Booher BanterYour Resource for the best ideas to improve communications skills.

The biggest wall to scale in almost any communication challenge is credibility.  Ask any political candidate.  So it’s really little surprise that a new survey by BlessingWhite, a New Jersey-based consulting firm, revealed that employees trust their own managers (75%) more than their senior executives (60%).  We North Americans are a little less trusting of the senior execs (53%) than those surveyed on other continents.  T+D, August 2008, pg 14  Shall we credit the infamous CEOs of Enron, Tyco, and WorldCom for that statistic? 

Comparing attitudes of more than 7,500 workers on four continents, the study also revealed some other commonly held misconceptions about communication.  The key finding was the premise of my book released last year: The Voice of Authority: Ten Communication Strategies Every Leader Needs to Know (McGraw-Hill).  That is, simply giving information is NOT the same as communication.

Let me get more specific:  When it comes to routine information, bad news, or good news—whether about mergers, layoffs, terminations, products recalls, innovative marketing strategies, new initiatives for the year, or acquisitions—the typical rank-and-file employee does not feel that he or she knows what’s going on companywide.  Yet senior leaders scratch their heads and say, “We sent an email with the announcement and put it on the web.  Why don’t they understand?”

Answer:  Information has to be interpreted and relevant to the audience to be useful and understood. 

Back to the BlessingWhite study:  When middle managers do the interpreting and make information from “on high” relevant, they build trust and engage their employees. When they don’t, well,…that could explain much of the distrust suggested in the responses from the other twenty-five percent of the disengaged workforce.

Posted at 2:32pm in Communication—Interpersonal, General Communication | Permalink | Add Comment » |

Some very smart people have difficulty with grammar. But the peculiar thing is that some think others don’t notice!  

That’s like an amateur carpenter saying to an experienced builder, “I’m making my daughter a desk chair for her dorm. One leg is an inch shorter than the other three. But I don’t think that’ll be noticeable, do you?” That’s like a shipper saying to the accountant, “Our invoices don’t agree with the bank statements, but I don’t think that should create any questions, do you?”

It’s common to notice errors and imprecision in our own area of expertise yet think accuracy and precision in language don’t matter.  But they do.

So here’s the deal:  We’re offering blog readers early, free access to our new 25-question online grammar quiz at www.howsyourgrammar.com. Would you do me the favor of spending 15 minutes to see how your grammar skills measure up?  I think you’ll find it beneficial as well as challenging.

We’ve been selling the print version of the quiz for more than 20 years to our corporate clients wanting to assess the grammar/writing skills of job applicants or others being considered for promotions. This month, we launched the online version to coincide with the release of my new grammar book in the fall.

For the next few months, we’re offering this as a free preview version to blog readers.  (In the future, we’ll be selling the more comprehensive, 50-item assessment to our corporate clients.)

Thanks for accepting the challenge!

Take the Quiz!

Posted at 5:07pm in Grammar | Permalink | Add Comment » |

It was an historic night all around.  Obama and McCain joined each other on the same platform for the first time during the presidential race.  But more important than that, they did not face each other in a challenging, tit-for-tat confrontational style.  Neither did those who analyzed the debates afterward dispute and disparage each other as they debated about who “won” or “lost.”  In fact, the question of winning or losing didn’t even come up. 

In case, you missed the two-hour forum, Obama took the stage for a full hour and answered questions from moderator Rick Warren while McCain remained off-stage in a sound-proof room.  Then McCain came on stage and answered the SAME questions from the moderator.

Without a doubt, it was the most enlightening forum to date.  Sure, the candidates got a few ‘gimme’ questions like, “Why do you want to be president?”  But they also got some tough questions like:  “What has been your biggest moral failure personally?”  “What three people will you be listening to as president?”  “Which issue have you changed your position on from 10 years ago, and why?”  “When does life begin?”   “How do you define rich—give me a number?”

Obama’s Communication Style:  

Obama looked relaxed, confident, comfortable, congenial. He tossed in dash of humor here and there (to Warren’s question about how he would define rich, he shot back that Warren would certainly fall in that category, with 25 million copies of his books sold.)

Obama gave broad, general, answers to most questions.  For example, to the question about three people he’d listen to as president, he named his mother, wife, and grandmother.  To the question about when life began, he responded that was a “complex scientific and theological issue” and “above his pay-grade.” 

His sincerity and concern for his country came through in his tone and body language.  He talked about America’s responsibility to feed the hungry, heal the sick, help the poor, and live out their faith in the world.

McCain’s Communication Style:

McCain’s answers were brief, precise, decisive, specific.  On foreign affairs, he had a quick grasp of supporting examples for his summary answers.  For example, to the question “how do you define marriage,” he said simply, “Marriage is a union between one man and one woman.”  To the question about “when a baby should be granted human rights,” he responded, “At conception.”  To the question about which three people he would likely listen to, he named individuals that you might know of—individuals that you might either admire or dislike.  (General Petraeus, the CEO of eBay, and a democratic party leader). 

He often elaborated with an anecdote to illustrate his point or principle.  He peppered his responses to the foreign affairs questions with incidents, countries, presidents, prime ministers, dates, and crises as if he’d just prepped for a geography exam.  (Hey, maybe I just noticed this because I used to fall asleep in geography class.)

Showing humility in his responses about personal experiences and sacrifices, he was still able to use those experiences appropriately to establish credibility. When asked about his concern for the huge problem of more than 118 million orphans in the world, he mentioned that he and wife Cindy had adopted a 5-week-old orphan (now 17 years old) from a third-world country.

Although he looked nervous on the first question or two, he quickly relaxed in this forum and looked comfortable (smiling, nodding, natural gestures in sync with words, humor) within a few minutes. 

So who made all this possible?

Rick Warren:  Moderator

My analysis would be incomplete if I didn’t comment on the masterful job done by the moderator, pastor of Saddleback Church, the fourth largest church in the United States, with more than 22,000 members.   So what did he do to pull this off?

• Neutral site:  He selected a site that would minimize the sports-contest atmosphere that typically surrounds such gatherings and sets up a win-lose mentality on stage.
• Opening comments:  He stated the purpose—to set up a nonconfrontational forum, whereby listeners could get to know the candidates personally and hear their views on important issues.  He stated his goodwill and personal liking for both candidates, extending his personal credibility—high with the audience—to both candidates.
• He greeted both candidates warmly, hugging them as they came on stage.
• His tone in asking the questions was friend-to-friend, warm, genial—yet direct.
• He listened thoughtfully to their answers without cutting them off.  His facial expression and manner conveyed genuine interest in understanding the candidate’s viewpoint.
• He asked the audience—the entire audience––to stand in honor of each candidate as they finished their remarks (unlike other debates, where one side sits in stone-silence while the other stands and claps).

Well done, candidates and moderator!  Who won?   America. 

Posted at 9:41am in Communication—Oral, General Communication | Permalink | Add Comment » |

Hearing and watching the two talk about the recent turn of events is a study in contrasts.

John Edwards’ written words on August 8, 2008:  “In 2006, I made a serious error in judgment and conducted myself in a way that was disloyal to my family and to my core beliefs.  I recognized my mistake and I told my wife that I had a liaison with another woman, and I asked for her forgiveness.  Although I was honest in every painful detail with my family, I did not tell the public.  When a supermarket tabloid told a version of the story, I used the fact that the story contained many falsities to deny it.  But being 99% honest is no longer enough. 

“I was and am ashamed of my conduct and choices, and I had hoped that it would never become public.  With my family, I took responsibility for my actions in 2006 and today I take full responsibility publicly. But that misconduct took place for a short period in 2006.  It ended then.”

Not.

“Liason”?  “99% honest”?  “Took full responsibility”—in what way?  “A short period”?  “Ended”?

In the aftermath of that written release, the senator answered questions in a news conference, during which he came across equally insincerely. He thanked reporters for coming.  When they asked the tough questions, he thanked them for probing, smiling as if he’d just been complimented on his hairdo.

Switch to Elizabeth’s interview with Good Morning America last week. 

She reports that she was “angry, even furious,” with him.  None of this “we’ve worked through it months ago and are both better people because of it” that we so often hear from those less honest.  Her facial expression and tone underscored the pain of betrayal as she described her decision and choice, in light of the cancer and prognosis, to stay with the senator for the sake of their children. 

She did not sound bitter, battered, or belittled.  She simply sounded like the better person.

Authenticity counts for much in political races.  If John Edwards ever decides to give it another shot in politics, maybe he should have Elizabeth mentor him.

Posted at 8:40am in Communication—Interpersonal | Permalink | Add Comment » |

Want to hear a great story on what happens when people working together—often within the same organization or department and even on the same project—don’t talk to each other?

Writing in BusinessWeek, Robert Campbell tells the mystery of Werner Otto Hall at Harvard.  It is a three-story addition at the rear of the university’s famous Fogg Art Museum. Otto houses Harvard’s Busch Reisinger Museum.  On the inside, it’s a wonderful display of 20th Century German art.  On the outside, it’s a rotting mess.

The cause as best they know it today:  The art people didn’t talk to the architects.  The cure for the problem?   Knock it down and start over.

Read the full article here.

Posted at 4:42pm in General Communication | Permalink | Add Comment » |

One-size-fits-all works just about as well in presentations and documents as it does in shoes and swimsuits.  But it’s an issue that crops up often.  Here’s how a recent reader put it:

Dianna,

As a government civilian, I work in a large office environment surrounded by military members. Of 1,000+ people, there are 16 civilian employees. The military structure at the senior enlisted and officer levels really has become more corporate over the years. Still, the hierarchy is in place and there is a more rigid distance between (what would be in a 1,000-employee firm) a first line manager and the second line manager, followed by a huge gap between the assistant vice president and the vice president for, say, operations.

I have two primary functions: one as a senior, skilled technician and the other as a consultant of sorts. My biggest challenge is to be an effective communicator at every level of the process, something which few of the military members must do. I need to be able to communicate on large-scale, abstract concepts with the Commander and communicate in a detailed, technical environment with the technicians, along with everyone else in between. Should I be tailoring my speech to my listener or working on a one-size-fits-all communication pattern?

Erik

The mark of an effective communicator is the ability to shape a message that “gets through” to people at all levels in an organization.  Poor communicators dump data and information and leave their poor listeners to sift through and figure out what the message means for them in their day-to-day jobs.

Information is not communication.

Yet people frequently walk into briefing after briefing with the same set of slides—whether talking to the executive team, the mid-management committee of colleagues, or their staff of implementers.  And they wonder why they don’t get approval for their projects, buy-in on plans, or support from their team.

Consider these tips:

1. Tailor your core message to the key interest of your audience.  Answer this question:  How will they use the information?  For immediate decision?  For later response?  To distribute to others?  As talking points to “sell your idea” later?
2. Decide what they already know about the subject and try not to tell them that.
3. Delete extraneous detail.
4. Cut the jargon.

When it comes to communication, tuck, trim, tailor.  One size definitely does not fit all.

Posted at 8:34am in Communication—Interpersonal, General Communication | Permalink | Add Comment » |