Communication Tips for Professionals

The majority of people – due to their very nature, have a fascination with the sound of their own voice – which usually seems to manifests itself in a compulsion to keep on talking. However, there is a great deal of difference between speaking and communicating, with the latter requiring considerable application of effort. People with inherently good communication skills, or individuals who have extensive management training experience, know what to say at exactly the right time, at what place and to whom. Even more importantly, they usually understand when not to say anything at all, and simply listen. There are certain key characteristics that depict whether a person is a good communicator or not – one of them is being a good listener. You may be able to easily communicate your ideas and various points of view to others fairly clearly, but when it comes to listening to most people, you find that you’re an absolute failure. In most people, the quality of listening is closely related to their grasp of information, and with the ever changing situation in business environments today, excellent listening skills have become an imperative for success.

Here are some business coaching tips that will help you to improve your listening skills:

1. Pay attention to what the other person is talking about. It’s quite important to pay attention to the speaker, and it is not only the matter of maintaining good eye contact, but the posture of your entire body is important as well.

2. Let the other person speak. Patience is the essence of any good communication ability. It’s important during the act of listening that you should allow the other person to put forward his/her opinions, while making a point to not interrupt in the middle of the discussion.

3. Do not impose your opinion. To avoid conflict, you should respect the opinions of others, and at the same time, try not to impose your opinions on others either, as it often happens that the opinions of any two people don’t even remotely come close to common ground.

4. Ask meaningful questions. It is important that during a discussion only meaningful questions pertaining to the discussion are asked or raised. These questions should always help guide the discussion trend towards a meaningful conclusion.

5. Help and support the other person. Good listening requires creating a supportive environment for anyone speaking in order to help them sense that all is going well. Encourage the other person, and let them feel that you are interested in listening his/her opinions or views.

6. Restate your thoughts. Listening is quite different from hearing, and it’s not the easiest of skills to master. Although listening alone will certainly enable you to gain some knowledge, or at the very least help you to reach an opinion, it is still quite important that at the end of any discussion you should be able to easily restate, in sequence, all of the previous thoughts from the conversation.

It is quite true that the more you listen, the more effective and efficient you become. Many of you might be well versed in speaking, but have you ever really given consideration to the value of listening? The tips given above may not guarantee that you suddenly transform into a good listener, but what they definitely will do is improve your listening skills to a great extent, automatically affecting a positive impact on your overall communication ability.

Alan Gillies is the Managing Director of the L2L Group. He specialises in delivering Executive Coaching, Training and Consultancy Services to International Businesses across the World. Want to discover more about these insightful business building success strategies? Get Alan’s essential FREE Business Pack today!