"The mind is like a TV set, when it goes stops working, it is a good idea to shut off the sound."-Unknown

Interpersonal communication skills are one of the most basic, yet one of the most ignored of the many communication skills necessary to be a leader. ONE CANNOT LEAD THE MASSES UNTIL YOU KNOW HOW TO PERSUADE A FRIEND. And it is surprisingly difficult to get a friend to act even in their best interest. Have ever tried to get someone to exercise more?

This communication skill conceptually is rather simple, having just two individuals, with one acting as a sender and the other acting as a receiver. Besides that, you have a couple of hidden processes known as encoding and decoding with the selection of media an important consideration. Last but not least, don't underestimate the importance of feedback.

To build interpersonal skills, you to focus on building a number of component skills. The major component skills include:

• Master NONVERBAL communication
• Learn TWO-WAY COMMUNICATION techniques.
• Choosing the type of LISTENING most appropriate to the situation.
• Creating positive IMPRESSIONS.
• Developing sound RELATIONSHIPS
• Using relevant of QUESTIONS.

Surprisingly, even this relatively simple form of communication is fraught with many types of problems. The short list includes:

• Encoding problems on both the sender side
• Decoding biases the receiver side
• Choose the wrong communication medium,
• Bad timing
• Fail to read feedback, and so on.

Interpersonal communication is the skill set used between two individuals, with one acting as a sender and the other acting as a receiver. Surprisingly, even this relatively simple form of communication is fraught with many types of problems.

Problems include a number of encoding and decoding biases on both the sender and the receiver side. But individuals will also choose the wrong medium, fail to solicit feedback and so on.

This communication skill process is conceptually rather simple, having just two individuals—one acting as a sender and the other acting as a receiver. Besides that, you have a couple of hidden mental processes known as encoding and decoding.

Selection of the medium is another important consideration. In today's large organizations, you commonly see individuals sending an email, when they should pick up the telephone.

Last but not least, don't underestimate the importance of feedback. Its one of the most important interpersonal communication processes, but one that typically operates nonverbally and thus out of conscious awareness.

While Interpersonal communication appears to be simple, it has a surprising number of variations. For example, interpersonal communication can be two-way or one-way. If it's one way, it is sender dominated. The receiver is very passive, in many case, faking it with an occasional acknowledgment statement. In fact, a receiver doesn't even have to even say anything, they can simply nod from time to time. Faking it comes in handy since one doesn't have to pay attention to a boring person. As one can see, one-way interpersonal communication creates problems and it has sometimes been called passive listening.

Interpersonal Communication Barriers

Surprisingly, even this relatively simple form of interpersonal communication (compared to what is going on in groups anyway) is fraught with many types of barriers. The short list includes:

* Encoding problems on both the sender side
* Decoding biases the receiver side
* Choose the wrong interpersonal communication medium,
* Bad timing
* Fail to read feedback, and so on.

Most people are terrible listeners—but they do know how to fake it pretty well. We do this with techniques such as nodding at the right moment, period acknowledgments such as, "Ah" and "Ah, ha," and the classic technique present in the marriage, the "Yes, dear." In fact, we are so good at faking listening, that the average person can't even tell.

Leaders cannot afford to develop a reputation for unskilled listening—it's ruinous. Despite this, one of the more common complaints in many organizations is, "My boss doesn't listen to me."

Listening is important—it's hard work—it's something few people do well. That's because the interpersonal communication skill called listening requires constant mental energy and it easier to fake it. Technically, faking it involves using certain types of acknowledgement signals to give the sender the impression that we are paying attention when we are not.

Plus there are actually different types of listening. For example, you can listen passively, actively, or emphatically. One can listen to memorize or critically listen as a means of logic checking.

This interpersonal communication skill can be improved, but it requires both knowledge and effort. For many years, I actually did this wrong. I hand thought the fundamental problem was a series of barriers. It turned out, the real problem was one of related of limitations of attention. There are five of these.

• Serial Information drastically diminishing parallel language processing
• Capacity Limitations cause that information overload
• Fatigue counteracts vigilance
• Short Attentions Spans
• Attention is selectivities misses more than it processes
• People focus it internal when they should have it external.

So remember the words of Andre Gide, "Everything has been said before, but since nobody listens, we have to keep going back and begin again.

One of my more favorite jokes about nonverbal communication goes this way,

"A newcomer to a certain summer resort was surprised to find a group of men gathered on the lawn one evening shouting numbers at each other.
"Sixteen," one would yell, and all would laugh.
"One hundred and thirty-five," another would say, and all would laugh.
"Twenty-seven," a third would say, nearly choking with glee, and all would laugh.
"Two hundred and three," shouted someone, and this time everyone fell off his chair howling. The laughter continued till some turned blue in the face and had to be pounded to keep them from suffocating~
Numbers continued to be called thereafter, and laughter, now more subdued, also continued.
Finally the newcomer spoke to one of the men on the fringes and said, "Pardon me, but tell me what's going on."
'Well," said the other, "this group meets every year at this resort, and night after night we swap stories. Naturally, we all know the stories, so we gave them numbers and save time by calling the numbers."
The newcomer nodded. "I see. But tell me this. When someone shouted, 'Two hundred and three,' everyone laughed particularly loudly. Why was that?"
His informant chuckled. "Kohl Well, you see, that one we had never heard before.

Body language contains meningomyelitides more meaning than what is embedded in the words. Yet, few individuals pay much attention to it and the average person is rather clueless as to what it all means.

Part of this confusion stems from cultural differences. While a smile is universal, the meaning attached to other facial expressions is determined by culture.

Besides cultural differences there are many different types of nonverbal communication. These include: artifacts, haptics, kinesics, facial expressions, paralanguage, gestures, osculesics, chronemics, interpersonal distance,and body movements (Tubbs, and Moss, 2006).

As you know, emotions and mostly communicated though voice characteristics and facial expressions. If you don't pay attention to these, it is like having the right eye shut and the left one looking left when it should be looking right. You miss so much.

To make matters worse, many people tend to engage in a form of self-talk. This is a special type of self-talk in which the person speaks, but pays not attention to what to the other person. For example, that classic self-talker really doesn't care whether their words are understood or confusing.

But periodically, they will come out of their mental masturbation to see that you haven't left. And of course you will nod politely. They in-term will think that you agree with everything they have just said. It's not that hard to identify the self-talker, all you have to do is look into the eyes. Besides the problem of self-talk, there are many different types of nonverbal interpersonal communication.

Test yourself. How good are you nonverbal communication? Do you know the meaning of the following terms.

• artifacts,
• haptics,
• kinesics,
• facial expressions,
• paralanguage,
• gestures,
• osculesics,
• chromatics,
• interpersonal distance, and
• body movements.

For some reason, many executives assume that they have to dominate everyone. This is typically done is through communicating in loud voice with a fast tempo, for a long period of time to prevent someone from being able to speak or ask questions. If a question does get asked, the executive has a fall back position—the two-minute tirade of irrelevancy.

The power of questions can be seen in TV shows where during a trial, the defense attorney or a prosecutor can enhance or destroy a witnesses credibility simply by the using well structure questions.

Without improving this verbal communication skill, effective counseling, therapy and group facilitation is essentially impossible.

Questions are one of the most powerful methods of verifying and extracting information from another. The key is to ask the right question since most people answer them honestly. Many fail to recognize that questions have the power to same goal as persuasive statements. Rather then use statements, it's better to use questions to encourage the person to discover the answer themselves.

Communicating through questions is subtle and more indirect. It possesses the additional advantage that the person typically doesn't become defensive as a result of during interpersonal communication.

Without using this interpersonal communication technique, group facilitation is essentially impossible. Other situations such as therapy will suffer as a result.

How To Use Questions Interpersonal Communication

Clarifying Meaning

A question is a tactful method testing that there is no misunderstanding. Sometimes we may not understand what we have just been told. A question comes to the rescue.

To Facilitate Action

Questions can stimulate progress by getting someone to take action. For example you can ask, “What do you plan to do about it?”

To Keep the Conversation

Going Certain types of questions prevent the conversation from dropping off completely. For example, “Please tell me more?”

Probes

To elicit information is the most commonly accepted reason to use a question and the one most people would associate with the use of questions.

To Change The Subject

Sometimes the conversation gets stuck in the quicksand of back and forth statements that lead no where. A well designed question is the rope that pulls the conversation in a different direction.

To “Tie-downs” a Decision

Tie-downs often are useful tools to get someone to make a decision. For example, “What would you like to do?”

To Serve as an Intervention

This challenge to the status quo is an indirect and less threatening method for someone bring up underlying assumptions or unstated inferences. For example, “How sure are we that this information is accurate?”

A number of studies over the years have indicated that interviews have a relatively low correlation when it comes to predicting future job performance. Despite this low validity, organizations everywhere make interviews a must pass initiation ritual to access corporate riches.

So while interviews are not that valuable to the hiring agency, they are super important to the job seeker who must act, must project, must skillfully communicate in a way that meets the interviewers criteria for the ideal candidate.

Good interpersonal communication skills produce good relationships—it's are simple and as complex as that. While Americans tend to de emphasize the importance interpersonal communication skills in building relationships due to the use of contracts in business, Other cultures follow a different set of rules.

For cultures in Asia, for example, business doesn't begin until the relationship is sound. So if one has bad communicate skills, if you can't form strong interpersonal relationships, you are like a dentist without a drillabilities.

Additionally, certain types of influence techniques require this use of this set of interpersonal communication techniques. One cannot expectations for example. It has been shown in the psychological research that communicating expectations are incredibly important.

In in this area: one uses interpersonal communication to:

• Establish trust
• Build rapport (or being liked),
• Generate Empathy, and
• Create a Positive Impression

Individuals in business and government need to learn how to adapt their verbal communication patterns to take into account cultural differences. It's not enough to speak the same language, you have to use it properly in a cultural context.

No where is the more obvious than in the verbal communication rituals needed to form a positive first impression. To do so, you must be culturally congruent, must incorporate another's behavioral patterns into your own. So rather than shake hands, you might use a wai in Thailand, a bow in Japan and a kiss in Brazil and France.

Cultural communication consists of a number of interpersonal skills, among them forming a positive first impression. According to the research, 30 percent of meaning is communicated nonverbally. It's actually higher than this if you are talking about first impressions.

Impression management is technically a series of verbal and nonverbal techniques that come into play when we first meet someone. It's culturally specific in that all cultures have a greeting ritual that is done when people meet.

That ritual can be modified when it comes to meeting someone from a foreign culture. For example, when two Koreans meet each other it would be coming to bow. However, when a Korean businessman meets a Western one, it becomes something I call "the half bow with a hand shake."

Resources

You never get too good at something things, and you never get too good at interpersonal communication. And no matter how good you are now, you can always get better.

Classic Readings On Interpersonal Communication

Tapscott, Don (1998). Growing Up Digital: The Rise of the Net Generation. New York: McGraw-Hill.

Baron-Cohen, Simon (2004). The Essential Difference: The Truth About the Male and Female Brain. New York: Basic Books.

Bate, Barbara & Taylor (Eds.) (1988). Women Communicating. Norwood, NJ: Ablex

Tannen, Deborah (1991). You Just Don't Understand : Women and Men in Conversation. This isa classic. It contains many patterns men and women have that lead to miscommunication.

Resources On the Net

Interpersonal Communication. Allyn and Bacon. This is an nice overview of interpersonal communication. You will find scholarly views on topics such as: relationship development, self-disclosure, patterns and interpersonal conflict.

Communication Skills Test. This site (called Queendom) has many different types of assessments, many offered for free.

This article has a number of communication tips—over 55 of them. These form the basis for something called heuristics—the ability to make a good decision based on available. 

Services:

Moss, Stewart, and Tubbs, Sylvia (2006). Human Communication, Principles and Contexts, 11th Edition. New York: Prentice Hall.