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Business communication

30 March 2009

One of the first books I read when I started business coaching and mentoring in Derby and the Mildands talked about different types of Business Communication. It was amazingly obvious that we all communicate differently but it was something that I had never realised. I just though that we talked and that was that. Then I discovered NLP and it all changed. This information tip sheet explains about how we all have different behaviours and how to communicate with people who by their very nature have more or less feelings, more or less talking, more or less sensitivity and more or less pain.

After reading this you will:

• have greater understanding about how people react in different circumstances
• understand how to improve communication between your loved ones, family, friends and colleagues
• be able to fathom out why people seem so strange to you and not to others like them
• realise how feelings, sensitivity, words and gestures mean different things to different people
• recognise that words are only the tip of the iceberg and that tone, volume, getsures and body posture is very important
• know that communicatioon is everything in life and business

Business communications between Us

• Our natural behaviour and reaction to any circumstances are all very different due to our individual character makeup. This is based on the people that we have come into contact with in the past, starting with our family and friends and then going on to school and work colleagues
• Apart from this, there are a lot of behavioural patterns that we are born with that can be like our parents or amazingly can be quite different. These differences can be very marked and can not only cause problems at home but in the outside world. The thing is that all of us tend to judge people from our own position rather than seeing them from their own perspective
• This also depends upon how we feel at any one time, how we are naturally and the different circumstances that we find ourselves
• We all tend to judge others too readily and problems come with this judgement behaviour. It is really important to remember that if you can have a relationship without judgement, then you’ll have a relationship without problems
• So we need to look at some of the different areas of the Spectrum, but first of all you need to remember that we are all at different points on the spectrum:-
   
• Touch – No Touch Spectrum.
  This it means that naturally some people are Touchers who like to hug and touch other people and I’m quite sure you can think of people like this. At the other end of the spectrum there are the No-Touchers, those people who need lots of personal space around them. In these cases you have trouble actually getting near them in fact they seem to walk backwards away from you. This can even happen in the same family between Spouses and also between Parents and Children. Unfortunately neither party really understands the very different natural behavioural characteristics of the other, despite being married or being offspring. This can obviously create some potentially difficult consequences. The suggestion therefore is to bear this in mind when you meet people and be aware of where they are coming from and behave accordingly…ie if you are a Toucher be careful

• Talk – No Talk spectrum, which is a lot easy to see or rather hear. As we all know there are some people that just cannot stop talking and yet there are those who just never seem to say anything, they just don’t get started.. In meetings they never seem to stay really quiet and rely totally on the talkers to do the communicating. It is important therefore to understand that they are by nature non-talkers and to find out in what circumstances they will talk, so you are able to find out their ideas and get comments from them
• Pain/Thin Skinned– No Pain/Thick Skinned spectrum. This behaviour is not one that you can see but one feels and some people literally feel pain when they are in a particular situation. The best way of describing it visually is that those people who like to ski, especially down dangerous slopes are in the No Pain/Thick Skinned part of the spectrum and account for about 30% of the population. Often these people make good credit controllers because they are assertive by nature and feel no qualms in asking for payment from people. On the other end of the spectrum there are the Pain/Thin Skinned people who are softer in their approach to people and certainly don’t make good traffic wardens
• Changer-Imager/Starter – Non-Imager/Finisher spectrum : this is very much depends upon how we think and how our brains visualise objects. As you are probably aware we all see things differently..some see coloured objects, some see black and white, some see in one plane, some see in great depth and some see multiple images and there is very little you can do to change it. That’s how you see things and that’s it. The thing is that depending upon where you are on the spectrum your brain is either coming up constantly with different images of say a dog or house or car, whereas others will have just one image only. Obviously the former i.e someone who is a Changer-Imager will be a great creator of ideas, but don’t expect him or her to finish a project or be a storekeeper. The latter i.e a non Changer-Imager will probably not like change of any description and will not come up with any new ideas

From just a few of these examples you can see the very different perspectives from where people are coming from and so when you are communicating with others, be they new or old acquaintances, please take them into consideration.