Building Relationships – Entry, Dialogue and Closure

of a relationship. Keep these trust-building pointers in mind as you use

all these tools:

• Be open to other people and their ideas.

• Listen carefully to people’s full messages before responding.
• Treat each person as unique and special. Be respectful.
• Don’t try to “become” a different person or Social Style. Small be-
havior adjustments can demonstrate your willingness to be versa-
tile in a relationship without compromising your personal integrity.
• Articulate and demonstrate a positive intent toward other people.
• Follow through on what you promise.

SUMMARY
If things go extremely well in relationships, you may begin to see peo-
ple emulate your Versatility. Even without knowing anything specific
about Social Styles, the important people in your life may begin to re-
spond to your efforts to be more collaborative by increasing their own
willingness to do the same. It’s called reciprocity.
There’s no guarantee that being versatile with others will make
them versatile with you, but everything we’ve described so far is an
outline for what it takes to make it possible for that to happen. When
it does – when people recognize your honest efforts to respond to their
needs and expectations – a special thing happens. Other people start
making an effort to make you comfortable, too.
The energy and productivity that can come out of these kinds of sit-
uations is astounding. Somehow your common ground becomes big-
ger and you begin to focus your efforts on shared goals and outcomes.
You have commitments to mutually beneficial causes.

• One of the biggest challenges in building relationships is to be

heard and respected quickly through all the communication clamor
in people’s lives. That includes face-to-face talk, e-mails, reports,
presentations and documents that come your way daily.

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 Building Relationships – Entry, Dialogue and Closure

• Wilson Learning’s Entry/Dialogue/Closure concept is an effec-

tive way to view the critical junctures in the development of any
relationship.
• Relating means building trust and creating a sense of credibility.
• One of the most important Entry tools in Wilson Learning’s kit for
easing relationship tension is the use of Purpose, Process and Pay-
off statements, which define the reason for meeting or communi-
cating, how the meeting will be conducted or the communication
will be structured, and the benefits for those involved.
• It’s also important in the Entry stage to be aware of the impression
you make with people in four critical areas: Propriety, Competence,
Commonality and Intent.
• During the Dialogue stage of relationship building, your challenge
is to get to know the other person’s needs and interests.
• There are five categories of questions helpful in improving commu-
nication: Permission Questions, Fact-Finding Questions, Feeling-
Finding Questions, Best-Least Questions and Magic-Wand Ques-
tions.
• Closure is concerned with aligning your mutual goals and interests
so people feel compelled to act in your interest.
• Four things you can do to convey your reliability in a relationship
are to support decisions, manage plans, deal with dissatisfaction,
enhance the relationship.
• Trust, the foundation for open communication and productive rela-
tionships, is strongly related to your own personal integrity and
positive intent. Knowing how other people’s Social Style influence
how they like to be treated opens the door to greater trust.

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