A huge and crucial part of working in a leadership role in any organisation is the ability to communicate – to direct reports, superiors, wider staff, clients … perhaps a board or shareholders.
It doesn’t matter how good you are at your job, your career will be influenced by your ability to listen to people, decode what it is they’re really trying to communicate, and respond appropriately. And the cornerstone of this process is conversation.
Most of us spend a lot of time having conversations of various forms, but some people are clearly much more effective than others at ensuring the conversations they have strengthen relationships and are productive, rather than waste time and destroy trust.
Why is conversation so important in organisations?
Trust is of the key trends influencing how we are expected to lead. The trust deficit describes the loss of trust society has in the key institutions of business, politics and the media. Trust is being discussed at the highest levels – it was on the agenda at this year’s Davos Summit, by the World Economic Forum. It is an issue for every person in every industry.
Many of the seeming endless series of scandals made public clearly show senior leaders and politicians acting in ways which appear to be entirely self-serving, so it’s little wonder the public has become increasingly cynical.
Also, the relationship between employer and employee has fundamentally changed. It used to be long-term, now it is increasingly transactional. We don’t build the relationships we used to have with employees, and perhaps not the loyalty. We can’t assume that people will stick around anymore, so planning is difficult.
Technology, particularly the voice it has given people, has had an impact. Anyone can be a celebrity – buy yourself enough followers and you can be an influencer, it doesn’t matter if you know anything or not. But even the average person, thanks to technology, can feel heard. How do they feel coming into work if they don’t feel they’re part of the conversation? If they can’t say what they think?
That, in part, has led to the death of deference. We no longer automatically respect people because of their age, rank or profession. People now must earn respect.
We work in a knowledge-based economy; we’re no longer all about manufacturing, where outputs could be controlled and measured. We need to focus on intrinsic motivators rather than extrinsic ones.
While the need for good communication, good conversation is more important than ever, our workplaces often harbour barriers.
Peter Senge, US systems analyst and author of The Fifth Discipline: The Art and Practice of the Learning Organisation, attributes “the disease of the hierarchy” to compel people to say what their senior managers want, not need to hear.
Employees frequently don’t believe management is really interested in hearing what they think – often because that is what experience has taught them.
Sometimes people think what is needed is action and that too much talk is unproductive and a waste of time, and many people prefer to use technology, rather than have an in-person conversation. Email is often an excuse not to talk. As leaders we need to quit command and control, and take up co-creating and collaboration. Talking.
We need to think about how we communicate. We need to think about having conversations.
Good conversation is based on a number of distinct skills. While personality – our innate strengths and preferences – influences our ability to use these skills, we can work on them, develop them, and improve them.
UK communications expert Dik Veenman has significant experience in this field. Founder of The Right Conversation, a team of consultants and researchers specialising in organisational performance, Dik’s specific expertise lies in improving the quality of conversations within organisations. His clients include the BBC, Bank of England, Toyota, Virgin Trains, Ernst and Young and British Telecom.
Much of Dik’s recent work has been in the area of researching the enablers and barriers to better dialogue in the workplace.
Facet5 joined forces with The Right Conversation to create the Facet5 Superskills Report. Extensive research showed that there was a correlation between personality and how people naturally show up in conversation against the superskills. This report measures your natural preference, approach, and what you’re more likely to pay attention to, not learned behaviour (which also plays a big part). It helps individuals identify strengths, along with areas to develop or manage. For anyone interested in developing conversational skills for any aspect of work or personal life, a workplace personality profiling system, such as Facet5, can be a useful tool. – Ingrid Green
'It's little wonder the public has become increasingly cynical.'