Do you find communication difficult?

If you don't do enough homework in advance, your communication will be aimless and waste time. In this case, you will naturally find it difficult to communicate, and even fear to communicate with others.

But communication in the workplace is unavoidable.

Therefore, in order to make our communication more smooth and achieve satisfactory results more easily, we need to make necessary preparations before communication. Specifically, we can start from the following three aspects:

Three aspects to make workplace communication more effective

1. Clarify the reason and purpose of communication

Before communication, ask yourself a question: "Why do I have this communication?"

Then give yourself a clear answer in your heart.

By asking and answering questions, you can force yourself to think deeply and discover the real reason and purpose of your communication. After all, if you don't know what the purpose of communication is, it's even more impossible for others to know. In this case, your communication is doomed to failure before it starts.

What if I can't answer?

Generally speaking, communication in the workplace is problem oriented, and is aimed at solving a specific problem. So, if you can't answer the question "Why should we communicate?", you can try to change your thinking:

(1) What is the problem I want to solve?

(2) Why is this important? What will happen if it is not solved?

(3) Why can't I solve this problem at present? Specifically, what is lacking?

I believe that through this method, you can easily find the reason and purpose of your communication.

Three aspects to make workplace communication more effective

2. Select appropriate communication objects

When we know our purpose, the next step is to find the right person.

You can't think of asking a question about the sales of logistics.

So, before communication, ask yourself these questions:

(1) What information do I want?

(2) Who knows the most about the relevant topics?

(3) Will he be willing to provide the information I need?

These questions can help you quickly identify the people you need to communicate with.

Generally speaking, the person in charge of specific matters or the person in charge of relevant departments will be the appropriate communication object. The former is because it can provide first-line information and provide us with the most original materials; The latter is because it can help us sort out the whole business, so that we can have a big framework in mind.

Three aspects to make workplace communication more effective

3. Sort out the contents of communication in advance

Before communication, you'd better make a draft to sort out your communication content. It can be divided into the following two cases:

3.1 Communication is to express opinions

If the purpose of communication is to express opinions and persuade others, you can refer to the pyramid structure to arrange your communication content.  Specifically, it is to ensure that your statement conforms to the following four basic principles:

(1) Conclusion comes first. Show your point of view at the beginning to help the other person focus on what you are saying

(2) The upper system is lower. In the vertical structure of the pyramid, the upper layer must be the core view or conclusion of the lower layer.

(3) Inductive grouping. The information is grouped according to its common attributes, such as "purchase", "sales" and "warehousing".

(4) Progressive logic. The arrangement of the elements in the communication content should follow some logical order, such as time order, space order, importance order, etc.

Three aspects to make workplace communication more effective

3.2 Communication is to obtain new information

If the purpose of communication is to obtain new information, you need to first analyze your current situation: your understanding of specific matters and the information to be further obtained.

It is better to write down all the questions you want to ask on paper. Then classify and summarize the questions in the same aspect, so that the other party can maintain logical consistency when answering questions.

At the same time, for open questions, you need to anticipate the possible answers of the other party, make corresponding response plans, go to further inquiry, and get more information. For example:

"What do you think is the business pain point of the current department?"

The answer to this question may be "the morale of the sales team is poor" or "the customer flow is declining"

If the other party's answer is "low morale of the sales team", you can further ask the reason for the low morale, "Is the KPI setting unreasonable or lack of team cohesion?" If the other party's answer is "passenger flow decline", you can further ask how the other party plans to deal with it, "How do you plan to deal with the impact of passenger flow decline on the department's business?"

Three aspects to make workplace communication more effective

epilogue

If you are prepared for anything, you will lose if you are not prepared.

To ensure that your communication can be carried out smoothly and efficiently, you need to do enough work around the above three aspects before communication. I believe that through these preparations, your communication will achieve satisfactory results.