BUSINESS COMMUNICATION

 What is Communication?

 How is it different from English?

 So, what is Business Communication?

DEFINITION
 It is the communication between the people in or out of
an organization for the purpose of carrying out the
business activities
IN THIS SESSION OF
BUSINESS COMMUNICATION
 Two aspects

 First aspects focuses on communicating strategically

 Second aspect on managing meetings, conducting mock

meetings, writing official letters, reports, minutes, legal
documents, press release, and compliance
LEARNING OBJECTIVES
 Effective communication is a strong determinant of your
success

 Good communicators often manage to land good roles

 Good communicators are preferred for promotion as they

can articulate their ideas well

 The importance of communication should be always

there
THREE BASIC RULES
 1. One speaker at a time

 2. Understand the message

 3. Keep conversation True, Relevant, Adequate and

Clear (TRAC)

 Silence and stillness are powerful forms of

communication.
EFFECTIVE
COMMUNICATION
 Focus on the Information

 Use Open-ended Questions to Expand

 Use Closed ended Questions to be Specific

 Encourage Dialogue

 State your Understanding

 Summarize the Key points

TIPS TO IMPROVE COMMUNICATION
 Pay Attention
 Be Consistent

 Common Ground

 Have a Stake

 Self-belief

 Be Genuine

 Be Strategic

 Never Argue
BENEFITS OF EFFECTIVE BUSINESS
COMMUNICATION
 Builds better customer relationships

 Saves time

 Increases productivity

 Maintains clarity

 Empowers partnerships
3 GOLDEN RULES FOR
EFFECTIVE COMMN.
 Improve Pronunciation & Diction

 Spruce up your writing skills

 Five exercises to practice everyday

 Read newspaper to your mirror
 Don’t read local newspaper
 Use dictionary as much as you can
 Make a list of words
 Make an effort to speak in English
WRITING PROCESS
 Pre-writing

 Drafting

 Revising

 Editing

 Publishing
EFFECTIVE MEETINGS
 Clear objectives

 Wise use of time

 Process
ENHANCING COMMUNICATION
PROCESS
 Mandatory to have effective communication skills

 EFFECTIVE
COMMUNICATION : Two-Way Process
 THE COMMUNICATION PROCESS

msg msg msg msg

Source Encoding CHANNEL Decoding Receiver

FEEDBACK
 Source

 The point from which the message has originated

 Encoding

 The sender must use words or techniques to be understood by

the recipient
 Channel

 Richest channel – face to face

 Leanest channel – impersonal static (letter, report)

 Everything else (phone, email, voicemail) lies in-

between
 Decoding

 Itrequires the receiver to listen actively and ask for clarity wherever
required by

 Paraphrasing (using other words to reflect what the speaker has said)

 Silence

 Clarify

 Questioning

 Summarize
 Noise
 Itcan be physical noise or could be caused by
 confused messaging,
 lack of clarity in message,
 poor choice of communication channel,
 recipient’s biases,
 cultural differences,
 recipient’s knowledge
 Feedback taps basic human needs
 To improve, to compete, to be accurate

 Feedback should be well-timed, descriptive, authentic,

specific

 It is a crucial component of communication

 Context

 Context setting is important for the message to be

structured effectively

 It is essential for the message to be received positively

 Personal background of the audience needs to be taken

into consideration
7 CS OF EFFECTIVE COMMUNICATION
 Clear
 In purpose, goals and ideas

 Concise
 Brief, crisp, to the point

 Concrete
 Vivid facts, laser like focus, resonance with the recipient

 Coherent
 Logic, connection to the main point, consistent
7 CS OF EFFECTIVE COMMUNICATION
 Courteous
 Open and friendly, devoid of insults, empathetic

 Complete
 Relevant, sufficient, call for action

 Correct
 Error-free, jargon free
CLARITY OF MESSAGE
 Don’t bury your main message

 First ‘what’, then ‘why’

 What – state your main message first

 Why- then add supporting information

 Don’t overload your sentences

 A well-constructed, clear sentence is 1-2 lines

 What + why + how
AIDA : FOR WRITTEN COMMUNICATION
 Attention
 Grabthe reader’s attention
 Example, an attention grabbing email subject

 Interest
 Ensure they stay glued on what you say
 Example, talking about the problems or aspirations of the
reader
AIDA : FOR WRITTEN COMMUNICATION
 Desire
 Create a desire to fulfill their need
 Example, highlighting how life will become easier if they use
your service

 Action
 Translatedesire into action
 Example, asking them to call or come for a demo session
WAYS TO IMPROVE WRITING SKILLS
 Brush up on the basic principles of writing, grammar and
spelling.

 Write like it’s your job and practice regularly.

 Read more so you develop an eye for what effective

writing looks like.

 Take the time to analyze writing you admire. Follow

those whose writing you admire
EFFECTIVE WRITING SKILLS
 Put the reader first
 WIIFM – What’s in it for me
 Write to express not to impress

 Use simple words and short sentences

 Use jargon only when necessary. In other words, avoid

jargons as much as possible

 Write with verbs and nouns

 Format to improve readability

RULES OF EFFECTIVE WRITING
 Audience analysis

 Create an outline

 Use AIDA (Attention, Interest, Desire, Action)

 Try some empathy

 Rational, emotional and ethical

 Identify your main theme

 Use simple language

FEW OTHER RULES
 Getting to the point

 Use of non-discriminatory language

 Punctuation, Grammar and Spelling

 Tone
 WRITE WITH VERBS AND NOUNS

 Use active voice.

e.g.,
 The company sells insurance.
 Not: Insurance is sold by the company.

 The construction crew repaired the road.

 Not: The road was repaired by the construction company.
CHOOSE THE RIGHT VERB AND THE
RIGHT NOUN
 Mr. Johnson ran quickly across the four-lane street, almost
falling down when he stepped in a large hole in the concrete.
(22 words)

 Mr. Johnson sprinted across the boulevard, stumbling when

he stepped in a pothole. (13 words)
EXAMPLES OF JARGON
 The new FMIS system from Global provides VOR/DME nav
redundancy, as well as enhanced GPS capability. (jargon)

 Global's new flight management system provides several ways to

navigate your airplane, including the latest in satellite navigation.

 While the new ST7000 provides extensive memory and is extremely

user compatible, it lacks the requisite capacity for calculating at a
high rate of speed. (jargon)

 Our computer system is easy to use and has enough memory, but it
is too slow.
DIFFERENT FORMS OF WRITTEN
COMMUNICATION
 Letters

 Emails

 Reports

 Minutes of Meetings

 Legal Documents

 Press Releases
LETTER
 Letter writing is a prized skill in the world of work.

 The higher you advance in your career, the more you

will need to write letters.

 Letters are more formal and official than other types of

business communication.
LETTER WRITING
 Clear purpose

 Simple and straight tone

 Salutations, beginning of a letter

 Body

 Valediction and signature

 Proofreading
PLANNING A BUSINESS LETTER

 Determine the purpose of your letter:

 Why are you writing the letter?

 Know your reader:

 Who will read it? Is it for the boss? Subordinate? Client

 Choose the thoughts to be included

PLANNING A BUSINESS LETTER

 Collect supporting facts

 Arrange the Materials in Logical Order

 Select the Right Tone

DRAFTING A BUSINESS LETTER
 Determine the purpose of the letter

 Plan the message

 Use natural conversational language

 Be compact and clear

 Be brief but not too brief

STEPS IN WRITING REPORT
 PROCESS
Determine the purpose of the Report

Identify the Receivers

Collect the necessary data

Analyze and classify the data

Outline the report

Prepare the final report

Present the Report

REPORT
 Title Page

 Terms of Reference

 Summary

 Table of Contents

 Introduction
REPORT
 Methods

 Results

 Discussion

 Conclusion

 Appendices
MINUTES OF MEETINGS
 Summary of what happened during the meeting

 Written by personal assistant immediately after the

meeting and verified by the chair

 Distributed to all those who attended (and not attended

the meeting)

 Delegation of responsibility and deadlines

 Details of follow-up meeting

LEGAL DOCUMENTS
 While drafting an agreement

 Prepare an outlines

 Establish a single principle of division

 Arrange items logically

 Appropriate headings

 Keep audience in mind

LEGAL DOCUMENTS
 Use concrete and clear words

 Avoid gender specific words

 Use short sentences and correct words

 Use active voice to make it look more direct

 Try making positive statements

PRESS RELEASE
 Press release is a written summary updating the media about
activities going on

 Press is a tool for sales

 Your story needs to be newsworthy

 It has to sound professional

 Good quotes help

 Have a strong headline

MANAGING EFFECTIVE MEETINGS
 Effective meetings

 Achieve the desired objectives

 Do you want a decision?

 Do you want to generate ideas?

 Are you making plans?

MANAGING EFFECTIVE MEETINGS
 Effective meetings

 Use time wisely

 Priorities

 Results

 Participants

 Sequence

 Timing

 Date, time and Place

MANAGING EFFECTIVE MEETINGS
 Effective meetings

 Satisfying participants that a sensible process has been followed

 Ask everyone to chip-in with their ideas

 Summarize each of the agenda items

 Note items requiring further discussion

 Watch body language

 Ensure meetings stays true to the course

 Summarize at the end

USE OF SOCIAL MEDIA
 Remember, everything on the internet is written in ink,
share sensibly

 Potential recruiters might very well visit your social

pages to ascertain the causes you support

 Everything posted on social media pages is stored

forever, even when you have deleted them

 Spend time on professional social networking sites like

LinkedIn which would help you
COMMUNICATION MISTAKES TO AVOID
 Not editing your work

 Assuming that your message has been understood

 Reacting, not responding

 Being underprepared

 Not customizing your communication

COMMUNICATION MISTAKES TO AVOID
 Using the wrong channel of communication

 Avoiding difficult conversations

 Violating others’ privacy

ERRORS
 Run-on sentence or common splice

 Pronoun error

 Mistakes in apostrophe usage

 Lack of subject/verb agreement

 Misplaced modifiers
ERRORS
 Me, myself and I

 Article errors

 Informal/redundant words

 Comma errors

 Which versus that

 Use of ellipses
NONVERBAL
 A majority of the meaning we attribute to words comes
not from the words themselves, but from nonverbal
factors such as gestures, facial expressions, tone, body
language, etc.

 Nonverbal cues can play five roles

 Repetition
 Contradiction
 Substitution
 Complementing
 Accenting
EFFECTIVE LISTENING
 Three Basic Listening Modes

› Competitive or Combative Listening

 Happens when we are more interested in promoting our own point
of view

› Passive or Attentive Listening

 Genuine interest in hearing and understanding the other person’s
point of view

› Active or Reflective Listening

 The interest is to understand what the person is thinking, feeling,
wanting or what the message means.
RULES OF GOOD LISTENING
› Stop Talking !!

› Hold your Judgments

› Focus

› Paraphrase (putting the contents in own words)

› Remember Names

› Question
HANDLING DIFFICULT CONVERSATIONS
 Choose the right time and place

 Anticipate that you may not be on the same page

 Use a respectful tone

 Genuinely desire a win-win outcome

 Be empathetic
 Maintain eye contact

 Stay in control

 Write it out

 Don’t interrupt

 Don’t team ups

 PRESENTATION SKILLS
 Tips for Effective Presentation Skills
 Have clear action/
recommendation

 Understand your
audience

 First (and last)

impressions are
everything
 PRESENTATION SKILLS
 Tips for Effective Presentation Skills

 Keep it Simple

 Perform, don’t present

 Handle Objections smartly

 Do thorough home work

 Learn power point

 GROUP DISCUSSION
 Itis a formal discussion involving 1 to 12 participants
in a group
 The group is given a topic or a situation

 Need to discuss for 15-20 minutes

 GROUP DISCUSSION
 GDs can be topic-based or case-based

 Types
 Topic based GDs
 Factual Topics
(education, tourism)
 Controversial Topics

(reservation, M v/s W)
 Abstract topics

(number 10, color blue)

 GROUP DISCUSSION

 Why GD
 To understand a subject
 Help solve a problem
 Change attitude
 To arrive at a decision
 Improve listening skills
 To hear others’ ideas
GROUP
DISCUSSION
 Skills Needed

 Communication Skills
 Knowledge and Ideas
 Leadership and Coordinating Abilities
 Assertiveness
 Flexibility
 Exchange of Thoughts
 Addressing the Group as a Whole
 Thorough Preparations
GROUP DISCUSSION
 Tips

 When to Speak
 How to Communicate
 How to Convince
 How to Lead
 Listen
 Behavior
 Quality v/s Quantity
 Summarizing
GROUP DISCUSSION
 Roles
 Initiator
 Info/Opinion seeker/giver
 Clarifier
 Summarizer

 Don’t
 Attack
 Dominate
GROUP DISCUSSION
 Mistakes
 Emotional Outburst
 Quality v/s Quantity
 Egotism Showing Off
 Get Noticed – But for
the Right Reasons
 Managing One’s
Insecurities