Good Verbal Communication Skills

• Good verbal communication skills are the key to successful persuasion.
• Learn how to communicate effectively by eliminating weak language.
• Good communication skills are easy to develop, if you know how!

In this article we are going to be looking at how you can improve your communication skills.

Since virtually everything you do in your life involves some form of communication, learning how to improve your overall communication skills can have a massive impact on your life.

Improve Communication Skills By Reading More 

One of the best ways to improve your communication skills is to read more books. Reading will help to improve your ability to express ideas, whilst also expanding the size of your volcabulary.

Conversely, not reading many books and watching lots of TV will have the opposite effect, thereby making your communication skills worse.

So if you want to improve your communication skills, start reading more!

Good Communication Skills Involves Positive Language

A good communicator always uses words that communicate precisely what they mean.

For example, rather than say they “might” do something, they either say they “will” or they “won’t”.

Instead of saying “if” they say “when”, and instead of saying “they will try” they say “they can”.

Good communicators therefore always leave little doubt in the listener’s mind as to the meaning of their message.

This is important because when you introduce doubt into the listeners mind, you are in danger of losing both credibility and believability.

To improve your communication skills you should therefore express exactly what you mean, rather than making someone guess as to what you are trying to say.

Are You A “Try-er” Or A “Do-er”? 

People who use positive language are also perceived as being more action and result orientated people. These are the type of people who you ask to do a job, and you know they will do it.

Those who use limiting and vague language such as “try”, “maybe” and “sometime” tend to be unreliable, lacking in motivation and will usually not do what they say they will do.

Who would you prefer to rely on? The person who “tries” or the person who “does”?

Assertiveness Communication Skills

To speak assertively means expressing your thoughts and opinions with confidence and a belief in your right to express them.

This does not necessarily mean that everything you say will be correct, but that you are not afraid to express yourself and you do so with without apology.

This last point provides a good example of how not to speak assertively.

For example, often people will express an opinion only to devalue its importance by attaching an uncertainty to the end of the sentence.

A phrase often used is “well that’s only my opinion” or “but I could be wrong”.

Whilst these phrases may be appropriate under some circumstances, using “uncertainties” after expressing your opinion shows both a lack of belief in yourself and in what you are saying.

To the listener these uncertainties make you and your opinions seem less important, and therefore less persuasive.

So to speak assertively, speak your thoughts and feelings with confidence, and recognise your right to express them. Avoid adding uncertainties to the ends of your sentences, as they will degrade the overall value of your message.

Take Responsibility

Good speakers take responsibility for themselves, and their actions. They avoid the language of victimisation and avoid blaming others for past misfortunes.

Once you begin to blame other people, you immediately convey the message that you lack the power to control your own life.

Playing the victim, where you talk of past misfortunes in order to gain sympathy, also reveals a lack of self esteem and a need for external approval.

So to speak responsibly, do not whine or moan about things or people that have gone wrong for you in the past. This communicates weakness, and a lack of personal control.

Instead, recognise and admit your mistakes. This will increase the credibility and believability of you and your message.

Win - Win

Successful persuaders will always try to find an outcome in which both people benefit. This is important because when someone feels as though they will be loosing out on a deal, they will be more likely to resist you and your persuasion attempt.

By creating a win - win situation, whereby both people each get what they want, persuasion becomes a lot easier and quicker. In order to accomplish this, cooperation and some sacrifices will need to be made.

So remember, always keep in mind what the other person wants. If you can find a way to give it to them, whilst still getting what you want, you will become very successful persuader indeed!

Speak Decisively

Speaking decisively means being a straight talker, getting to the point and avoiding worthless meaningless waffle.

If you want to say something, say it.

There is nothing worse that listening to someone go on and on about something, when they could have said it in a few words.

If you want a good example of this go ask an elderly pensioner for directions (this has happened to me on many occasions!).

In my experience, I have found the elderly to give extremely specific and detailed instructions on how to reach my destination.

Usually they also provide some historical background information, or personal experiences, they had with those locations.

Of course this is very helpful, and very much appreciated, however in most cases they could have told me how to get where I wanted to go in a few words.

I suspect the reason the elderly do this is because they have more time on their hands, and are grateful for the brief company. When I ask younger people for directions, they are almost always a lot more brief.

So to speak decisively, get to the point and don’t waffle!

Avoid Weak Language

The first type of weak language to avoid involves the overuse of intensifiers. Intensifiers are words placed before a sentence to boost its importance.

For example, I really like ice cream, it’s really good, because it tastes really really nice.

In case you didn’t notice, the intensifier was the word “really”. Overusing intensifiers has the opposite effect of their intended use, and serves only to weaken the sentence.

Hesitations And Fillers

Uh…well…ummm…. I think the next type of weak language is ummmm……uh…..ummmm…. oh yeah, its ummm hesitations and fillers!

Hesitations and errr…ummm fillers, are usually not words but rather sounds like “uh” and “um” that you say while your brain tries to come up with an appropriate response.

The most common of these is “um’ and virtually everyone uses it, except highly educated and skilled speakers.  Using “um” occasionally is forgivable, however what is not forgivable is someone who says “um” every third or fourth word.

Overusing hesitations and fillers conveys a lack of intelligence, lack of confidence, uncertainty in your message and an overall lack of communication skills.

It’s actually quite easy to avoid using hesitations and fillers, if you consciously try to stop saying them.

However it is very difficult to eliminate them completely, as they have almost become integrated into the English language as words. This is especially true for “um”.

So to speak more confidently and authoritatively, avoid the use of hesitations and fillers.

Tag Questions                                         

Tag questions are short questions that you add to the end of a sentence.

For example, “that was a good game, don’t you think?” or “this tastes good, doesn’t it?”

Tag questions are perfectly acceptable if used occasionally. However adding a question to the majority of your sentences will communicate uncertainty, a lack of self belief in your opinions and a need for external approval.

Disclaimers

Disclaimers are short introductory expressions that ask the listener to show understanding or be tolerant of what you are about to say. A commonly used disclaimer is “I am not an expert in this field but…” or “I am not a doctor but…”

Disclaimers prime the listener to devalue what you are about to say, even before you have said it. This makes your message seem less believable, and more likely to be questioned or rejected by the listener.

Hedges And Qualifiers

When a person is uncertain of something they are about to say, they tend to use hedges and qualifiers. These are words or phrases that are said before a statement is made, which suggest uncertainty and a lack of confidence in that statement.

For example, “I sort of like that” or “I think I like that” both create uncertainty in the listener’s mind about you are going to say.

If you want to communicate certainty and confidence when delivering your message, you should avoid using such phrases before making a statement.

If you feel the need to use qualifiers, then use more powerful phrases such as “the evidence suggests that…” or “based on previous experience…”.

Another way of conveying uncertainty about your message is to use phrases such as “I know I’m not describing this well but…” or “this probably isn’t the best way to say this but…”

Again, these phrases said before making your main statement, will convey uncertainty to the listener and suggest that you lack authority or expertise in that area.

Apologies

Frequent apologies during social interactions are extremely common with people who have low self esteem.

Inappropriate or an overuse of apology, occurs when you apologise for things that are beyond your control.

For example, “I am sorry that didn’t work out for you” or “I’m sorry I couldn’t help you” could both be considered excessive apology if the person continues to add an apology to the majority of what they say.

Apologies themselves are not a bad thing, however when they are used excessively, they tend to convey weakness or a need to be appreciated/liked by other people.

This can be seen as submissive behaviour, which can lead to other people trying to dominate or control you.

Understanding The “Power Vacuum”

I once saw an excellent documentary which illustrated this point rather well. The documentary was about an experiment done in prison regarding control and the use of power. The study found that during social interactions there is something called a “power vacuum”.

During the initial stages of a conversation, both people compete for power over the other.

It was found that if you do not assert yourself, then the power will go to the other person and they will dominate you.

So if you are seen as submissive, such as by excessively apologising to another person, you essentially give up your power thereby allowing the other person to control you.

Once you have lost this power, your ability to assert yourself, and therefore express your true thoughts and opinions, is severely hampered.

Just to clarify, the act of apologising is not a bad thing, and you should always apologise if you have done something wrong that was your fault.

However avoid overusing apologies, and do not apologise for things that were beyond your control.

Integrity

Integrity means doing what you say you are going to do. This is an extremely important characteristic to have, because if a person learns that your word means something (i.e. you will take action on your words) they are likely to trust and value what you have to say.

However, should a person learn that you do not follow up on your promises, this trust will be lost, and anything you say in the future will be seen as suspicious and unlikely to materialise.

Your word should be your bond, and you should work very hard to honour your promises.

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