Communications Fundas - Part 3

Communication is all about acknowledgement.
Acknowledgement that the other person is worthy of your attention.
This goes not only when communicating face-to-face, but also for written communication.

Let me prove it to you.
What is your first reaction when you see an email with lots of typos? The best you may come up with is: "A casually written mail!"
And the worst: Delete It!

If someone has taken the effort and time to convey something to you in written form, it becomes your responsibility to put in similar effort and time to understand what is written. That's when good communication happens.

Communication Fundas - Part 2

With Emails and messages making for bulk of business communication, ‘Context’ has become more important of the two components of communication.

You see, context for any communication is set up not only by a preface but also by body language: the tone and volume of the voice, pursed or smiling lips, narrow or smiling eyes, tight or relaxed facial, aggressive or encouraging body posture – communication is not just words exchanged; it is information exchange to achieve a goal.

Because the body is effectively detached from emails, the context that body language sets now has to be performed by written words. And as we all know written words do a miserable job of conveying messages, even though English is a fairly rich language with words that have subtle variation in connotation.

Besides, the issuer and the recipient are separated by space and time. This means that emails can easily be misinterpreted – deliberately or otherwise – to gain time or deflect attention.

I find use of non-verbal cues in emails help (the theory being – non-verbal physical signals can only be replaced by non-verbal characters). Italics, underline, different font, colour and bold letters, are examples of non-verbal cues that can be effectively used.

See the difference.

Please complete the work by today Close of Business.

Please complete the work by today Close of Business.

Emoticons (or smilies) are powerful non-verbal signals that can be conveyed over emails. Smilies have gone beyond figures formed by keystrokes. There are rich varieties available and I find these extremely effective.

Use of emoticons in business mails is generally frowned upon. But do not worry too much about it. Unless, it is proposal or a cold call or a response to a customer complain or such!