case and in the end they win.
AIM
The aim ofthis project is to analyze the social skills developed by Erin Brockovich (or other character) and the level of empathy, assertiveness, active listening and feedback that Erin Brockovich (or other character) uses while she (he) interacts with others, as well as to analyze the verbal and non verbal communications (barriers, persuasive communications, negotiation, leadership, delegation, ...). I willconclude this project with a personal reflection regarding all the communication skills and communication elements of the movie.
SOCIAL SKILLS
After watching the movie, the first thing I would like to mention, from the stand point of social skills, is that the movie contains all the ingredients required for being one of the subjects of study in a course of communications skills.

Empathy
Themovie is plenty of scenes and situations where Erin Brockovich shows her ability to put herself into the shoes of the sick families. This is one of the great assets that she posses her empathy towards their clients. She feels their pain, understands their needs, and embodies a rare compassion. "I hate lawyers; I just work for them," she says to those who are wary of her intentions.
Although inall the interviews she has with sick people Erin shows empathy to them, in my opinion the scenes that better reflect empathy are when Donna tells Erin that she has cancer or when she visits a girl wearing a handkerchief over the head.
On the other hand, we have Teresa, one of the lawyers of Ed´s partner firm. She does not feel any kind of empathy to the people she interviews and she is rejected,not getting any kind of information.
Assertiveness
In the scene where Ed and Erin are with Donna and other people, and Ed is trying to convince them to move forward with a suit against PG&E. He is using an assertive speech, expressing his ideas clearly without being aggressive and defending their rights in a reasonable way, but they do not get convinced until Erin uses all her communicativeskills, in particular her empathy, and put herself in the place of them, this skill is clearly showed when Donna offers a coffee to them and Ed says that they have to go, but Erin orders him to take the coffee.
Active Listening
Active listening is present in the interviews that Erin makes to her clients. In the first interview she makes to Donna Jensen, from the beginning of the interview tothe end, Erin always keeps her eyes looking at to Donna´s eyes, she does not interrupt Donna Jensen while she is speaking. Throughout the interview Erin shows interest on what Donna is telling her, giving Donna the impression that what she is saying is very important.
Another situation of active listening is when Erin Brockovich goes to the University to talk to a toxicologist expert to get...