Three Steps That Can Improve Relationships: Effective Communication is Key

Miscommunication, misunderstandings and assumptions all cause conflict in personal and professional lives. You can improve all relationships in your life with effective communication skills. Apply a simple pattern in your relationships with sincerity, and you will have more satisfying outcomes.

The common thread that runs among self-help books, sales books, relationship books and management books is effective communication. The cliché is that we have one mouth and two ears, so we are supposed listen two times more than we talk. The trouble is that often when we supposedly are listening, we are really formulating what we plan to say when that person quits speaking, especially in the course of an argument. This is not effective listening. How can you listen when you are thinking about what you would like to say?

A tip to check yourself and others to see if people are really listening is to notice how quickly you or your friend respond. If there is a thoughtful pause, then there is listening because the responder had to pause to think about what was to be said next. If there is no pause, simply a quick reply, then no listening. The responder has been busy formulating the next thing to be said.

The path to effective communication is three steps that are easy to say, but take a lot of practice to implement. The steps are to ask an open-ended question, listen, and then ask another open-ended question.

This is a beautiful system, especially when you are at a loss in terms of what to say. If you simply give people the space, they will tell you what they think is important. Simple questions, such as:
"How have you been?"
"Tell me more about what you've been doing lately."
"Tell me more about how you made that decision."

Often we ask these as a courtesy, but ask them and mean them if you would like to be an effective communicator. Give the person plenty of time to answer the question. If they answer out of habit, "Fine" or "not much," ask them to tell you more. You can drive the conversation and make the other person an effective communicator, too.

When you really start to listen to people, it's amazing how much you can actually learn. If it is in your professional life, it is powerful knowledge to understand what people really want, what their goals are. If it is in your personal life, again, it is powerful to know what is important to people in your life.

Ask. Listen. Reflect.

The reflection is important in effective communication because this is a time to verify that you are hearing correctly. If not, this is a time for clarification. It also draws the other person to tell you more because you are genuinely interested.

Effective communication will help lessen conflict in your life. Effective communication will improve your relationships. Effective communication is genuine. It is not phony or superficial. People are great at detecting insincere communicators and, frankly, people find it insulting.

Ask. Listen. Reflect.