In our last blog we highlighted the idea of communication intelligence and success – and the powerful Forté reporting tool that can be used to understand, quantify and achieve it. In the words of one of my personal mentors, Paul Hersey, “At the root of effective influence are three basic competencies; learning to diagnose, adapt and communicate”. Sounds logical, right? Perhaps not to everyone.
Some days ago a coaching client and I were discussing the blog and the ideas of acting on purpose, of adapting your message to another’s behavioral patterns in order to be more effective with them. My client very passionately let me know, “I have a problem with that thinking – it seems to me kind of deceitful…or manipulative, even purposely misleading. By being someone that I’m not, in my trying to be more outgoing than I really am, isn’t it all just a lie? ”
So which is it, deceitful, or dynamic? In adapting your interactions with another to match their communication patterns, preferences and tendencies are you scheming or sincere?
Are your efforts a perversion, concealment or distortion of the truth? Is your intent to mislead through trickery?
Or are your efforts to diagnose and adapt those of energetic and effective action? Or are you being productive, influential and charismatic, as with any dynamic force, are you earnestly working to simply produce positive movement? With my client I used the following story to illustrate the power of the latter argument.
Over the holiday break my indoor soccer team scheduled a couple of ‘pick-up’ nights to make up for the leagues being off over Christmas. We are made up of just about every nationality you can think of, from the ‘Yanks’ and ‘Chaps’ (Americans and Brits) to a range of Latin Americans, Asians and Europeans.
One teammate, arguably the most impactful player we’ve got, is a Bulgarian. He speaks English very well (he’s also a 747 pilot for one of the world’s largest airlines) but I thought it might be nice to wish him a happy new year in his native language. It’s easy to Google a translation (‘chestita nova godina’) and I laid it on him in my best ‘Bulgarian’ accent when we showed up to play. He turned around with a big smile on his face and said, “Yes, yes, thank you Don!”
So, what do you think – deceitful or dynamic, manipulation or movement? To my coaching client the distinction was clear. While we may instinctively want to pass judgment on someone’s intent, adapting to another’s “language” is simply effective and efficient communication. My client even added, “NOT adapting to another’s communications patterns and preference is akin to travelling to Bulgaria, finding they don’t understand you – and then just speaking LOUDER in English! Having the flexibility to communicate as others would prefer is in fact the ultimate compliment.”
Acting on purpose. Acting with purpose. Find a way to communicate in a way others might best understand. Diagnose, adapt, and communicate.
**If you missed it last week, CLICK HERE to take your Free Forte Communication Style Survey. It will take you less than 5 minutes and the report will be delivered immediately**
