You Suck at Communicating

Okay, okay. Maybe that’s a little harsh, but don’t take it personally, so do I. We spend the entirety of our waking hours communicating — verbally and visually; with our actions and even with our inaction; to colleagues, clients, customers, friends and loved ones. So why are we so horrible at doing so?

“The single biggest problem in communication is the illusion that it has taken place.” -George Bernard Shaw

Here’s a few things that have helped me overcome communication issues. Hopefully they help you too.

Be Prepared

Politicians, Comedians, News Anchors — they all have full teams of writers working to ensure their policy, punch line, or breaking news is received in the right manner. Even Reality TV is scripted. Then why do we feel we can walk into a room full of stakeholders without a minute of preparation and expect our agenda to get across appropriately, let alone approved or bought into?

Don’t sell yourself or your audience short — be prepared.

Some tips on being prepared:

1. Write it down. Start with complete thoughts if you have the time and reformat to smaller bite-size chunks to allow for ad-libbing and a more casual delivery.

2. Prepare an agenda. Even just a few bullet points of what you expect to cover will help you and your audience stay on track.

3. Practice makes better. It goes without saying, but you only get better by doing. Look for opportunities to stretch your communication skills and go the extra mile to ensure quality delivery of your agenda.

The old adage, “I’d have written a shorter letter but I didn’t have the time” holds true with communication. Even casual one-on-ones can become more effective and oftentimes shorter with the appropriate amount of preparation. You never know, a few minutes of preparation may just turn that hour meeting into a 15 minute stand-up. And we all know fewer, shorter meetings is a good thing.

Be Quick to Listen, Slow to Speak

Effective communication and collaboration is often just as much about what you don’t say.

We’ve all been there — room full of stakeholders; hours of painstaking design work up on the screen; then those fateful words, “Well, what do you think?”. Listening to stakeholder feedback and responding appropriately is critical to good communication.

Some tips on listening:

1. Don’t be defensive. Regardless of how feedback is shared, being defensive never works. Stand up for what you believe in, but if possible, wait a bit and prepare to appropriately defend your point of view.

2. Ask clarifying questions. Remember, you suck at communicating, so don’t expect your stakeholders to share their ideas perfectly either. Ask as many questions as you can to get to the bottom of their intended critique.

3. Consider everything. Even if you have already considered it, make everyone feel as though their voice has been heard.

4. Write it down. Actively taking notes is not only a great way to remember everyone’s feedback, but is also a reinforcing action that shows everyone is being heard.

5. Follow-up. This is most often done by recapping the feedback from the previous meeting before diving into the current iteration. We have a rule on our design team that if feedback is shared in a more casual or one-off setting, the designer should circle back with whomever shared the feedback (stakeholder, team member or otherwise) and show them the progress since their feedback was shared.

Being slow to speak is not just good proverbial advice, but goes a long way in ensuring effective communication.

Do it in Person

Much conflict can be avoided when we take the time to communicate face-to-face. When talking to someone in person you get all of the emotion, facial expression and body language that comes with what they (and you) are trying to communicate — leaving little for misinterpretation.

Some tips for communicating in person:

1. Don’t hit “send”. Writing that lengthy email can be very therapeutic, but will do no good once sent through cyberspace. No matter how carefully you craft your words you will never be able to control how others read them.

2. Use video. Using a tool like Skype or G-chat is a free, easy and effective way to get a group of people together remotely. You see them, they see you, and you never have to leave your desk or travel to another country. We live in the future.

3. Schedule a meeting. Come prepared and be quick to listen.

There you have it. Just a few tips I’ve found to be helpful. Oh, and remember, Paul Rand didn’t just throw a bunch of logo options at Steve Jobs for NeXT, he designed one logo and then wrote a whole book on it. There’s quite a lesson on communication in there somewhere.