On Communication Better

Yesterday I came across an article in The Guarding on communication norms. It’s a bit of a long-ish read on how to communicate better so here is the tldr: ask questions and listen.

Gift of the gab: how to become a supercommunicator

For some, the art of conversation remains elusive and awkward. But others find it easy to put people at their ease and steer their way through difficult topics without giving offence. Charles Duhigg asks how they do it – and whether we can get better at it

The GuardianWill Coldwell

Isn’t it counterintuitive that to communicate better we need to shut up and pay attention to the other person? It's not about crafting your argument, using fancy words, sounding like an expert. It's also not about power poses and hiding or accentuating your accent.

It's about listening.

Think about it, how can your words have an impact on the other person if you don’t know what’s inside their head or what they are feeling. That's why if you get better at listening and asking the right questions at the right time, you'll become a supercommunicator.

Martha B from Connections Hub offers these three questions to build deeper relationships:

“What is most alive for you right now?”

“What response would you most want from me?”

“How do you feel having shared this with me?”

Becoming a better communicator seems to be my theme last week. Don't ask me where I saw it, might have been Twitter, but someone shared how they improved their communication and relationships. You might guess it by now, but it's by asking questions and digging deeper into the story. When you hear a story, there's often a tendency to share a piece about yourself by telling how this story relates to your life. But that might prematurely cut off the story, and kill the seedling the story planted.

I leave you with some science: teams where everyone gets equal speaking time perform better. But here is the caveat: people need to feel called to speak. You can’t have a shitty team culture, measure everyone’s speaking time via a Zoom app and force people to say their opinion. Humans aren’t robots.

Go out and listen 💜