We all communicate multiple times a day, but could we be getting better results? From a simple text or phone call to a job interview or big presentation, the way we express ourselves and get our point across can really matter. In a recent podcast series, Ros Atkins speaks to an array of fascinating guests such as a comedian, doctor, magazine editor and Olympic athlete to reveal different techniques and approaches to communication. Each episode is only 15 minutes long and can be found here.
Purposeful communication. One of the episodes is with Barack Obama’s former speechwriter, Sarada Peri. She talks about how she would prepare speeches for Obama and her first key point is about “inquiry”. She always seeks, first and foremost, to understand the purpose of the speech or communication. This means asking questions such as: Who is your audience? What is your goal for communicating? How are you trying to make people feel? What do you want people to do as a result of the communication?
Starting with the ‘why’? The concept of purposeful communication links with Simon Sinek’s Golden Circle model (explained in a TED talk here), that “people don’t buy what you do, they buy why you do it”, hence he advocates for starting all communication with explaining the why, before explaining the how and what. This helps to engage and inspire hearts and minds. We have recently been working on a leading change programme with Birds Bakery in the UK. To date this has involved an all-staff survey with over 800 employees, and in-depth focus groups with over 60 people face-to-face. Communicating the ‘why’ during change processes was a key learning for them.
Connected communication. One of our communication models that particularly resonated with the team at Birds Bakery was our “Connected Communication” model (see below). This sets out seven sequential stages where communication can get “snagged”, preventing an action happening or an idea taking root. The best way to prevent any of these snags occurring is to develop a communication style that incorporates a “back brief”. This involves asking the person, or people, with whom you’re communicating to give you a quick synopsis of what you have just either told them, or asked them to do, at each of the different stages.
Authentic communication. Sarada Peri, also spoke in the podcast about the ‘style’ as well as ‘substance’ of communication. One widely cited study suggested that 55% of communication comes from body language, 38% is how we say it or our tone of voice, and only 7% is the actual verbal content. With so much of communication being about tone and body language, it is important that what we’re communicating is authentic. In the podcast, Sarada shares that there was a lot of pressure for Obama to sound angry or upset in public speeches to be persuasive but that is not who he is or how he wanted to lead. She instead encourages people to ask, “What is the one thing I can uniquely say?” We are more credible when we are ourselves and can share our unique perspectives and experiences.
Communicating from your lived experience. Part of our work has involved building the confidence of ‘experts by experience’ to ensure that their voices and experiences are influencing decision making in their sector. Rosie has been chairing the Ella’s Survivor Advisory Board. Ella’s is a London-based organisation working with women who have survived trafficking and sexual exploitation. The Survivor Advisory Board brings together survivors to shape the services Ella’s provides and its direction of growth and development. During their one year anniversary, the group reflected on their experience on the board so far. One of the women wrote, ‘I am so glad that we are able to turn our pain into power and use our experiences to help other women.’
The importance of two-way communication. Kemal and Rosie recently facilitated a session with the Irish League of Credit Unions Foundation (ILCUF), as part of our involvement with their strategy renewal process. They ran an interactive exercise called “Colourblind” to emphasise the importance of communication in teamwork and strategy implementation (see pictures below). Key learning coming out of this exercise was that communication is a two-way process requiring clarity of message, good questioning skills and, most importantly, active listening.
Change Makers of the Week
Maya Angelou quote “I've learned that people will forget what you said, people will forget what you did, but people will never forget how you made them feel.”
Best wishes
Lorna, Kemal, Ian and Rosie