Coping with nerves: the credibility problem

Nervousness is probably the biggest problem to be surmounted for most inexperienced speakers. Were it not for nervousness, common sense, and normal intelligence, would ensure that most talks were interesting and well planned. But nervousness seems to disable common sense, and normal intelligence gets swamped by anxiety. A blog like this is needed just because speakers get nervous. Like a rabbit caught in a car’s headlights, they don’t know which way to run. All sorts of bizarre behavior results, unless there are firm guide lines. Like clinging to the wreckage in a storm, any fragment of advice gives security. Even if the speaker doesn’t feel at all like smiling, for example, the knowledge that he or she ought to smile is enough to make them feel that they are doing the right thing.

Nervousness is a very real problem, and is the root of most of the other problems with speaking. We all talk competently in a group of friends, but as soon as the group of friends becomes a wall of strangers, nervousness usurps our every-day competence, and we need the prop of advice.

Unfortunately, many experts on speaking dismiss nervousness as not worth discussing. Like laziness, or cowardice, these blog seem to imply that it is something to be ashamed of, and certainly not something to be discussed. The speaker may be jollied along with advice like ‘Don’t worry’, or ‘It’ll be all right’. He or she is given the impression that nervousness, like incontinence, is something which is better not thought about. It will go away if you ignore it, and if not, there’s nothing to be done about it. Nervousness is beyond help, these books seem to imply, and only courage will overcome it. Good chaps put a brave face on it, and never mention it to other chaps.

Sadly, all this hearty pretense is no help; it merely increases the sufferer’s sense of his or her own inadequacy. It is also cruel: extreme nervousness is one of the most unpleasant experiences most civilized people go through. It is a form of physical and mental suffering which is unparalleled. Extreme misery, anguished anxiety, and even physical nausea are added to shame and a sense of inadequacy. Embarrassment is the least of the suffering. It may take weeks, months even to get over the misery caused by a catastrophic failure to cope with nervousness. The speaker may go through savage reassessments of his or her abilities as a result of ruining a presentation through nerves. Undoubtedly, nervousness is a serious problem; it needs careful and considered help.

Nervousness can be helped, and eventually reduced to manageable proportions. It is, after all, a purely mental phenomenon. Attitudes, and knowledge about the cause and function of the anxiety, advice about how to reduce it, and experience which renders the terrifying familiar, are the clues. Much of the work on nervousness has been done by musicians: talented young musicians find the intricate dexterity required to play their instruments turned into clumsiness in front of judges and audiences. Since it is clearly a waste, musicians have studied the problems of tension in performance. Speakers, who have similar problems, can benefit from the knowledge and techniques gained from these studies.

The first thing to learn about nervousness is that it is universal. Every nervous speaker thinks that he or she is the only one in the world to suffer. Compared with the calm competence of every one else, he or she feels their own shameful failure as a personal inadequacy. The truth is that nervousness when facing an audience is very common. Almost everyone suffers from nerves, even experienced professionals, and the reason why we are not aware of this is simply that the basic effect of nerves doesn’t show. Providing the gestures are controlled, butterflies in the stomach are invisible to the audience. So the calm and confident speaker you watched with envy, was almost certainly trembling like a leaf inside: you just couldn’t see it.

It is a good thing that speakers are nervous. Contrary to popular belief, the calm and controlled speaker is acting, he or she is disguising nervousness in a practised simulation of indifference. If he or she were really not nervous, there would be no energy to give the talk: nerves are useful to the speaker, without them he would go to sleep. Even people who make their living from appearing in front of audiences—actors, comedians, performers—are nervous just before going on stage. They rely on these nerves to give them the boost of energy which makes them sparkle. And the shot of adrenalin they get becomes a fix. It is something they can’t do without, and is probably why these people love the stage experience so much. Nervousness is a useful, and essential part of performance, not something to worry about or be ashamed of. The art of effective speaking is not ceasing to be nervous; it is using the nervous energy to improve the talk. Standing up and speaking requires a great deal of effort: the slight lift given by nervousness arouses our energies.

If you feel you have an unusually nervous disposition, you may be surprised to know that you are not alone. Such sensitivity is common; psychologists calculate that: ‘Between five and eight per cent of the population are unduly anxious.’ Knowing that you are not alone doesn’t change the fact that you are nervous, but it should give you hope that your nervousness can be conquered. One of the more unpleasant features of being very nervous is a sense of isolation, and
the fear of shame if others see that you are nervous. Take heart, there is nothing especially unusual in being highly sensitive, and you are far from alone. Almost certainly, there are compensating advantages in your higher than average levels of arousal, and sensitive response to anxiety. Highly nervous people, for instance, are often of above average intelligence. It is possible to apply this intelligence to solving the problem of nervousness by learning about it, and applying the results of research. The higher sensitivity is also compensated by greater alertness, and awareness of audience reactions. It sounds paradoxical, but is none the less true. Nervous people usually make good speakers, once they have tamed and applied their nervousness.

Keep Breathing space for memory During Speech

During the body of the talk, it is too easy for ideas to become jumbled together in the listeners’ minds. Unless the speaker is careful to mark the sections with clear signposts, the landscape of the talk will merge into a blur, and few details of the mental journey will be remembered. Where new ideas interfere with ones previously presented there exists what psychologists call ‘retroactive’ interference. Where old ideas interfere with those following (perhaps because they are so arresting that the listener’s mind is still partly dwelling on them) psychologists call it ‘proactive’ interference. The technical terms are not important, but the principle is. Memory depends on clear space around important ideas and facts, and rest or silence is the best form of clear space.

Despite every care, it is still not possible for a speaker to ensure that everything he says is remembered. Partly this is just an inescapable fact of mental life. People forget. Forgetting itself is an interesting subject and psychologists have suggested a number of reasons for forgetting. They include repression, a word coined by Freud to describe the way people force out of consciousness events and ideas which for some reason they do not want to remember. Motivation is as important in forgetting as it is in remembering. Quite slight motives can lead to forgetting, such as an embarrassing professional lapse, which may lead to all information surrounding the situation being repressed.

Other causes of forgetting are the decay of the memory traces for physical reasons, interference from other similar memories, and loss of the ability to locate the memory. According to this last hypothesis, all memories are retained in the brain, but retrieving them is too difficult. Recalling other features of the experience, or working gradually back into our memories, will often enable us to discover memories we had thought lost. Thus my father, writing his autobiography for his grand children in his seventy-second year, started re-telling an incident in which a school-fellow had died of meningitis. To his surprise he found he could remember the boy’s name, and even his address. He had not remembered those facts for sixty years, and certainly could not have recalled them had he been asked. The ‘search’ theory of memory claims that forgetting happens when more and more memories are built up without enough features to differentiate between them. Unless simple clues are given to act as handles, it becomes harder and harder to find any particular fact, from the mass of detail in the memory.

Let me make three final points about memory before concluding this section. The first point is that it is useful to distinguish between active and passive memories. Faces seen at a meeting, for example, remain familiar if we meet them again, even though we may not be able to place a name on them. The image of almost every face we see is retained in the memory; but voluntary access to the information has been lost. Recognition is passive; active recall requires a pathway into the memory. Effective memory relies on clear structures being developed to retain access, and not just on the vividness of the memory itself. The speaker’s task, therefore, is to provide this unforgetable structure, without which the detail amassed in the talk will be lost, like water poured onto sand.

The need for organization to help active memory leads me to the second point. Unless we can see a structure in the details, they are less meaningful, and therefore much more difficult to retain in memory.

It is immediately obvious that learning the first list would be a major task, whereas the middle list is only moderately hard, and the last list is perfectly easy to remember. The conclusion for the speaker is obvious; break up similar facts into patterns. Remember that you must link new ideas into existing ones, using a clear structure, if you want your audience to remember them

The third and final point about memory is a more hopeful one. It is a strange fact that we are usually modest about our memories. Hans Eysenck comments that:

"when you ask most people about their memory, the first thing they usually say is that they have the bad luck to have a very poor memory. There is an interesting contrast here with what happens when you ask people about their intelligence or sense of humour: only a very small percentage of people will admit to below-average intelligence or a poor sense of humour!"

The memory is extraordinarily powerful, much better than we think. When tested on their memory of ten thousand pictures, people recognized 99.6% of them correctly. As the researcher commented: “the recognition of pictures is essentially perfect”. The brain is highly sophisticated and memory itself has no visible limits. The audience could remember much more than they often do; the amount is not limited by any natural maximum capacity. If the speaker prepares his talk in a way which provides the opportunities for memory, and offers a clear scaffolding of organization on which the memories can be hung, there is no limit to what the audience can be
helped to remember.

The structure of reasoning Is Very Important For Preparation of Speaking

The third job of preparation, after selecting the relevant material, and organizing it in a clear and simple structure, is to form the details into a coherent argument. Every talk has a case to argue, unless it has no more structure than a telephone directory. The way this case is argued, the way the details are marshalled as evidence for the points being made, is an important part of the planning.

The first point is that you cannot make the argument complete, and prove every point and detail. Spoken argument can only sketch the outlines of the case. It gives an emphasis and immediacy, through personal involvement, and immediate feedback from the audience, but it does not give a forum for the fine points and the mechanics of scientific proof. Speaking can only offer the bold outlines of proof, not the inner workings, of the argument. The details are better written down. So if you have to present a case which has a detailed proof, you must summarize, give a few salient details, and refer your audience to the published papers, or internal reports.

Skimming over the details of reasoning does not relieve the speaker of the need to be accurate. It is wise to avoid apparently spurious argument; the audience will spot it. Ogden and Richards warn about the ‘process of ‘lubrication’, the art of greasing the descent from the premises to the conclusion.’ While such a process may seem attractive, you should not imagine that the audience is less sharp, just because they have fewer details. They have more time to think, and will be able to bridge the gap between generalizations, to work out the details for themselves. Unless the story hangs together, they will not believe what you say. Accuracy is just as important in spoken presentations, as it is in published papers.

The art of conveying an argument in a spoken presentation lies, then, in the selection of the examples to use. Most scientific arguments are based on induction. But you should never try to offer complete induction, listing tables of figures and results. In a talk you can only state the hypothesis, use a few illustrative examples of the kind of results obtained, and state the conclusions. Of course, you must make sure that the examples you give are typical. One way to do this is also to give exceptions to validate the examples, and forestall criticisms.

The old adage is: ‘The exception proves the rule’. This saying, incidentally, is usually misunderstood, because ‘proof means test, as in ‘proof spirit, or ‘proving’ a gun. The adage means that the rule is checked by the exception. Can the exception dent or explode the rule you are trying to prove? Will the rule survive? The purpose of giving exceptions is to see whether the exception can be explained away as an irrelevance, not a true exception, or an example of some other rule altogether. If not, then the rule must of course be modified to take account of the facts which it does not satisfactorily explain.

The psychology of audiences requires that an attempt is made to illustrate a rule, or general conclusion, with obvious and typical facts, as well as apparent exceptions. The speaker’s job is to allay doubts, and calm suspicions, not to produce cast iron proofs. He has also to explain and clarify the rule, and exemplification is often the best way of explaining, as well as the best way of justifying, a conclusion. But as speaker you should never lose sight of the role of examples as aids to the audience, rather than as elements in a scientific method. If you keep this distinction in mind, you will be able to persuade yourself when preparing the talk that not all details, facts and figures are relevant to the task. A carefully selected set of illustrative examples is all that the structure of the reasoning requires in verbal presentation.

In considering the type of examples to choose, the speaker must find what will be easiest for the audience to understand in the limited time available. Thus, there is evidence that human beings prefer direct proof to indirect proof. That is to say they prefer to be shown that something is the cause, not that all the other possibilites can not be the cause. This seems to be because of the universal tendency to cognitive economy: in other words people like the simple and direct route to a conclusion, rather than one which requires sustained attention, a sharp memory, and active deduction. So the wise speaker will construct his argument as a direct, not an indirect, proof. The aim should be to give strong, simple arguments, which offer clear, uncomplicated reasons, not elaborate and intricate analyses.

Thoughtful Selection: The First Thing Speaker Should Do During Preparation

Speaking is always very much critical point to have effective communication. An expert who have effective communication skill always need to have good command over speaking skill. Effective speaking skill will always help people to build an effective communication etween people through building rapport and exchanging feedbacks. You have to work hard to improve your speaking skill as to improve your effective communication skill. In this regard, i am here discussing the phase where you need to select what you are going to deliver through your speech.

The first important decision in making a selection of material is what you are going to leave out, not what you are going to put in. Talks are not for the transfer of a mass of information from one mind to others. That job is better done by paper. They are best used to give an overview of the subject, to create interest and enthusiasm. If you are already expert in a subject, you must now decide what the audience don’t need to know; if you have to work on a new subject, as soon as you have understood it, you will have to make decisions about what is not needed in the talk.

It is a mistake to try to pad the talk out with masses of information and detail, in the belief that the audience will be impressed by your knowledge. They won’t be—they will simply go to sleep. The amount of information which can be absorbed in one session when listening is strictly limited. The listening situation is quite different from sitting down with a book at a desk, and making notes. When listening, it is not possible to do more than gain an overall impression, and perhaps a handful of facts. Hard, dense packed information, cannot be communicated in talks; it is a mistake to try.

This fact is common experience—think how many actual details you remember from the last technical talk you heard—but it is encouraging to find it supported by research. Erskine and O’Morchoe did an experiment, in which they taught one class only essential principles with little detail, and then compared their knowledge with another class which had been given a lot of details. The first class did better. Their conclusion was that too much material causes interference, and the audience remember less, not more.

Too much detail, then, is counter-productive in a talk (to use one of the familiar buzz-words of the 1970s). Factual information can only be used as illustration, or example, never as the substance of the talk. A verbal presentation communicates attitudes, enthusiasms, impressions, not facts. To try to battle against this natural situation will only alienate the audience, and reduce, not increase, the amount of information that is remembered. If you use cleverly designed visual aids, you may be able to incorporate a few figures and hard facts. But you certainly cannot expect the talk to be the source of reference for this information.

If you need to transfer a mass of solid figures, it is best to give a handout, with the figures tabulated for reference. You can then refer to a sample selection of the figures during the presentation, to illustrate the general point. But the aim of the talk should not be to learn detail. If you are talking on a technical subject, the audience should leave the talk with a desire to go further into the subject, or an impression of the range of complexity the subject embraces. They should not, and cannot, expect to walk out of the room with a mass of figures, facts, and details securely pinned inside their heads. Talks don’t do this. Detailed learning has to be done with paper at a desk; talks are for interest and general information, not the transfer of a dense mass of information.

The first task, then, is to select the material, and reduce the bulk of detail to manageable proportions. Selection, however, requires an aim, and this aim must be specific, not vague. It is impossible to make decisions about whether to reject, or leave in, a particular fact unless there is a very definite image of the audience and its aims in mind. So you must always select your material not for a general talk on the subject, but for a specific speaking task: for this audience, this task, and this amount of time. One consequence of this rule is that each talk you give must be considered separately. A general purpose talk will probably result in a vague presentation which will satisfy none of its audiences.

Another factor which must be considered when selecting information is the unloading rate, and the digestibility of what you are saying. People who are experts in a subject often fail to remember that it has taken them many years to get their minds around it all, and that what seems second nature to them now, may be confusing and alarming to a newcomer. The rate at which new information is offered is an important factor in the ability of the mind to absorb it. This factor, often not even considered, is so important that it is worth spending a little time on it.

Typically, experts assume the audience can absorb information faster than they actually can. I have rarely seen an expert making his subject too simple. So it is fairly safe to assume that you must introduce new ideas more slowly than you think necessary, and never more quickly. There are many techniques available to modify the rate at which new information is provided. You can, for example, modify the rate by repetition, example and anecdote. Simply repeating the same information in different words effectively halves the unloading rate. You can also open up more breathing space between ideas by adding new examples, which illustrate the same point, and you can provide a rest, while focusing on the same point, by including some amusing anecdote which relates to it.

One technique to ease the shock of new information is like getting into cold water by taking a wild plunge. It works by giving the audience a full list of the topics and key words at the beginning of the talk. This is the sudden plunge, and they will then need reassuring that it is not as frightening as it sounds. You can then go back to the beginning, and start again with the first point, slowly making it clear. It is worth spending rather longer on the first point, giving lots of examples and supporting information, because if the audience can be made to understand the first point, they will approach the rest with more confidence. By shocking the audience with their inability to comprehend the whole subject, and then proving to them that they can, after all, be brought to understand the first point they come to, you will boost their confidence in their ability to learn.

Mix old and new Material in Your Speech

Another way of reducing the unloading rate is to ensure that there is a mixture of old and new information. Some speakers seem to think that they must retail only new facts, and can ignore the old facts. This is not so. The old facts are the foundations on which the new facts must be built. These foundations will be buried under all the other daily information the audience must cope with. You must uncover, bring to light, or remind the audience of what they already know before adding new information. It also controls the overall unloading rate. A mixture of familiar facts amongst the new reduces the total strain on memory and comprehension. It gives the audience a satisfying feeling of competence. The feeling of smugness, in the unspoken reaction ‘we know that’, will transfer to a feeling of interest and respect if it is followed by the reaction, ‘but we didn’t know that’. If, just when the feeling is becoming, ‘we can’t cope with all this’, you introduce more familiar material, the audience will feel themselves on firm ground again. By alternating familiar and strange, new and old, the audience’s comprehension is kept flexible and alert.

The technique of mixing familiar and new is supported by theorists of communication. Umberto Eco makes a technical point about the communication of information, which confirms this important principle in selecting information. The content of a presentation cannot be all new; some of it must be familiar, even repetitious, in order to orientate, and rest, the listener’s mind. Eco insists that there must be:

communication dialectic between probability and improbability (that is between the obvious and the new—and ultimately, in a more technical phraseology, between meaning and information). A high rate of improbability runs the risk of not being received, and therefore the message must be tempered in small degree with conventionalities, commonplaces, and must be reiterated…One of the problems in message-coding is the balance between the obvious and the new. How few conventionalities are necessary to communicate a piece of information (as a new thing?).

To achieve this controlled unloading rate, with a mixture of familiar and new information, you must carefully select the examples and analogies. Of course, it is not possible to give a formula for the exact unloading rate appropriate for a particular audience, or to provide an infallible rule so your presentation will be just right. But this doesn’t matter. What matters is that you have thought about the problem, and are aware that you must watch the rate at which you put out new ideas.

Judging the selection of material is more a matter of conscious awareness, than of perfect correctness. Thinking is what matters; don’t blunder on oblivious. Audiences are flexible, subjects have many different ways in which they can be presented, there is usually a willingness to learn in the audience, and an ability to figure it out for themselves. The only rules are to remain aware of audience reaction as you talk, and be prepared to modify what you are saying if blank incomprehension, or glazed stares of boredom, meet what you have said so far.

Vivid and entertaining examples are often the best way to engage an audience’s attention, and to ease the passage of new information. But this does not mean that you should load example after example onto an already satiated audience. Avoid indiscriminate use of all the examples you can think of; choose only the best ones. The examples and analogies you do use must be brief, familiar and concrete. It is often difficult to think of good examples, and one writer on the subject, Donald Bligh, admits that, ‘Personally I find that I can never think of good examples at the time of lecturing. They therefore have to be prepared in advance. In fact it is quite a good idea to collect examples at all times.’ Following the second principle of this chapter, it is a good plan to have more examples than you need, and to make a selection as you talk, depending on which type of examples seems to strike a sympathetic chord, and how much relaxation, or increase, of the unloading rate the situation requires.

There is no doubt that the best way to make the talk memorable is to use materials which are specially relevant to the audience, dramatic, or simply funny. But this can go too far. One speaker, a most distinguished man in his own field, tried to make his lectures memorable in an unusual way. Gray Walter, the famous neurologist, ‘asserted that essential ingredients of a successful lecture were humour, horror and sex. To provide for this alleged desire for sensation, in an erudite lecture on ‘Brain mechanisms and learning’ he used coloured backgrounds for tabulated data in which such outlines as bathing beauties were engraved in white.’ The problem with such tactics is that the audience can sense when they are being pandered to, and soon resent it.

To set out to entertain before anything else will not only fail to communicate the necessary information, it will probably lose the respect of the audience as well. The ideal, as in everything to do with speaking, is to provide as much change and variety as possible. So mix theory with anecdotes; and mix humour with serious points. If you have just given a dry, detailed and strenuous exposition, lighten the atmosphere with an amusing story. And if you have just told a long anecdote, take the opportunity to emphasize a complex theoretical point immediately afterwards. In this way the audience is kept alert by the ever changing demands being made on their attention.

Preparation Is Very Important for Any Speaker

Communication effectively is an art. Effective communication required a people to share his/her thoughts with audience. Speaking is the way of sharing their thoughts. So effective speaking skill is very important to achieve success in communication. And to have such success in communication, it is required that people need to develop their communication skill. Here, i will discuss about the preparation part of speaking which is very important to have success in communication.

If I were asked to give a one word explanation of the sort of confident, organized presentation we all envy, it would be preparation. The confidence comes from the speaker’s knowledge that he or she has everything ready, has thought through the whole subject, and has enough of the right material to support the presentation. The sense of organization comes from the careful arrangements and selection of what is said, so that all the points are part of a logical order. Neither of these virtues are available to the speaker who bets on his luck (or cheek) and just talks off the cuff. Good speakers are prepared.

How do you achieve this? It is as much to do with the audience’s abilities as the speaker’s, and it is about the logic of organization, as much as the psychology of presentation. But the aim of all the advice is the same—that secure and admirable sense of being well prepared. There are two simple pieces of advice which start this process of preparation in the right way. Firstly, ask yourself what the aim of the talk is, rather than what the subject of the talk is. The first is much more specific than the second. If you plan to talk about a particular subject, you may feel the need to mention everything there is to know about that subject. But if the aim of the talk is to arouse the audience’s enthusiasm for a research project on that topic, a brief sketch of the more exciting possibilities would be more relevant. A complete catalogue of every aspect will merely bore them, and will achieve exactly the opposite result.

There are many cases where the aim may be rather different from the subject. The advantage of thinking about the aim is also that thenthe decisions include the audience, and the audience’s perceptions and needs, not just the speaker’s ideas and knowledge. In practice, a very common mistake is to prepare a presentation as a speech on, for example, ‘Heavy water reactors’, without thinking whether the audience is interested in technical details or scare stories. If the aim is to reassure a local population that the heavy water reactor being built next to them is perfectly safe, then a lot of technical details about the design will probably scare them witless! Think of all your decisions when preparing the talk in terms of what you want the talk to achieve, and not in terms of what the bare topic of the talk is.

The second piece of simple advice is to prepare more material than you need. The idea of preparing ‘just the right amount’ is foolish. Until you start talking, you won’t really know how much material you are going to get through, And if you insist on battling on to the bitter end of what you have prepared, you will almost certainly get the timing wrong, as well as turning the talk into a marathon. Talking should never be a dutiful forced march, it should always be an exploration, a discussion, a fascinating glimpse of the subject. It is an opportunity to learn about something new, which has to stop when the allotted time runs out. The best talks all end too soon, and the sense of having more to say, but having no more time, is the most satisfactory impression to leave.

The talk is also more interesting if the audience feel you are stepping smartly through the topic, summarizing far deeper knowledge and just mentioning the more interesting aspects. This impression is created if the speaker has more material than he needs at his finger tips; the need to summarize and curtail while he or she talks keeps up the level of tension, interest, and expectation. An audience should never come out of a talk feeling that the subject, like them, is exhausted. They should always be fired, rather than quenched. This happens best, if you prepare more material than you need. The habit of having extra material also allows you flexibility in timing when giving the talk, and helps you to answer questions at the end.

Communication with Angry People

It is never very easy communicating with angry people and when we are faced with anger we often go on the defensive, understandably so because it feels like we are being attacked, verbally! Our instinct is to either lash out (fight back) or run away (flight). Sometimes flight is the best option, distancing yourself before saying something you might regret later. Or if the angry person is coming at you with a knife, for example, then running away is decidedly the best option!

Getting angry with someone who is angry with you will only escalate the situation so it is best if you can deal with this as calmly and as assertively as possible.

Your inner voice is critical here. Instead of thinking ‘How dare this person speak to me like this’, which will only make you aggressive towards them, it is far better to tell yourself to keep calm, that you can handle it.

My own response to anger is to depersonalize it by thinking, ‘Why is this person behaving like this? There must be a reason.’ You need to keep an open mind as to what is causing that anger, trying to see it from the other person’s viewpoint.

When someone is angry it is not usually you they are angry with but the situation. Something has happened to make them angry. You need to deal with it before it escalates into a personal attack.

Get the right body language and inner voice

Body language is critical here. Keep your posture as upright and open as possible, telling yourself, ‘I can handle this, I can deal with this, I can keep calm.’ Take slow breaths. Keep your eye contact on the other person and lean towards them. This takes courage. Mirror the other person’s body language if you can but obviously if they are waving a fist at you it is not advisable to mirror this! What I mean is that if they are standing you should stand too, if they are sitting then sit down.

What to do next

Once you have got your inner voice under control and your body language right, listen hard to what they are saying. When people are angry they do not always express themselves clearly, in fact they rarely do. They let off steam. Allow them to do this and don’t interrupt them. Let them have their say. You can never reason with someone until they have worked their anger out. When they have said what they needed to say then you can start asking them questions but before you do this summarize what they have said, stating the position as they see it. This enables you to check that you have fully understood the situation and shows them that you have listened. Keep your voice assertive, i.e. steady and controlled, neither shouting nor mumbling.

For example:

‘So what you’re saying, Mr. Smith, is that we promised to come and see you on Thursday and after waiting in all day, no one turned up?’

‘Yes, that’s exactly what I’m saying. I had to take a whole day off work.’

Empathize if you need to and apologize if you or your organization is in the wrong.

‘I do apologize Mr. Smith. I recognize how irritating and inconvenient that must have been for you. Now, let me take some details and sort this out for you. What is the order number?’

Here I have apologized and empathized with him (well who wouldn’t?) and then asked him an open question to get the facts. By this time hopefully Mr. Smith is calming down.

Sometimes you can also de-escalate this situation by asking the angry person what action they would like you to take. This puts the initiative (and the solution) firmly back with them, sometimes taking them by surprise and catching them off guard.

Compliant- The Last Personality Trait Group

The Type D (compliant) likes to comply with the rules and regulations. This means that they are usually very systematic, precise, hyperefficient and bureaucratic. These people love facts and detail, the more the better.

They can often be shy and self-effacing unless they have a high degree of B in their personality. Equally they could need a great deal of assurance depending on their level of intellect. Their compliant nature means they can often be easily agreeing which makes it difficult for you to know exactly what they are really feeling and thinking. They need to feel completely sure of their position and of others’ expectations.

They can give the impression of coldness and disinterest and will use rules, authority and logical argument to influence the actions of others. They have a tendency to correct errors and inaccuracies that others might consider insignificant.

Managing a Compliant People

If you are managing a Type D then they like long-term goals fully negotiated. They like harmony and tend to avoid direct confrontation. They need a detailed brief and explanation of reasons before doing anything. They can often prevaricate and do not like taking risks. They are concerned with quality, and do not want to accept inferior work regardless of timescales so you will need to allow plenty of time for them to do things. You will also need to delegate very specifically. They can be surprisingly ambitious with lofty goals but an innate lack of assertiveness and unwillingness to become involved in confrontational situations can make it difficult for them to achieve their goals.

They are punctual and like punctuality in others. Coupled with a high intellect, these people are attracted to jobs like systems analysts, researchers, medical consultants, scientists.

Their influencing style is based on logic and facts often quoting authorities and rules and regulations. Their weakness can be rigidity and nitpicking.

Relating to a Compliant People

You will need to give them plenty of time to make up their mind but gently direct them. Be straightforward in your approach, stick to the business in hand and build credibility by listing the pros and cons to any suggestions you make. Reassure them that there won’t be any surprises. Be realistic and accurate and provide solid, tangible, practical evidence. They need time to make any decisions.

Recognising a Compliant People

With this personality type you may get lowered eye contact and fidgeting mannerisms. There will be no dominant body language, in fact the body language is much more likely to be submissive. The handshake can be perfunctory and not terribly firm. Compliant individuals can often speak quietly and can be vague. Again, as with our Type C personality the Type D will enjoy complex hobbies requiring patience and detail. There are, of course, many more complexities of personalities than I have given you here but I hope the above goes some way in helping you to understand that we are all different and because we are we need to accept that different approaches work with different people. Being aware of the different personalities, reading the body language and keeping an open mind so that you try and understand where the other person is coming from can all combine to help you relate to other people more effectively, and, hopefully, give you the ability to communicate with them more confidently.

Measured- Third Group of Personality Traits

The Type C is measured and far more logical and analytical than either our A or our B personality. They are steady, often security minded and don’t like a lot of change. They can be suspicious and sceptical of new ideas and it will take some time to persuade them.

They are consistent, caring and patient. They often make good nurses particularly if their C personality is combined with the people skills of a B Personality. They don’t like taking risks and will only do so if they have weighed up all the pro’s and con’s. They are great listmakers!

Many engineers fall into this category, as they are attracted to the occupation by its analytical, methodical approach. Lawyers, accountants and professional buyers may also fall into this personality type.

Because of their cautious nature Type C’s can have a tendency to procrastinate and over-plan. They are generally warm hearted but when aggressive can be very stubborn and intransient.

Their influencing style is based on logic and facts. Fairness is paramount to a Type C personality.

Managing a Measured Personality People

If you are managing a Type C personality then it is best to set long-term goals with careful and periodic reviews. The Type C needs to be told what you want; they prefer to rely on more assertive people to take the lead.

When introducing change it is best to do it in stages, introducing an element of trial and give them time to adapt. Explain and delegate with detail. Once embarked on a task the C will want to concentrate on it, and doesn’t like interruptions and distractions, or changing the goalposts half way along. They work slowly and thoroughly. For this person to communicate more confidently they need to feel they have your support and encouragement. In informal or antagonistic situations they could clam up.

Relating to a Measured People

In order to communicate more effectively with a Type C personality you should try winning them over with a logical reasoned approach rather than appealing to ideals which would succeed with our Type B or vanity or ego which would succeed with our Type A. Once you have won them over, or got a commitment from them, they are often very loyal and reliable. You need to take time to build relationships with them, giving them time to explore their real feelings.

Your open questions are vital here. These are people who will simply give you a one-word answer if you ask a closed question. They won’t help you out like the Type B who could talk until the cows come home.

You will need to be sincere and show a genuine interest in them. Take time to find areas of common ground. Be honest and open and patiently draw them out in a non-threatening manner. Slow down, move casually and informally. Provide lots of assurances and give clear specific solutions with maximum guarantees. Give them the detail. If you don’t, they will ask for it. You can’t fob them off. Don’t rush them – they don’t like it.

For a Type A this can be very hard to deal with but if you want to communicate more effectively with someone who is a Type C then you must make this effort. Equally if you are a Type C communicating with a Type A then learn to speed up, prepare what you have to away from any meeting and when in the meeting be as direct as you can. I had a good example of this when running one of my courses. The headteacher of a school who was a Type A personality told me that he was having difficulty getting on with his deputy head. The deputy headteacher told me that she was having difficulty getting on with her headteacher. It was apparent to me that she was a Type C personality. She liked detail and he didn’t. I told her that for her next meeting with him she should prepare as thoroughly as she could outside the meeting and that when she went into the meeting she should give the headteacher short sharp answers and only the information he required, leaving out detailed explanations. This she did and reported back to me with the result that, after the meeting her headteacher said, ‘That was the best meeting we’ve had.’ He felt it was a good meeting because she had communicated with him in the style he liked, understood and could respond to.

Whereas our Type B is optimistic and enthusiastic our Type C is pessimistic and cautious. This can cause frustration between the two different personality types but equally the two can complement one another and work and live very well together if they recognize their individual personalities and strengths. Type B can encourage Type C to ‘lighten up’ and take risks and a Type C can reign a Type B back in when he or she goes ‘over the top’! Two Type C’s in a relationship will also work well. It might not be fiery but it could be a long, loyal and comfortable relationship.

Recognising a Measured personality

They are not motivated by status so the designer accessories, big cars etc. will be missing. In addition, there will be no dominant body language; the handshake can be firm or weak. Their dead giveaway though is their facial expression and body language. The Type C will be looking at you rather sceptically. They will sit well back in their chair with their arms folded, not necessarily with hostility, but they will reserve judgment on you and what you are saying until they have weighed you up and decided whether or not they like you.

Their hobbies will be those that require more detail and patience – perhaps fishing, cross stitch, cake decorating.

Do You Posses Social Personality Traits in Yourself?

Nature of Social Personality Traits People

The Type B (Social) likes people and likes to be liked. They find it much easier than any of the other personality types to mirror and match another person’s body language because they are more attuned to people needs and moods. They do it rather naturally because they want people to like them.

They are adaptable, flexible and participative. They have high energy levels and are articulate, confident and cooperative. They are enthusiastic, embracing and come up with lots of ideas and they are not afraid of change, in fact they thrive on it.

They are usually highly persuasive individuals who manage in a democratic style but find it hard to deal with confrontation. Because of their desire to please they can often change their mind to suit the person or situation, so can appear fickle and manipulative to some people.

Their influencing style is that of the friendly helper showing concern, expressing friendliness and warmth. They try to influence by appealing to others’ emotions. Their optimism is usually a major influencing factor but they may be gullible and impractical.

Managing a Social Personal:

If you are managing a Type B individual then you will need to give them short to medium-term goals and a consistent management approach. They thrive on variety and like lots of things to do and to be involved with people. If they are not working or involved in people then they will become demotivated and unhappy. Continued rejection and disapproval will also demotivate them. They need praise and approval. They find regulations restrictive and like to work in an environment where they are allowed freedom to use their initiative. Because of their high levels of energy and enthusiasm they can sometimes come across as being overbearing. Lack of concentration at times and a tendency to disregard rules means careful management.

Relating to Social Personals:

You need to spend time building solid relationships with this person rather than simply issuing instructions. Leave plenty of time for socialising and take time to socialize at the beginning of an interview.

Appeal to their enthusiasm and their vision of things but be careful if you need to rein them in as you can dampen their enthusiasm and hurt them.

Identifying People with Social Traits:

You may still get the firm handshake but with this person you will have less dominant body language. Status is as important to the Type B as it is to the Type A so you could get the big car and the designer accessories but the essential difference between these two types of personalities is that the Type B will spend more time over the pleasantries, making you feel comfortable. They will not be so direct and forthright as the Type A. They will quickly participate in any meeting, throwing in ideas. They will be friendly, talkative and smile at you. Indeed you may have trouble shutting them up!

They enjoy team working and so their hobbies will often be people and team related, for example, football, netball and socializing.

Know Better The Characteristics of People With Dominance Personality Traits

Nature of Dominant People:

Dominance personalities have dominance and superiority in their make up. This makes them rather impatient individuals. They are very direct people who ‘speak as they find’ and ‘don’t suffer fools gladly’. They are confident decision makers (although these may not always be the right decisions) but there is no pussy-footing around with these types. They are extremely time conscious and find it hard to relax. They are always doing something and even on holiday, if they take one, will want to be using the time ‘wisely’. They can be rather intolerant of others who are slower than them. They manage or lead in an authoritative and often autocratic style, have a high degree of energy, and like getting things done. They are good at ideas, and at problem solving. They often enjoy going into troubled organizations to turn them around. They also often tend to be entrepreneurs, liking start up situations, being natural risk takers. They quickly get bored with the detail and are starters rather than finishers. When they get bored they will want to move on to a new challenge. Generally speaking they are high achievers and quite driven individuals pushing themselves onwards and upwards. They can take a high degree of stress, more in fact than other types, but there is a danger here in that they might not know when to take the foot off the gas. Because they drive themselves and find it difficult to relax they are candidates for burn-out and are prone to high blood pressure and heart attacks.

Type A personalities (Dominant) do not have a high need to be liked: ‘If you don’t like me then that’s your look out’, can be their response. Or you may hear phrases like, ‘You have to be tough to do this job.’ ‘You can’t make an omelette without breaking eggs’, ‘Getting paid to make tough decisions is what I’m here for’. Their influencing style is that of a tough battler, pressing for results, giving orders, issuing challenges, sometimes threats even. They are enterprising and forceful but can give the impression of being dictatorial and arrogant.

Managing a Dominant personality People:

If you are managing someone who is Type A then ideally you should give them short-term goals, and projects that give them a high degree of recognition and status. Type As thrive on praise – often public, which is why many of them enter public life.

You need to ensure they have the opportunity to develop new skills and interest. Type As will often chase excitement and be thrill seeking. They don’t like to depend on others and are in fact highly independent.

They are motivated by status, often favouring the status symbols, big and powerful cars, nice house, designer clothes. But status positions will also motivate them. They are competitive but not in a team way, competing against themselves and others to be better, faster, more successful.

They like to be in control and to feel that they have control over their lives.

Relating to a Type A personality:

Two Type A’s living together or married will find it very difficult. Because relationships are about compromise, two equally dominant individuals will find it hard to give in to the other. This will also happen within an organization if you have two Type A’s vying for power.

When you talk to someone who is a Type A try and speed up the way you talk, be direct, get straight to the point and ensure that your handshake is firm and your body language positive. Don’t go into too much detail. For example, don’t go through a proposal step by step or they will quickly get bored and irritated and cut you short. Be clear, specific, brief and to the point. Use time efficiently and stick to the matter in hand.

Recognizing the People with Dominant Personality

From the description above you may already have a good idea of how to recognize a Dominant Type A personality. They will use dominant body language for a start

Their speech will be direct. They will not take time for social chitchat but will want to get right to the point. They will make flat assertions like ‘That’s rubbish.’ They will also use a lot of ‘I’ statements and be ready to give you the benefit of their wisdom and provide advice on what you should do. Put a Type A in a group and you will quickly see them take control and lead that group.

If you were to ask them what sport they liked, or what their hobbies are, you will find that they enjoy single competitive sports rather than team games. Often Type A enjoys squash, golf, athletics and sometimes horseriding as handling an animal gives them a sense of control. They are unlikely to enjoy detailed pastimes.

The Best Way to Have Success in Communication- Getting on Others Wavelength

The more you have in common with someone the easier it is to get along with them.

We are more easily influenced by those we like hence the saying, ‘people buy people’, as any salesperson worth his salt should know. If we like someone we are more inclined to buy from them and to cooperate with them.

Conflict usually results from differences or perceived differences between people. So enhancing this likeability factor can reduce conflict. The more we blend with the other person the less conflict there will be.

Blending with the other person can maximize similarities and minimize conflict.

We can do this by mirroring their body language, not mimicking it but gently matching it. We do this naturally when we are with friends. Just watch people in a café, restaurant or at a bar together and see how similar their body language is, or if they are not hitting it off how distanced and different it becomes.

So when you find yourself in conflict with someone, or disliking them, stop and ask yourself why this person is behaving in the manner they are? Even if you don’t fully understand their reasons, or find them difficult to understand, this will at least prevent you from getting overemotional. Also remember that you can’t change another person so it is no good thinking, ‘I wish they would be more reasonable or compassionate, or understanding, or less hostile.’ Wishing won’t make it so.

Personality traits

So how can we get on someone’s wavelength, even those whom we find it difficult to relate to? I always say to people, ‘You think you‘re normal, but what is normal?’ Normal is different to each and every one of us. We see the world through our own eyes, we think everyone should behave, act and be like us. Well of course they don’t and they’re not like us. We are all different. We all have different personalities and understanding this and recognising this can help us to adapt our approach to another person and get on their wavelength.

In 1926 William Marston came up with a model of Personality Types that is still used today. While people are highly complex and certainly more complex than the descriptions I am going to give you, this model will, I hope, help you to see yourself and others in a different light and enable you to change tactics to communicate more effectively.

We inherit personality traits from our parents, grandparents, great grandparents … Of course this is influenced by other factors like upbringing, environment, education and levels of intellect and maturity but to make things more simple here we will look at the four basic types of personalities. Although we may contain a mixture of these traits some will be stronger than others within us. This dictates how we communicate and behave. See if you can recognize ourself from the descriptions below. Then think about how you might need to change your approach towards another person in order to influence and persuade them, and to manage them.

Now, namely the personality traits are:

• Dominance
• Social
• Measured
• Compliant

In the following blogs i will discuss about these personality traits in detail. Happy reading.

The Barriers of Effective Listening

There are many things that prevent us from listening, not least of which is laziness. We simply can’t be bothered. Or maybe we’ve never been trained to listen. Our upbringing is such that no one has listened to us so why should we listen to them? No one has taught us how to listen.

The first thing we need to do is to open our minds and have the desire to learn this skill – after all it is good manners to listen. But what prevents us?

1. different perspectives: we see things differently to the person talking and we disagree with them
2. strong emotions: we have very strong feelings on the subject which prevents us from listening; we may also have prejudices
3. physical tiredness or discomfort: we may be tired or hungry; we may be hot or cold; we may be under stress and feel anxious or unwell
4. desire to talk: we love to talk most of the time, to be the centre of attention; we love the sound of our own voice and think that only our opinions really count
5. distractions and mind wandering: we may be distracted because of a noise; or we may be thinking ahead of all the things that need to be done; we may be worried about someone or something
6. reactions to the speaker: we may dislike the person who is talking to us; we may find them boring or opinionated

Tone, Pitch and Pace- 3 Important Aspects of Speaking

How we sound when we speak does influence others and I am not just talking about accents (although those do give out an impression) but rather the tone of your voice, its clarity, its passion and enthusiasm, its variances.

Think about how you talk to someone who is ill – gently and with compassion and understanding. Now think about how you greet an old friend across the street, or prevent a child from running out into the traffic. How do you sound when you scold someone or are short-tempered?

If you talk in a monotone you will sound dull and uninteresting; you will also lack credibility. The more credible you are the more persuasive you will be. No one is going to do anything if you ask them in a boring, quiet monotone!

So try varying the pitch and pace of your voice. Try enthusing it with some passion. A good way of practising this is to read aloud to young children because then you have to put in all the different voices or they very quickly get bored.

If you talk in a high pitched voice (mainly women) so that you sound like a little girl, you will also be less credible. Try slowing your voice down, don’t talk so quickly, take a few more breaths in between talking and lower your voice.

As a general rule speak with clarity, talk in a strong, steady voice neither shouting nor mumbling. If talking to a group of people then let your eye contact reach the person the furthest distance from you to ensure that you project it.

To build rapport with someone match the pace and tone of their voice. I don’t mean mimic them but if they speak softly and slowly then lower your voice and slow it down. If the other person speaks quickly, try and quicken up.

No matter what your message, present it in terms that are of interest to others. Think of who you are communicating with and then decide how you should pitch your voice and what sort of words to use. We are all aware of the person/people who talk jargon either to confuse us or to make us feel small, so make sure you don’t fall into this trap and if you are on the receiving end of this then don’t apologize, to them, for example: ‘I’m sorry, I don’t understand you’. It is their fault they are not explaining to you correctly so simply say, ‘What do you mean?’ pleasantly and not aggressively.

Believe you are worth listening to and convey that belief to others. The more passionate you are about your subject the more powerful your communication but beware you don’t get too carried away and forget your listener, you could be too enthusiastic and alienate them. Which brings us to our next chapter, listening.

Don’t be too apologetic- It Will Not Good For You As Speaker

When you need to state something keep it brief and to the point: don’t go all around the houses to make your point or over-apologize. For example try saying, ‘I’d like to get started this week’, or ‘Would you like to come over for a coffee?’ Not, ‘I wonder if you’d mind terribly if we er sort of started this next week?’ Or ‘I was wondering if you’ve got nothing else to do, that is if you’re not too busy, if you’d er like to come over for a coffee?’

Be careful too of over justifying yourself. For example, ‘I wouldn’t normally mention this but I’m without the car tomorrow, my husband’s had to take it to work because he’s got to go to London on business and the trains are on strike and I was wondering if you’d mind giving me a lift into work?’

Instead simply say, ‘Could you give me a lift into work tomorrow Alan as I’m without the car?’

If you need to apologize don’t do it profusely, simply say, ‘I’m sorry’. Or if you wish to sound more assertive, then ‘I apologize’.

Practise using ‘I’ statements, which are assertive, for example:

• I feel
• think
• my idea is
• I prefer
• I feel
• as I see it
• my view is
  

And be careful of using phrases that put you down, for example:

• ‘I’m hopeless at this.’
• ‘You know me, I seem to be useless at ...’
• ‘I can’t seem to ...’
  

People will believe it and so will you because your brain is telling you that you can’t do something so you won’t be able to!

Powerful and persuasive words are often those with many vowels in them, for example need and please.

‘We need to do something’ implies urgency and people respond to this rather than ‘We could do something’, which implies a question mark in its structure. We must do something sounds more like a command possibly prompting the response ‘Do I have to?’ or ‘Must I?’ While, ‘You must appreciate’ can prompt the response,‘Why must I?’

Nervous Body Language: That Kills You As Speaker

One hand gripping the other behind the back is an attempt at confidence but there is frustration, lack of self-control and the person is trying hard to seem relaxed – look for how hard the hand is gripping the wrist. If the hands are held quite high behind the back this often indicates timidity. The hand moved even further up the arm indicates tension and nervousness.

Fingers in the mouth can also show people under pressure.

Touching the face or stroking the back of the neck can signal embarrassment and rubbing, stroking or touching the nose means the person is not sure and possibly has negative thoughts; if poor or no eye contact accompanies this then he could be lying.

Touching the ear may indicate that the person doesn’t like what he/she is hearing. Watch for this in meetings and sales situations and examine what it is you have just said to get this response.

Touching the eyes could indicate that the person doesn’t like what he or she is seeing. Watch for a shifting in body language along with this and consider the situation and the dialogue.

Foot lock – this tends to be a woman-only gesture where one foot is wrapped round the other leg. It is construed as a defensive attitude.

Beware of Mannerisms: They Disclose Yourself To Others

We all form certain mannerisms like pulling the eyebrow, rubbing the nose etc. We need to be aware of these because they may be giving out the wrong signals. The best way to know if you are doing this is to watch a video recording of yourself, or get a friend to tell you each time you make a nervous mannerism.

A Senior Communication Expert told me a story, some years ago he was working with a young lady who always put her hand over her mouth when she spoke. This gave out the impression that she was lying or was uncertain of herself. He asked her why she did this and she told him that when she was younger she suffered from terrible acne, which caused her considerable distress and embarrassment so she had got into the habit of covering her face when she spoke so people couldn’t see her skin. The habit had stuck long after her skin had cleared.

Here are some further body language signals that you might like to be aware of.

Sitting down with the hands and arms clasped behind the head

This is a superior gesture or exhibits extreme confidence sometimes bordering on arrogance. It can also be accompanied by the chin held high.

Leg lock – when one ankle is crossed over the knee of the other

This denotes a dominant and competitive personality. The higher the leg is crossed over the more dominant and competitive. If the person is also holding his leg this means he is stubborn and unmoving, he’s made his mind up.

If the thumbs are on display in an upward position this shows that they are in charge! This is often a familiar stance of a barrister in a courtroom. Some speakers also adopt this posture, which can be rather intimidating towards the audience.

Another variation of this is when the thumbs protrude from the pockets, which displays dominance.

Thumbs wrapped round belt: If a man is standing with his legs firmly planted apart, thumbs in belt pose, with fingers pointing down towards crotch area this is an aggressive posture when adopted facing another man. If, however, a man adopts this posture towards a woman then it can be interpreted as a sexual gesture.

In recent years some women have also adopted this posture, in this instance it exhibits an attitude of dominance and sexual control over men.

Hands on hips: This is an aggressive and threatening gesture when used by a man or when used by a woman to another woman. If a woman adopts this posture towards a man then it can be interpreted as a sexual stance.

Body Language – Posture, Gestures and Stance

When reading body language you need to look at the whole person and the complete picture. Just because someone has his arms crossed it does not necessarily mean he is hostile. If his arms and legs are crossed and he is perhaps scowling or keeping his distance by sitting back in his seat then the complete picture tells you this person is aggressive or hostile and is not going to cooperate.

I recall a course I was running. A woman was sitting at the table with her head in her hands. Did she have a headache, or a hangover perhaps? Or was she hostile? From her body language and the situation I deemed that she was on the course under sufferance and that by withdrawing her eye contact, and her complete facial expressions, she was saying ‘I don’t want any part in this’; ‘I am not going to cooperate’.

So I started by asking her a question, which meant that she had to look up and give me eye contact. I could then begin to engage with her. After several more exchanges, and as the course progressed, she confessed that she hadn’t wanted to come on the course but that she was now enjoying it. A victory indeed!

Your Body Language During Attending Meeting

At some time we all attend meetings, whether this is work related, more of a social nature or a combination of both. For example you may be on the Parent Teacher Association of a school, or on a charitable fundraising committee. Making an impression at meetings could help you to be heard in that meeting, or you may wish to read others’ body language to find out what they really think about your views.

First, where to sit

In meetings if you want recognition always sit within good eye contact of the decision maker (who may not always be the chair). This can often be at the opposite end of the table. To lessen confrontation sit next to the challenger. It is far more difficult to attack from the side. Avoid sitting directly opposite the person.

If you are a junior or new participant wait to be told where to sit.

If you wish to avoid attention sit in a blind spot for the chair where it is physically difficult for them to see you and wear your most neutral outfit with no special accessories.

Another point about seating which I have often observed is that when both men and women enter a room together, the men will all sit together and the women will sit together. Only if someone is late and there are no empty spaces will the genders divide. In schools and sometimes at work it is a good idea to mix the genders to encourage more cross-gender communication and cooperation. For example, ask all the girls to come into the class first and tell them they must not sit together, then invite the boys to fill up the empty places.

Other ways to enhance your power at meetings

Make sure you find out the objectives of the chairperson if you can. Don’t be afraid to contribute your points but if you’re out to win or score points only important to you, you may become resented. Never expect to succeed in a meeting on a wing and a prayer. Preparation is essential. Whenever possible, without overdoing it, always try to state your views, or ask an intelligent question.

Resist the temptation to finish other people’s sentences or criticize them at a personal level.

Even if you are feeling emotional about an objection try not to show it. Your detractors will leap on you like a wounded animal if they sense weakness.

Be positive but if you disagree or have reservations say so and have reasons why you disagree to back this up. Show that you can think a thing through logically and laterally.

If you wish to speak hold up your hand and look at the chairperson. Only interrupt if the meeting has more of a casual flavor about it. Women interrupt conversations far more than men, in fact men find this rather irritating. They often wait until someone has finished speaking before having their say, unless the speaker is a waffler or droning on too much and the interrupter is an impatient man.

As chairperson if you wish to shut someone up without verbally telling them then one of the most effective ways is to look away as they are speaking to you, alternatively you can glance at your watch. You can sit forward and hold your hand up; this is the physical STOP sign. You can also accompany this by saying, ‘Hold on’, or ‘Excuse me’.

Never adopt the role of the Disruptor or the Nonentity

The Disruptor is the person who arrives late or dashes in and out to take phone calls. This is most irritating and implies superiority; either that or he can’t organize or prioritize his time effectively!

The Nonentity remains part of the furniture. If you don’t or can’t participate then you probably won’t be invited again. More involvement brings more responsibility but it also means more visibility and hence advancement.

Eye contact

During business meetings you should keep your eye contact on the eyes and forehead of the person who is speaking.

You can use direct eye contact to make a point both in a personal relationship setting and in a business setting, for example when you have a serious point to make or when reprimanding a child.

Do look interested during the meeting, lean your body forward, give good eye contact to the speaker and the chair, make occasional notes.

Don’t look bored, doodle, sigh, sniff and shift about unless you really want to give the wrong impression and not be asked back!

Prepare Before Speaking Infront Of Any Group

I have already suggested that an audience is a very different thing from a collection of individuals—it is a group, and as a speaker, your task is to manage this group, and present your material in a way which will help them. So the more knowledge of group behavior a speaker has, the better he or she can do their job. I do not propose to write a textbook of group dynamics; there are already plenty of good ones. In any case, the basics are simple enough. But a few pages about groups is a useful preparation for speaking. Thinking about group psychology will help you be more aware of group dynamics, more sensitive to feedback from the group in front of you, and more able to make effective preparations to speak. There is a great deal of research on group behaviour. Even in 1968 a writer noted that there were well over 2,000 different research studies on the topic. Knowledge about groups is now extensive. In many cases it reflects what instinct tells us, but not always, and conscious awareness of group behaviour can only help the speaker.

The first fact about groups we must remember is that they are composed of individuals. As speakers, we too easily imagine that the sea of faces in front of us belong to undifferentiated clones. Stereotyping is used by speakers to misjudge audiences, almost as much as audiences use it to misjudge speakers. Speakers tend to think that an audience from company ‘X’ will be all whizz kids, or an audience from company ‘Y’ will be old and cautious. And this enables the speaker to miss the fact that there may, or may not, be some of both these types of people, in each audience.

The mere fact that the audience are all sitting down, facing one way, tends to deprive them of individuality in the eyes of the speaker. This is a curious mistake, since when we are in the reverse position, sitting listening to someone else talking, we feel our individual identity; our own reactions contrast with the group’s. Yet when we are speaking ourselves, we tend to think of the audience as some homogeneous, and powerfully distinctive, object. We think of them as having an overpowering common identity. I suppose it is because we feel so conspicuous as the speaker, that we tend to see the audience as about as undifferentiated as a wall. Each brick may be different, but the total effect is massive. Of course, the truth is rather different, for each person in a group is an individual. They all have their own standards and motives, and many also belong to many other different groups.

The first lesson to be learned about groups, then, is that they are collections of heterogeneous individuals. Indeed, far from being repressed, individual roles and individual differences are often enhanced by the crowd effect, the stronger personalities becoming more assertive in response to group pressure. By considering the role of individuals, rather than of the group as a whole, you will be able to recognize an audience’s diverse needs. No talk is likely to satisfy everyone in the group, and an outsider will understand if the talk is angled towards the majority of the group. But it is fatal to talk solely to one sector, and appear ignorant of the needs of the rest of the audience. When analyzing the audience, assess the variety of different interests it represents, and try to devise a strategy which will speak to all of them.

One good technique is to alternate different kinds of approach, so that no one group has time to lose interest. Thus, for example, an audience including technical, and lay people, can be dealt with by alternating complex technical facts, with a few sentences of simple explanation. A mixed audience of marketing managers, and personnel managers will all enjoy a presentation which alternates between the marketing prospects of each topic, and the way it will affect production. People are surprisingly tolerant, and will listen to several minutes of information that they don’t understand, and which doesn’t concern them, as long as they know that the talk will come back to their own interests. By providing a mixture, a speaker can cater for a wide range of interests in his audience. But of course he can’t use this technique, or any other technique, if he hasn’t bothered to work out who his audience is, and what their interests are.

While considering the audience’s individuality, it is important to consider their relationships to each other, as well as their relationships to you. There may be both administrators, and researchers in the audience. Their ages may be both younger and older than yours. They may be more hostile to the departmental manager, sitting silently in the front row, than to you. There is nothing sinister in acquiring this sort of knowledge and skill in your understanding of groups. It does not represent ‘some dark power that enables them to manipulate people more easily.’ Knowledge about groups is a wise part of the effective speaker’s armory. It can be used to avoid making obvious mistakes, antagonizing people, and failing to explain the information. It can smooth an interaction, and help to make the talk a more satisfactory experience for every member of the audience.

Knowledge about groups, then, is also knowledge about individuals. You should learn to identify the assertive (and the ‘invisible’) members of a group. Talk to the quiet and self-effacing ones more than to the alert, responsive and pushy ones. Remember that the status of an individual influences a group’s norms powerfully. If there is a very senior manager, a highly respected scientist, a powerful union leader, or an ambitious local politician in the audience, the rest of the group will be aware of him or her. They will also modify their behavior so they seem typical of the kind of group he expects. Your role as speaker is to be aware of the restraining influence of high status members. The aim must be to counter the subconscious tension caused by the presence of the powerful person, and to help the group to relax. You can do this best by treating the special person as neutrally as possible. Don’t show him or her special attention, but equally don’t pointedly ignore them. Try to show by your distribution of attention that you regard the person as a normal member of the group, for the duration of the talk. By treating a powerful person without embarrassment and without pointed attentiveness you will help the whole group to feel at ease, and listen to the presentation.

Find the leader

You should try to identify the devious members of the group, and be aware who is functioning as group leader (he or she may be the boss, the manager, or simply the funniest, or most loud mouthed person present). It is worth noting that there will not necessarily be only one dominant figure in the group. Sociologists discovered, when they started studying groups, that there were usually ‘two leadership functions: the task specialist and the socio-emotional leader.’ There may be one member of the group who is the acknowledged expert, whose approval or irritation at what you say will be echoed by the whole group. A separate person may be the social leader, and if he or she laughs the whole group will laugh. Of course, you must not pander to these leaders; but they are useful indicators of the group’s reactions to the presentation. It is usually easy to identify the people who fill these roles. They are often the more attentive members of the audience, apparently taking their function as group leader responsibly. Other members of the group can often be seen glancing at them. The leaders, on the other hand, will rarely look at other members of the group.

Be aware, too, of the challengers for the leadership, who may disrupt the presentation by fighting their own battles for attention, and trying to score group approval. There will also be scapegoats, whom the group may want to assist you in discomforting. Be careful. The group will not necessarily admire you for pandering to their own prejudices. You will also need to learn to pinpoint both the narks and the nodders, and to recognize the tactics of opposition. Notice that some members of the group will be visibly secure in the situation (relaxed posture, crossed legs, and forward positions in the room). Others will be visibly insecure (tense posture, face partially covered by hands, and back-to-the-wall seating position). Try to encourage security, since it will aid the audience’s concentration. Try to unite the group, by acting on the individuals in the group to even out their differences. It is much easier to talk to a homogeneous group, and you are more likely to be able to galvanize their interest and enthusiasm.

Another factor is the way in which in larger groups, size brings pressures to bear on the individuals in the audience as well as on the speaker. The effect of size is to make individual listeners more nervous about speaking up, during question or discussion times. But ‘unhappily it is not always the right people who are silenced…the weight of the group may act like an ox sitting on the wrong tongues. The bore, alas, is seldom unnerved; that, indeed, is why he is a bore.’ The speaker’s role in such a large group is to function like a chairperson, evening out the pressures. He or she can do this, even during a presentation where the audience is silent. He can facilitate attention from the inattentive, and discourage the disruptor and bores.

The best way to do this is to look at the inattentive, smile, in passing, at the apparently reticent and withdrawn, and pay little attention to those who are nervous, or too highly charged. The enthusiastic nodder should receive only a fleeting glance, but your gaze should repeatedly stop at the bored or withdrawn person. The speaker has to perform a ‘delicate balancing act’. He or she must avoid outraging the group leaders, and the members of high status. But he must also make sure that the less conspicuous group members feel that they are important, and that their interest and attention is valued. The length of dwell of carefully distributed eye-contact is the main skill a speaker employs to unite and balance his group.

Speech come first: Do You Argue?

Spoken language was the first form of communication between human beings. It came long before written language, and writing is a transcript of speech, not vice versa. This more primitive form of communication still provides the most direct access to other minds. The reason why people prefer to listen to a spoken explanation is that it seems to need less effort to understand than the more formal medium of writing. Yet some speakers try to make speech as close to writing as possible, and destroy its freshness and immediacy. Speaking is the direct route from one mind to another, and is the way we usually choose when we want to ask a question, or give an explanation. Research shows that ideas and information are more easily understood and processed through speech than through writing.

Unless they are pretending to be formal, people usually speak in a style which is more direct, and easier to understand, than the style in which they write; speech makes the personal interaction more immediate. One of the reasons is that when speaking, interest and enthusiasm in the listeners are generated by non-verbal, as well as by verbal, signals. The variety and impact of the message are heightened by the presence of another person. Listeners also feel more secure when they can see the person who is giving them new information. Their judgment of the validity of the message, the competence, and the depth of knowledge of the speaker is easier if non-verbal clues, as well as verbal clues, are available. There are many reasons why speaking is the best of the communication channels. It is not always used, largely because people are afraid of their inexperience and inability to speak well. Yet practice and study can provide the skill needed to use this most direct path into the minds of others. It is worth the effort to become an effective speaker.