By Virginia Auciello

Success at your job is surely related to skill and competence, but skill and competence is not enough for recognition and promotion. No matter what job you have, if you want to excel you must have outstanding communication skills.

Do people feel heard when they talk to you? Can you turn around a tough situation with a customer? Can you influence your boss to accept a good idea? Can you sell? All of these situations rely on excellent communication skills.

When someone is talking to you, the most important thing to do is to give that person your full attention and cause them to feel both heard and respected. When people feel heard and respected, they attach a magic quality to you - credibility! Where credibility exists, we can build relationships of trust. Working in an environment of trust reduces miscommunication and allows individuals to concentrate on what is really important. And when our customers trust us, we have their commitment. So why don't we give our full attention? Takes too long? Too much to do? Any situation will take longer when we don't give people full attention. So multitasking is not always better. Full attention allows us to save time later and results in a much higher level of "people satisfaction".

When you are the talker, do you think before you speak? We are not suggesting to rehearse every situation, we are recommending to be thoughtful about your desired outcome for a conversation before you start.

Once you know your desired outcome, consider the concept of alignment. Do you words, your tone of voice and your body language all support your intended message? These three aspects of communication are always in your personal control, yet so often we agonize over what we are going to say without giving a thought to what it sounds like or looks like. If any of the three aspects of communication are out of sync, the listener will always believe what they see first, the tone second and the intent of the words will be lost. "What you do speaks louder than what you say." Here's an example: If I love to cross my arms over my chest and do that while I say "I'm entirely open to new ideas, please give me your suggestions.", it won't work. People will take one look at that poster and assume you've already made up your mind and you are just going through the motions. No alignment equals no desired outcome.

Language choice is also critical. Do you say "I can deal with them." A slightly different word choice, "I can work with them.", lends a different interpretation. The use of tentative language gets in the way of desired outcome, too, and it has become very popular. "Let me try to help you,", do you know any customer that wants to try to be helped? If I am the customer I want to talk with a knowledgeable and competent person that can help me. So many supervisors say to employees, "You probably might want to try ___." They make the suggestion optional when the intent is for the individual to change their behavior and do ___. The motivation for tentative language is sometimes consideration, instead the receiver of the tentative language perceives that the talker is unsure, not confident. Save the use of tentative language for those few times when you really are not sure of yourself.

So, giving someone your full attention is in your control. Stop whatever you are doing, look at the person and listen until they stop talking. You'll save yourself time in the long run and you'll cause people to feel heard and respected. And when you go to speak, determine your desired outcome first. The select words, vocal quality and behavior on purpose to support attaining your desired result. We all can increase our communication effectiveness simply by being aware. Go for it; it's up to you to use communication behaviors thoughtfully. It's worth it. Credibility and trust are great companions if you want to excel.