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Communicating Clearly and Concisely

Communicating Clearly and Concisely

Leaning forward across the table, I explained how I was writing a blog about management and leadership. The man sitting across from me had an impatient look on his face as he shook his head and said, “So you’re writing blogging software?” I said no, I wasn’t writing software to create blogs, I was writing a blog about management and leadership. He waved his hand in the air as if to dismiss this notion and said, “That is not a business. You need to have a clear idea.” I attempted to share that I realized it wasn’t a business, however I wanted to write a blog about management and leadership. But he wasn’t listening. Looking into his eyes, I could see he was already thinking about what he wanted to say next. He only wanted to talk about his ideas.

There are two things that stood out in this conversation for me. One was that I don’t clearly explain what I’m doing which is something I can work on. Second, this person wasn’t listening to me.

The more I thought about this experience, the more I realized if I am going to communicate an idea or project or anything to another person, I need to have an absolutely clear, concise, and compelling way of doing so. Because no matter what I am doing or where I am working, I need to communicate about what I am working on whether it’s a product or a service. If I can’t do that in 1 to 2 sentences and it doesn’t sound very interesting, I’ll lose a large chunk of the listening population. Why? Because they will only listen long enough to determine if they are interested in what I am saying. Once they determine they are not interested, they aren’t going to listen to anything else I say after that.

In the last year, I joined a small business networking group to see how this type of networking works. Every week, each person has 30 seconds to introduce themselves and their companies. This was a tremendous learning experience. I learned to narrow down my focus and hit at the heart of what I am doing. I needed the practice. Listening to others pitch their companies gave me lots of examples and helped me to understand how to be more clear and concise.

In reflecting on previous attempts to explain an idea or a proposal through the years, I realized I failed to be clear and concise. I needed a 1 to 2 minute pitch even when I was working at an established company. If I had a 1 to 2 minute pitch then presented the details, I would have been more successful in selling my proposals. Looking back, I’ve created many Powerpoint presentations to explain projects but I bet I just bored the heck out of my audience because I didn’t have my pitch refined and in place.

That conversation about my blog was a good kick in the butt experience for me and joining the small business networking group was just the place to learn what I needed to learn.

So why I am I blogging about managing people? I blog because I want to share what I’ve learned about managing people and the most important skill a manager cultivates, at least in my opinion, is self-awareness.

Communicating more clearly and concisely about my work is something to always be aware of and a skill I need to constantly cultivate. Communication begins with me.

Talk Positive Instead of Negative

Talk Positive Instead of Negative

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“You always talk about how great your team is,” my manager said to me, “and it’s not good that you do.”

Talk about confusing. I didn’t know how to reply to that one. I do know my teams’ weaknesses and strengths. I work with them on the weaknesses. So why would I tell my peers and my manager about the weaknesses all the time? Why wouldn’t I instead talk about the strengths, the good stuff, the positive stuff about my teams?

Being very confused about this feedback from my manager, I asked people I’ve worked with at other companies why talking positively about my team to peers and other teams is a problem. They told me it sounded like I thought my teams were better than everyone else’s. “I never said that to anyone,” was my reply. Their reply, “Well, it’s implied since you always talk positively about your teams.”

This is crazy. Or maybe dysfunctional is a better word.

People talk. When I talk about my teams’ strengths to those outside of my team, eventually, those comments get back to them. When I share negative things about my teams to others outside of my team, those negative comments also get back to them. Now what is more inspiring to you; knowing the leader of your organization is saying positive things about your organization – or negative things?

 

I gotta go with positive.

 

If there are issues preventing the team from delivering, yes, I will share that circumstance with my manager AND I’ll also share what I’m doing to fix those issues. I’ve replaced management staff and eliminated positions to fix problems within my teams; I don’t hide from the negative aspects of my team members.

I simply see no reason to only talk about the negatives and not the positives when it comes to my teams especially when I know that what I say will eventually filter down to my team members. I prefer they hear motivating comments than negative, de-motivating comments. I’ll go with positive. In the long run, the team will perform better and problems will be resolved more easily.

Which would you go with? Positive or negative?

Managing Mindfully

Managing Mindfully

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When I became a manager for the first time, I had no training in management. It was like magic – poof! You are now a manager. Go forth and manage.

So I did. I made mistakes. I bumbled around. I learned. I took classes and got feedback. Let me just say the early feedback wasn’t great. I realized I needed to spend time on my management skills and be mindful of how I managed. So I worked on my blind spots and strengthened my communication skills.

The key to all this management and leadership stuff?AdobeStock_81770478

It takes dedication and work to be a good manager and leader. And good managers never stop learning. On this site I share what I’ve learned about leadership and management – both as someone being managed by someone else and as a leader and manager.

 

Self-Awareness

Self-Awareness

Self-Awareness written on running trackSomeone once asked me what was the most important skill or quality for a manager to have. My answer: self-awareness. Many people would say self-awareness is not a skill or a quality – I think it is.

Self-awareness: Conscious knowledge of one’s own character, feelings, motives, and desires.*

Knowing myself, how I react to situations, what motivates me, what I want – all of these impact how I act as a manager. I learned this the hard way.

One of my managers sent me to a class on personality styles. At the time, I couldn’t figure out why he thought this important, but I’m so glad he did. We took a personality assessment before the class and the first thing the instructor did was divide the room into 4 squares or quadrants. Then he had us take a chair and sit in our quadrants. I clearly remember mine, which was driver. I was the only person in that quadrant.

We were given a situation and then asked how we would respond. When I answered, there was silence. None of them liked my answer. They thought it disregarded how they felt. Being a driver personality type, it really never occurred to me they would see my answer differently than what I intended. But they did. I started thinking, “Hey wait!; I’m the obnoxious person in the room.” I always thought someone else was the obnoxious person in the room but, nope, it was me.

That’s when I found out that driver personality types tend to run over people and usually don’t even have a clue that they’ve done so. Drivers think they are doing the right things for the team, even when it may not be the right thing for the team. Wow! Everyone isn’t like me! They have different personality styles which means they respond differently to situations than I do. Which means they might think I’m an obnoxious person. That was sobering.

 

Knowing my personality style helps me lead more effectively.

 

This made me aware that I need to know myself. I need to understand my character and my qualities, as it impacts those around me. This class helped me to understand that I have blind spots, my strengths can be my weaknesses, and that I need to understand other personality styles if I am to be good manager.

I’m still learning. I miss cues. I’m still a driver personality type. I can still be an obnoxious person. But at least I know it and work hard to put myself in someone else’s shoes, into someone else’s personality style. The bottom line is being self-aware helps me be a better leader.

* New Oxford American Dictionary