Communication in the workplace is essential for many reasons.
All of your planning and monitoring of business processes depend on your ability to convey the facts needed to get the task done . This can take many forms and may include modern electronic methods or a simple office circular .
What is crucial is that your meaning is comprehended by the recipient . Communication is based on telling people your requirements in a manner that the recipient can decode it and still know the exact meaning of what you said.
The Anglo saxon language is crammed with ambivalent words that can have numerous meanings depending on the context they are used in. It’s a bit like the childrens game called Chinese whispers. I’m sure that you can remember the hilarity when the message eventually got back to the original sender .
Children love this sort of game in business there’s more at stake .
So… How do you. know that your message has been understood in the way that you wanted it to be?
It’s easy …
Just ask !
By confirming that your message has actually been decoded in the way that you meant it to be ask the recipient of your email do they understand your meaning and the thinking behind sending it .
You can also train your teams or other business partners to actively listen to what you have said or written .
eg : You have just sent out an email to all of your team informing them that revenues are down and if the sales figures don’t improve then your financial targets won’t be met .
Active listening is where the person who gets your communication will reflect back to you what they understood about what you said .
” So, Mary , what you are telling theteam is that we have to increase our sales this month or we will be deep in trouble”
Your options are then to either clarify the message , If it isn’t received correctly or you can state that Yes that’s correct . The advantage of reflective listening is that all parties are clear right from the start and this will reduce lost time, later when you have to clean up any mistakes created by bad communication .
There are so many ways that you can have more powerful business communication.
Related posts: