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Hello I’m Elaine Kung. We continue with our series on SHINE Your Talk! How do we communicate so that we could best represent our personal brand, our Christian faith and our character. We finished the last eight sessions as an introduction. We talked about some sticky situation at work. How do we handle and communicate? We talked about the SHINE - the correct communication value that's high emotional quotient, EQ, versus the GROANS, the negative communication value that we do not want to use. That's a low EQ. And we had some brief introduction on ABCDE communication skills. We explained the six question we should ask when we are in sticky situations that represent REASON in an acrostic. Then we covered in detail, how do we do effective one-on-one meetings with your boss? And we're gonna dive much deeper into working with our boss now. How do we lead up? And then what are the approach, the benefit of conflict resolution.
So those are the brief introduction we've done in the last 8sessions. And these are some examples of sticky and sensitive, challenging, difficult situations that we learned to practice Matthew 10:16: Be shrewed as snakes and innocent as doves. How the boss may overload you with work, boss did not recognize your strengths, your subordinate is not performing, your coworkers are difficult to work with, your partner blames you for no reason, or you’re skipped at a promotion your ideas are not well received or not heard, and how to ask for a promotion for raise and how to ask for a mentor. All those could be the sticky situations, challenging and yet important for us to practice How to SHINE Your Talk! As we dive into the SHINE five main areas in our communication skills,it would help us to excel in our communication using biblical and practical principles so that we can build up our leadership and our communication skills.
Our goal with the SHINE, the five main areas we’ll cover is to practice our leadership and influence at work. And build trusted relationship with our managers, coworkers, subordinates, customers, suppliers. And how do you speak with confidence? Able to persuade others and earn respect. What’s the best strategy for different conflict resolution and gain agreement, how to overcome frustration at work when you're not seen or heard, and how to wield all these different, sticky situation with wise communication tools.
So now we're gonna start with the S in our SHINE. We're gonna spend the rest of our coming sessions to dig deep into each one of these five areas. We start with S - speak with SINCERE, 8C, PREPARE to Lead Up and one-on-one meeting. This is a very important area. How do we communicate with the SINCERE and the 8C, we’ll start with that in this current session. SINCERE represent the seven powerful and practical tips for communication. S - keep it simple, less is more, simple is easy for people to understand and digest and follow. And try to use stories. People don't like to listen to lectures. They love to hear about stories and we’ll give you a tool how to best articulate your story and be sensitive. When you communicate think from people's perspective, your audience, your listener. Be sensitive to their emotion, their feeling, be sensitive to their point of view. That's our S. I is Intentional. Be intentional in how you communicate means that you should have clear purpose in what you want to communicate. There’s a purpose driven, intentional, clear communication, and also with intention to practice active listening.
Remember, we talked about communication isn't just about speaking, it has a lot more to do with listening, right? So,we were created with two ears and God gave us two ears. One mouth is to listen twice as much, so we'll practice a lot about active listening skill in future session.
N is never interrupt. And then don't ever say “Never, always” because that's too extreme. That's exaggeration. We want to avoid that. You do want to never interrupt, listen until they finished their whole sentence, their whole point of view.
C is creative. Be very creative in how you deliver. Later on, we’ll talk about the different communication channels, so be creative, vary the approach that you deliver them, including your tone, your speed, your pace. And then connect with the audience. How you communicate has to connect with the audience in our feelings, our facts, our understanding of each other.
E is excellent preparation. Practice makes perfect. So when I present like preparing this talk, I work hard in preparing the content, researching, put into powerpoint, then practice makes perfect. And time the duration of each of the session and definitely pray. Cause only God can give us and anoint us with the Holy Spirit and give us the right wisdom, how to communicate, what to say, when to say it, with who.
So all that is E - excellent preparation.
R is relationship. In all our communication it's all about relationship. When we have good relationship, communication’s much easier. When you're good with your communication and you SHINE Your Talk, it helps you to build trusted relationship. You have a good reputation, good report. And learn to recap, that's part of active listening. When people explain what they meant, you say, “Here's what I heard. Did I understand you correctly?” And rephrase it. Don't just repeat their words, rephrase it in a way that they say, wow, you listen, you heard, you practice active listening, you digest, and you rephrase what you heard from me. They will feel so respected and they feel like they can trust you.
And finally, E is express what the audience need, how they feel, meet them where they are, connect to their thoughts, their emotions, their feeling. That's powerful seven areas of SINCERE communication tips.
Then we're gonna talk about these 8C to be effective in your communication. We have these 8C to help us make sure your points are complete. All the facts required by the receiver are completely given to them. Concise, less is more. Don't overload with too much content. To many words. Consider your audience, how's their mood? Are they tired? Are they very busy or overwhelmed? Be considerate of their needs, their requirements. Clear. Keep it simple, articulate. Concrete. Be very specific, don't be vague. So specific and definitive, exactly what you meant. And even provide numbers are very helpful. Courteous. Very professional, respectful, and listen to their point of view. And correct. Make sure what you present, especially the numbers are accurate with facts and figures. And even your language, your grammar should be correct. And compelling. When you do all 7C, your 8th C is much easier. Then you're very clear, concise, and compelling building on the 7C.
Now I'm gonna give you example. The top example, see if this is complete. “Let us meet tomorrow to discuss a product launch event. Please be there on time.” Is that complete?
Compared to the bottom. “Let us meet tomorrow at 11:00 am Conference Room A to discuss the product launch event. We will have to decide the keynote speakers and complete the event invite draft tomorrow. Please be there on time.”
Wow! What a big difference. The bottom example is very compete, clear on when, where, why and what needs to be done, very clear.
Now, concise. The top said, “I think we need to talk about the CSR campaign, I mean the one which we need to do as a quarterly exercise. I think it is a great way of enhancing our brand image. Basically, it would just be to visit an orphanage but we can sort of do other things too. For instance, we could take the kids out for a short trip to a nearby park or zoo. Let us sit and talk tomorrow.” Wordy, not concise.
Here's a much better way, just three simple bullets, but same content, clear and concise. “I need to discuss the quarterly CSR campaign with you. Let us take the kids out this time to a nearby park or zoo. Instead of just visiting them. This will help enhance our brand image. We’ll talk in detail tomorrow.” What a big difference.
So we want to do the bottom concise method.
Considerate. “It is impossible to do this revise scope!” “No big deal. I can do it too.” That's very rude. When you put exclamation mark, it's not good. So avoid exclamation mark, let's think of statements and question mark. “It may be possible to do this revised scope.” “Nice job. Would you share how you did it?” That's very considerate.
How about clear? “I would like to talk to you about the new client’s project, which the engineering team had discussed yesterday. I might need the help of John from your team.” A short statement, but not clear.
So let's look at a good example. “As you may know, we have signed up XYZ as our new client. I had a meeting with the engineering team yesterday and had discussed the campaign requirements for this project. John Redden from your team had done a pretty good job last time during the social media campaign for ABC and so I would like him to work on this XYZ campaign too. Would you be available sometime tomorrow to discuss this further?”
Wow! Very complete and very clear on what it is, why, when and who is involved. So it's very clear. And then how - we're gonna discuss it tomorrow. That's a very good example.
Now, clear and concise. “There was an expectation on the part of the committee that there would be a cessation of work activity by everyone.” Not very good. Here's a better example. “The committee expected everyone to stop working.” You see the difference? The top are 21 words and the bottom only 7 words. A 67 % decrease in words use. Yet it's very clear and concise. Get to the point.
Concrete. “Hilltop Resort is the best resort. Do come to us on your next holiday.” Not very concrete, a bit vague. Let's look at the bottom good example. “Hilltop Resort is the jewel of the western hills. Take a break from your work. Escape from life's chaos and stress. Relax and rejuvenate yourself at Hilltop. Go back fresh and energized!” What a big difference.
Yes, it's more words, and yet it's still very clear, conscience, concrete and compelling. You helped the audience to visualize the contrast of chaos and stress versus relax, rejuvenate, refresh and energize. What a big difference.
Courteous. The top, “I really do not appreciate how your IT team ignores the requests of my team alone. My team has an important function in this organization too, and we have our own IT requirements. Can you ensure that your team responds promptly to my team's request hereon?” Not very courteous, not very polite. How about the bottom? How can we be more courteous, patient. “I understand that the IT team is swamped with work and gets requests from every department in the organization. My team, however, is working on a high-priority project and I would greatly appreciate if you could ask your team members to respond to my team's queries promptly and help us complete this project on time. Please do let me know if you need anything from me.” So that's assertive. Clearly explain and also think from their perspective, yes they are very swamp. So you have empathy and then express the importance of your project and be professional and courteous.
Finally, correct. Further to our conversation today, oops conservation wrong word. I am attaching the plan for the first stage of the project for the 1 week, wrong word. So be careful on your spelling and your grammar. It's easy to correct into the green word, conversation instead of conservation. And it’s week, w-e-e-k, so that's correct. Grammar, correct. English, clear and concise. So let's practice our 4H with our head, heart, hand application, and make it a habit in these 8C and think about how you're gonna start doing something new, stop doing, do more the right things and do less. See you next time!