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How to improve your communication skills
Posted by Chris on 27/04/2010
How to improve your communication skills
An easy way to improve your communication skills Here is an easy way to improve your communication skills by a factor of two!
USE NUMBERS
Let me explain...
Everyday speech is filled with vague terms that are easily misunderstood
Terms like:
As soon as possible:
• Better
• Worse
• Fast
• Slow
• Good
This language introduces ambiguity.
Ambiguity can be defined as “a word or phrase that can be properly interpreted in more than one way".
Politian’s use ambiguity ON PURPOSE, because they cannot afford to be too specific:
Instead, their main task is to have universal appeal.
So, they use vague words.
In order to it play safe, Politicians choose words like:
• Change
• Fair
• Right
• Social justice
You can’t disagree with empty words but they LACK meaning i.e. their words mean whatever the listener thinks they mean: which is why the politician repeats them so frequently.
But you will never get a specific definition of any of these terms from a politician.
Consequently politicians fail in their objective of universal appeal.
Because of their forked tongues, we suspect that they lack credibility:
But
Assuming that you are not a professional politician
And that you live in "the real world" where words should have a specific meaning.
Then too much ambiguity will cause:
Misunderstandings
Confusion
At work ambiguity will cost you!
Specificity should be your communication goal.
How can you make yourself more specific?
Use NUMBERS:
1. Get into the habit of thinking and speaking using numbers.
2. Get into the habit of asking for numbers from others.
For example
Rather than:
“I need you do it as soon as possible.
Say “I need it before 5:30PM tomorrow.
Rather than saying “more".
say “25% more.
Rather than say "worse".
Say "Down by two hundred and twenty".
Formulate your statements into numerical quantities:
Would you get some milk?
Becomes: would you get two pints of milk?
“Make sure you have got enough money with you."
Turns into “Make sure you take at least £200 with you when you go."
“Show me some consideration
Turns into: “Text me at least one message every day when you are away”.
USE numbers
Numbers cause you to think quantitatively.
Quantitative statements are more specific.
Specific language is the goal.
So, numbers will make you at least three times more specific than the average politician.
This would be at least twice as good for business
Visit the Corporate Coach Group website for more information on effective communication skills.
On 29/04/2010 at 16:34 Skip Weisman said
Chris,
Great article, I couldn't agree more. As a matter of fact I just posted one of my articles you and your followers may find of added value to reinforce your topic. I've titled it "The 7 Deadly Sins of Organizational Leadership Communication," the full white paper I wrote is available at www,HowToImproveLeadershipCommunication.com and "specificity" as you mention above is at the top of the list of the 7.
Another interesting point is that in almost every organization people will point to "communication" as a problem. That word, in and of itself, is ambiguous and is a catch-all. I wrote an article that outlined 3 different issues that were identified first as a basic ""communication" problem, but when I dug deeper to find out what was really meant by the comment, it was something totally different in a couple of circumstances.
Is it any wonder why there is so much stress and frustration inside organizations today?
Keep up the good work,
Skip
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