Good communication is necessary for good inter-personal relationships. Most arguments/disagreements between people occur as the result of some mis-communication or clumsiness in difficult exchanges. Good communication facilitates mutual understanding which breads greater inter-personal harmony, facilitates effective cooperation and broadens one’s horizons.
At an organizational level good communication between peers and between leaders and their subordinates is essential for a healthy and productive organization. At a Schuitema Colloquium last year we were treated to a very interesting talk by Miles Crisp, who has extensive experience and insight into the functioning of corporates, stressed the significance of good communication. In an organizational setting the primary objective of good communication is the production of harmony so people actually work together.
Given that good communication is such an important element in successful inter-personal relationships, at an individual level and at an organizational level, I would like to list a couple of the essential skills that are required for good communication.
1. Learn to listen
In his talk at the Schuitema colloquium Miles told the audience that if you want to learn how to communicate well you must learn to use the phrase “that’s interesting, why do you think that?”
When listening to a person so many of us are not actually listening to what the person has to say but instead are thinking of ways to impose our opinion on them. A person who is very bad with regards to this we will call very opinionated. I have a friend who is precisely like this. He is so eager to get his point of view across that he will listen to half of what you have to say and interject with his opinion without actually having understood what you are trying to say, and as a result his response is very often way off track. He is unable to listen because he is too concerned with what he thinks about a matter to be able to silence his mind for long enough to understand what the other person thinks.
Listening is a moral skill. It requires us to suspend our own agenda and give attention to the agenda of the person we are listening to. Learn how to say “that’s interesting” rather than imposing your opinion. Allow the views of the person you are listening to reveal themselves in their entirety. Only then can you truly know where they are coming from and only then can you productively communicate with them.
I recognize that it can sometimes be hard to put aside our own opinion and listen intently to the opinion of someone else. If you really struggle side-lining your own opinion while someone is talking to you then make it a rule that you only respond a minimum of 30 seconds after the person has spoken. Remind yourself that everything before that 30 seconds belongs to the opinion or views of the person you are listening to, only after that 30 seconds has elapsed are your opinions allowed to be relevant. Before that 30 seconds has elapsed your opinion is irrelevant. This is a useful tool for making you accept that you do not need to consistently impose your opinion on others. This acceptance is immensely valuable, without it good communication is impossible.
2. Own your feelings
There is no quicker way to achieve a combative interaction that to accuse someone of malevolence. One of the core elements of good communication is capable handling of confrontation. confrontation is of course an a significant part of communication. It is absolutely necessary to confront people when we feel that they have stepped out of line. We must however be very careful about how we do this.
Broadly speaking there seems to be two ways of confronting a person. The first is to make categorical statements about the person’s character and its flaws. This is absolutely the wrong way of dealing with confrontation. If your neighbor plays loud music till 3 am in the morning and you knock on his door and deride him for being an inconsiderate degenerate who doesn’t consider the well being of others the response you are likely to get is unbridled hostility. In this instance you will not at all have progressed towards achieving harmony, you will only have managed to entrench conflict.
The second way of confronting is to honestly communicate to the guilty party the impact their actions have had on you whilst completely avoiding any categorical accusation against the person’s character. You own your feelings and convey them to the other person. You do not make the person directly responsible for your feelings, but you let them know what role they are playing in the production of the feelings.
There is a sharp contrast between these two methods of confrontation. The first says to the person; “you are a bad person and you must repent for your sins”, whilst the second says to the person; “your actions have negatively impacted me”. Both communicate that the persons actions have been out of line, only the second leaves the person with their dignity. At the talk given at the Schuitema colloquium Miles Crisp stressed heavily the requirement that you must always leave a person with their dignity. If you take away a persons dignity you will have conflict and your communication will have failed in its primary objective, which is to produce harmony.
3. Be honest
Lastly I would like to insist on honesty. To be dishonest is to abuse the capacity to communicate. The whole institution of communication is built upon the assumption that we are going to be honest with each other. Communication would cease to exist in its current form if everyone assumed that other people are going to be dishonest with each other.
Habitually abusing communication by being dishonest will have the consequence that people will stop putting much credence in what you say. You will have undermined your own capacity to communicate. I have had experience of a couple of people like this in my life. Upon experiencing their habitual dishonesty, even in small matters, I just stopped taking what they had to say seriously. I came to the view that this person just blows hot air and is not worth listening to. Indeed that is the last place you want to find yourself, side-lined as noise rather than listened to. If you are dishonest you should be side-lined as noise and should not be listened to.
If anyone has other essential tips for good communication please share them in the comments below, I don’t doubt I would have left many out.