Uncommon to most of our Labor Day weekends, we relaxed and visited with family instead of the usual getting kids ready to start school on Tuesday. So with that enjoyable break, I am finally catching up on my reading. One of my RSS feeds is from Keith Rosen, author of Complete Idiot’s Guide to Cold Calling. His post on The Best Managers Are Fully Accountable For Their Communication is definitely worth reading, but let me share his 7 Tips to Strengthen Communication with you.
- Am I taking full responsibility for the message being heard by the other person? (Remember that it doesn’t matter what you say, it only matters what the other person hears.)
- Did I respect the other person’s point of view or did I have a reaction (disagreement) to what they were saying that prevented me from listening to their full message?
- If I was asking someone to take a specific action (delegating), did I make my request clear & check to see if the conversation worked/was successful? (Did I receive feedback to ensure that I was understood?)
- Did I receive value from the conversation? (Did I allow the other person to contribute to me?)
- If the outcome of the conversation did not meet my expectations, what did I learn that would enable me to better communicate with that person? (Did I open up a new and greater possibility that I didn’t notice before?)
- Did I give the person the gift of my listening?
- When delegating a task or having a conversation, was I cognizant of the common sense trap?