Do You Communicate?

Communication is more than just speaking and expressing your views. Proper communication aims at eliciting a response from the audience. Communications is a complicated subject in the marketing context. Yet, in the daily work life, communication has gained far prominence. Communication is different from mere interactions. You have interactions with different key people- customers, superiors, peers, and subordinates. It is necessary to formulate strategies to communicate effectively to each of these key groups. Same rules cannot be applied to all the key persons.

Customers
Communication with customers is the most daunting task. Keeping aside the communication done in the form of advertising and marketing, there are many more situations where people need to continuously communicate with customers. Customer service representatives are trained with the procedures on how to deal with the various types of customers. Not all customers are polite and happy. You cannot take for granted a polite customer who might turn hostile if he is not satisfied with your reception. The most important attribute while communicating with customers is to listen. Listening is an important skill that has to be greatly developed while speaking to customers. You need to be empathetic with the customers as the situation demands and speak in the language of the customer while trying to either elicit a response from him or solving his problem. Every company has its own culture. As a representative of the company, you need to reflect the culture of the company while speaking in the language of the customer. Enormous literature is available to suggest how to deal with different types of customers.

Superiors
Handling superiors sometimes seems to be difficult than handling customers. There are many toxic bosses who know very little about the work and hate to listen to your advice. There is a polite way in which you can put across your point to your manager or boss. However, the rapport has to be established from the beginning. Speak less with your boss and speak with confidence. Learn not to hurt your manager's ego as you suggest alternative. Put it effectively and let it seem to the boss that it is his own idea. In this way, you can establish a receptive relation with your boss. Your boss would love to discuss problems with you and come up with solutions every time a problem occurs. Your communication with the boss influences your relationship with the boss. Avoid saying the word - No - to your boss and learn to speak positively even if you are not willing to accept his orders. Explain issues in such a way that the boss is convinced that you are very interested to carry out a particular task but resources do not permit to. Similarly, if you are ready to take responsibility for your boss's mistakes, you are advantage. However, remember the blurring line that you should not cross. It is again a problem if your boss takes all the credit and dumps failures on you.

Peers and Subordinates
Communicating with peers and subordinates is very important as it reflects your ability to lead the team in the future. Let your words show support and your eagerness to help your colleagues always. Be polite and try to address each and every person in your team. If you are comfortably acquainted with all your team members, you are always at an advantage. Be the first one to communicate good messages and congratulate every tem mate for your success. Express the fact that your success would not have been possible without their cooperation. The same rules apply for communicating with subordinates. Learn to gage the personality of the subordinates and apply different styles of leadership to get the work done. Focus on showing equal respect to all the colleagues through your words.

Learn to develop a unique communication style that stays in sync with your amicable personality to make your day cheerful and better relationships with all the stakeholders.