Effective communication

One of the most common causes of work and personal relationship struggles is communication. I know you have undoubtedly heard on numerous occasions that communication is vital for success, but it bears repeating. The ability to communicate effectively with all of your stakeholders will improve your leadership ability and overall success.

Communication requires a two way exchange of information: a sender and a receiver. In this model, there are several ways for communication to breakdown; the sender can fail to send the communication, the receiver can fail to receive the communication,  or the receiver may not be decoding the communication message properly.

In the first scenario, the sender fails to send the communication. This is when someone does not initiate the communication process: no verbal, nonverbal or written communication exists. In this case, there is no message for the receiver to retrieve and therefore, cannot be acted upon. Always make sure that if you say you will do something, follow up with it and let the other parties know.

The second scenario is the receiver not receiving the communication. This may happen due to interference in the communication medium: crash of the server, distracted surrounding when listening, different language. This is the case when the receiver is not readily engaged with the sender and is not getting the message correctly. To fix this, make sure that you are readily engaged with the sender and able to decode the message properly.

The third scenario regards decoding the message. If the sender sends a message to the receiver and the receiver gets the message, but does not decode the message accurately then there will be a lapse in communication. The prime example of this is when the receiver hears what they want to hear and neglects the rest of the communication. They got the message, but did not properly translate its meaning. To help with this always speak back the message to the sender to confirm accuracy, or ask the receiver to repeat back what you have asked.

Communcation is vital to the success of relationships and businesses. In order to communicate effectively try these tips:

• Communicate whenever somebody other than you needs to know something. People like to know what is going on if it affects them
• Keep the message clear and simple. This makes the message shorter and thus harder to be misunderstood
• Actively listen to understand the full meaning. This avoids distractions and focus on the sender
• Repeat back what is said to confirm understanding of the message

Taking the time to make sure that the messages that are sent and received are the same will go a long way to creating better understanding among groups and build a foundation of trust.