Communication within any project team requires four key elements:

All About Communication

Practically everything that we do as human beings requires communications at some level. We communicate when we are hungry, or tired, or happy, or sad. We communicate when we love someone and when we are angry. Buying groceries requires communication and so does visiting the doctor. You’d think that after a few hundred thousand years of practice humans would have this communication thing down pat. You’d think so, but that’s not always the case.

Communication is part art and part science. The “art” is being able to convey your message to someone else who you want to hear it. The “science” part is actually hearing the message. It’s not just being aware of the sound that the other person is making nor is it simply understanding the words. All of that is just hearing at its most basic level. The real science is actually in listening and that’s a whole different problem.

That’s because listening is a skill that everyone is expected to have yet no one teaches to us. We are taught how to read, how to do math and even how to speak. No one teaches us how to listen.

How to Listen Effectively

Simply hearing what someone says does not mean that you are listening or actually comprehending what is being communicated. And I cannot tell you how much this one simple truth has cost companies in wasted time, effort and dollars.

If a team member relates a project need and you misunderstand what was asked of you, you could end up spending a lot of time or money completing the task yet deliver something which is worthless.

Hearing is simply being able to recognize sound. Listening is being able to discern the meaning of that sound.

In order for listening to be effective the receiver of the information must fully understand what the information transmitter wanted them to understand. It’s that simple in concept but a lot harder to manage in practice. There are several reasons why effective listening fails. Here are the most common ones:

Preoccupation

Often a person simply fails to pay attention because their mind is preoccupied. This is the easiest of all the problems to remedy.

When someone is talking to you stop whatever you are doing, look at that person (unless you’re on the telephone, of course) and give them 100% of your attention.

That means that you don’t read your email while they are talking and you don’t think about your big night out that’s coming up. You give 100% of your attention to the person who is speaking.

Personal Bias

Personal opinions and biases also play a role in affecting our ability to listen. When you have to communicate with someone you don’t like, for example, your desire to have the conversation end as quickly as possible will cloud your ability to listen.

The cure for this problem is a little more difficult because it requires you to be a bigger person than you might be ready to be. There is no room for personal bias in a team environment. When you fail to listen to another team member you end up jeopardizing the project and your personal reputation.

If you can’t work out your differences with the other person then you must at least put them aside until after the project is completed. Even the fox and the rabbit will share a safe place during a forest fire.

Ego

There was a good reason that the first USA for Africa recording session opened with producer Quincy Jones saying, “Check your ego at the door”. He realized that such a large gathering of super stars was a potential breeding ground for conflict as each performer jockeyed for attention.

It’s hard to listen effectively when you think that you know more than the person who is talking to you. Attention wanders and important details get lost. Maybe you actually do know more than the person who is talking to you, but that doesn’t mean that he or she isn’t going to say something that will affect you or the project. The cure for this problem is simple. Take a cue from Quincy Jones and simply check your ego at the door.

Shouting, speaking too loudly, gesticulating and other methods of making ourselves heard rarely get the job done successfully. Speaking in a subdued tone, however, has a tendency to make people lean in and actually make an effort to hear what you’re saying. One of the best secrets of making yourself heard lies not only in the decibel level you use but also in the eye contact you make.

Pre-Conceived Notions

Often we think that we already know what the other person is going to say so we “tune them out”. That’s an outstanding way to miss a small detail that could have saved you hours of work or saved you from ruining someone else’s hard work.

Working on a team is a lot like crossing a railroad track. There’s a sign there that reads: Stop, Look & Listen!

How to Be Heard Effectively

Meeting your audience’s eyes as you speak can make the difference between people tuning you out – and people hanging on to every word you say. This rule applies when speaking to a single person or to a room full of people. Even when speaking to a crowd, speakers scan the audience and make brief eye contact now and then with as many individuals as possible in order to cement the connection between the speakers and their listeners.

Here are some good general tips to improve your verbal communication:

• Speak clearly
• Speak with confidence
• Make eye contact with multiple participants
• Scan the audience to be inclusive of all

How to Ask Questions

When asking questions, make sure you’re asking clear, concise questions which are pertinent to the current conversation. Asking questions about something you thought about regarding the previous topic interrupts the flow of creative communication and hinders thoughts of both askers and answerers on the immediate issue at hand.

Try to save off-topic questions until the end of the meeting, even if you need to write them down to be able to remember. Then approach the speaker with your query.

It’s also important to think before you ask. Get your thoughts in order so that you create a clearly understandable question without a lot of hesitancy or other confusing sentence interruptions.

How to Answer Questions

Answer questions as clearly and concisely as you ask questions – even if it takes a few moments to first get your thoughts together. Try to keep your answers straightforward and avoid using big words that are designed to make you look intelligent.

Mark Twain once said, “Never use a word that’s bigger than marmalade.” No one wants to have to refer to a dictionary in order to decipher the answer to a question. Also avoid “jargon” even if you assume that everyone knows what you’re talking about.

Samuel Clemens aka Mark Twain

There Are No Dumb Questions

Remember, no matter how inane a question appears — it’s not! Dumb questions are only those that remain unasked. It helps to remember the adage, “The squeaky wheel gets the grease.” If you don’t ask your question, you’ll never know the answer. You’ll then be forced to rely on guesswork which carries with it the potential of making you appear truly unwise because you didn’t take the opportunity to ask when you had the chance.

Conversely, never consider a question asked of you as foolish. If someone comes forward with an honest question – however simple the answer may be – you appear as the stupid one if you make fun of the person who asked the question. And whether you do so verbally or only in your own mind, chances are your answer will reveal your thoughts.

Always remember that the shoe could easily be on the other foot and you may someday need an answer to a question which appears “dumb” to someone else. Call it Karma, Murphy’s Law or just as luck would have it.

The most important thing to bear in mind whether you are fielding questions or asking them is the communication factor. What matters is the accurate conveyance of ideas and understanding, no matter how seemingly “dumb” or “intelligent.”

Avoiding Cultural Misunderstandings

The best way to avoid cultural misunderstandings when speaking is to know your audience and mind your manners. It’s not that difficult to avoid conflict when you treat others with respect and dignity, no matter what their heritage or their personal or religious beliefs.

It should go without saying that there is simply no room for racial slurs, sexual comments, ethnic jokes or any other kind of disparaging comments.

However, there are also instances where an intended nicety can backfire. Here’s a lesson learned from a friend of mine who served in the Gulf War…

“I wanted to make my Iraqi counterpart feel comfortable so I called him Dude, as I did with my closer American friends. Apparently this was the equivalent a great insult in his culture.”

Taking the time and effort to learn about another’s culture can go a long way towards avoiding bad feelings and disharmony. Make sure that anyone you speak to fully understands the message you’re trying to relate by asking him or her directly, with respect, to summarize what you’ve said. This way you’ll know immediately if something got “lost in translation” and the error can be corrected before a major calamity occurs.

This same type of thinking applies when you are the one listening to a speaker from a different culture than yours. You must be willing to ask questions, even seemingly “dumb” ones, if you are ever unclear about anything the speaker says. You’ll also do well by learning to overlook errors in speech that obviously were not intended to be offensive. There’s no advantage in harboring negative feelings when the intent is clear but the choice of words or their construction isn’t.

Someone once told me that I had “very crudely understood what they meant.” I was taken back for a moment until I realized that what he was trying to say was that I had “understood the gist of his idea” but not the specifics.

Making yourself heard is an art which anyone can learn.

Remember this Golden Rule: Speak unto others as you would have them speak unto you.