When it comes to your personal development as a professional, your interpersonal skills are among the most important to hone. These soft skills come in many forms from empathy to punctuality to reliability, but perhaps the most vital of all to possess are great communication skills, as they have a large bearing on how you fare in the workplace.
How Do Communication Skills Help You In The Workplace?
Perhaps the better way to phrase this question would be to ask how communication skills DON’T help you in the workplace. In any organisation, you need to know how to effectively interact with colleagues, suppliers, your bosses and everyone else you have dealings with. It’s a totally transferable skill that will help you no matter where you work.
How Do You Develop Better Interpersonal Skills At Work?
Well, when it comes to communication, we’ve got you covered, as that’s what we’re about to look at now. Here we offer up five useful tips on how to become a better communicator. So let’s get started.
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Tip #1 - Brevity Is Important For Communication
Whenever you’re communicating with anyone at work, it’s vital that you are succinct and to the point. Being overly verbose can not only be confusing, but also boring - leading to people switching off and not listening to you properly. We don’t mean that you should be blunt, but do keep what you’ve got to say relevant and to the point when you can.
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Tip #2 - Being Approachable Is Important For Communication
One of the interpersonal skills that will ensure that will make people want to speak to you is to be friendly and approachable. That means being pleasant, maintaining eye contact and smiling to make the person approaching you feel comfortable and relaxed. In a work setting, this is vital, as you don’t want colleagues to avoid talking to you because of your manner.
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Tip #3 - Being An Active Listener Is Important For Communication
What some people forget when communicating with others is that a conversation is a two-way street, meaning that you need to listen at least as much as you talk. Nodding, repeating back what’s been said to confirm and asking questions all demonstrate that you’re giving your full attention to the person you’re speaking to.
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Tip #4 - Try & Copy Good Communicators
You can learn the theory of communication from an online course, but it also helps to pay attention to others in the workplace that you know to be strong in this area. Try and take some pointers by observing what they do and introducing it into how you communicate. You could even pick their brain if you know them well enough, as they’ll likely take it as a compliment.
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Tip #5 - Consider What To Say Before You Speak
Whether you’re communicating in person or via email, it pays to think about what to say before you say it. You should consider who you’re talking to and the subject matter, adjusting your tone and approach accordingly. Do this right and you’ll go a long way to avoiding awkwardness and offence and developing good working relationships with everybody you come across.
Expand Your Horizons With Short Courses From OCA
Communication is such an important factor in anyone’s career, as it’s one of those interpersonal skills that can have a large impact on how you progress. The good news is that it can be worked on, as can your hard skills, which can be addressed with OCA video-based short courses online - something that represents one of the most mentally-stimulating ways to learn new professional skills.
At Online Courses Australia, our online training is not just CPD-approved, but is also put together with the help of top industry experts who know what employers are looking for.
If you’d like to know more about what makes our courses so popular with students across Australia, visit us today at www.onlinecoursesaustralia.edu.au where you’ll find training covering more than 20 different industries.
Alternatively, to speak about any aspect of our training that comes with 24/7 support, our flexible payment options or anything else, just give us a call at 1300 611 404, and we’ll give you what you need.
