Interpersonal skills for pharmacy students

Interpersonal skills can not be excluded when we are talking on the managerial skills necessary for the pharmacy students. Interpersonal skills are to be developed for the creation of good relationships in the personal life and the professional career. Interpersonal skills refer to mental and communicative algorithms applied during social communications and interactions in order to reach certain effects or results. The term "interpersonal skills" is used often in business contexts to refer to the measure of a person's ability to operate within business organizations through social communication and interactions. Interpersonal skills are how a person relates to one another.

In short, people interacting with other person, that’s what interpersonal skill means. We all start doing it from the moment we're born, and if all goes well as we grow up, we get more skilled at communicating our wants and needs, our feelings and thoughts. We all find people with good interpersonal skills are easy to be around because they connect with other people effortlessly, they seem to know the right things to say and they make communication in general an easy process and they seem not to mind making fools of themselves.

Habit of making good interpersonal relationship should be started from the student life as that is the period providing many opportunities to meet with so many people. Making a good relationship with the faculty is the first and most important thing that a pharmacy student has to do. Teachers are the candle bearers to the world of pharmacy to whome the students have to follow. For that, the students should develop the skill of empathy means the ability to put yourself in the shoes of the teachers and to see the things from their point of view. If there a decent relationship exists between these two, then only the flow of knowledge from the faculty will flow smoothly to the student. Pharmacy students also need to maintain good relationship with other students so as to build a teamwork which is essential for them in the professional life. Assertive attitude with good interpersonal communication skills makes a student dominant among others and project him out of the cloud. Cooperation with the others in every aspect is a must for a man being a social animal and so, having a responsibility towards the society.

In professional life whether in the industry, Research and Development or in clinical pharmacy the pharmacists need to establish a smooth interpersonal relationship. Collaborative workouts are necessary in the organizational life which is possible only with the application of interpersonal skills. As a member of the health care team, pharmacist has to mingle well with the other members like doctors and nurses. Whether pharmacists are communicating with patients, physicians, or colleagues, conflicts will occur. Learning appropriate conflict management strategies will help pharmacy student to address conflicts that occur in practice.

Dealing with patients is the prime one as they should have enough trust on pharmacist, conducting the interviews and counseling. To reveal out the facts from the patients and understand the real condition, good relationship plays a major role. Pharmacy scholars working in the area of marketing, intellectual property rights, regulatory affairs etc. need excellent framing of interpersonal relation ship.
Pharmacy students should be given opportunities to learn and practice interpersonal skills during their community Advanced Pharmacy Practice Experience (APPE). An establishment of collaborative educational model is necessary for the pharmacy students. These efforts can result in the creation of personalities with ‘good interpersonal skills’ which will lead to the increase in the productivity of an organization with fewer conflicts in future.