Something to Think About

10 Communication Secrets of Great Leaders by Mike Myatt, 4/04 Forbes - It is simply impossible to become a great leader without being a great communicator. The best communicators are great listeners and astute in their observations.  Become an excellent communicator when your interactions with others consistently use the following ten principles:

1.      Speak not with a forked tongue: Trust is best created by earning it ans will forgive many things where trust exists, but will rarely forgive anything where trust is absent.

2.      Get personal: If you don’t develop meaningful relationships with people you’ll never know what’s really on their mind until it’s too late to do anything about it.

3.      Get specific: Learn to communicate with clarity. Simple and concise is always better than complicated and confusing. 

4.      Focus on the leave-behinds not the take-aways: The best communicators develop the ability to get the information they need while leaving the other party feeling as if they got more out of the conversation than you did. When you truly focus more on contributing more than receiving you will have accomplished the goal. 

5.      Have an open mind:  A leader takes their game to a whole new level the minute they willingly seek out those who hold dissenting opinions and opposing positions with the goal not of convincing them to change their minds, but with the goal of understanding what’s on their mind. 

6.      Shut-up and listen: Great leaders know when to dial it up, dial it down, and dial it off (mostly down and off). The greatest form of discourse takes place within a conversation, and not a lecture or a monologue. 

7.      Replace ego with empathy: When candor is communicated with empathy & caring and not the prideful arrogance of an over inflated ego good things begin to happen. Empathetic communicators display a level of authenticity and transparency. 

8.      Read between the lines: Leaders have the uncanny ability to understand what is not said, witnessed, or heard. Rather astute leaders know that there is far more to be gained by surrendering the floor than by filibustering. 

9.      When you speak, know what you’re talking about: Develop a technical command over your subject matter. Good communicators address both the “what” and “how” aspects of messaging so they don’t fall prey to becoming the smooth talker who leaves people with the impression of form over substance.

10.  Speak to groups as individuals: Great communicators can tailor a message such that they can speak to 10 people in a conference room or 10,000 people in an auditorium and have them feel as if they were speaking directly to each one of them as an individual. 

11.  Bonus – Be prepared to change the message if needed: Develop a contingency plan. Use great questions, humor, stories, analogies, relevant data, and where needed, bold statements to help connect and engender the confidence and trust that it takes for people to want to engage. 

Bottom line – The leadership lesson here is whenever you have a message to communicate, make sure said message is true & correct, well-reasoned, and substantiated by solid business logic that is specific, consistent, clear and accurate. Communication is not about you, your opinions, your positions or your circumstances. It’s about helping others by meeting their needs, understanding their concerns, and adding value to their world. 

The best leaders are simply uncomfortable with anything that embraces the status quo. Leadership is pursuit – pursuit of excellence, of elegance, of truth, of what’s next, of what if, of change, of value, of results, of relationships, of service, of knowledge, and of something bigger than themselves.