I'm Sorry ... What Did You Say?

How well do you communicate with others? Yes - you are talking to someone, but are they really hearing and understanding what you are saying? And are you really listening to what they are saying? HOW you deliver your message is just as important as WHAT you are trying to say.

SIRC recently attended an insightful interactive workshop hosted by Sport 4 Ontario in Toronto called “Communicate and Connect in 90 Seconds or Less” with guest facilitator Corey McCusker from “Your Mind Matters.”

The objective of the one hour workshop was to identify communication preferences in each of us and to remind people why it is important to ‘connect’ when building strong relationships. Connecting is really established in the first 90 seconds or less, while much of how others listen to you is done at the sub-conscious level. The major elements of rapport between individuals can be broken down surprisingly enough into the following categories: 55% representing physiological responses, 38% representing tonality and, actual words only representing 7%.

A ‘Preference Test’ was administered to each participant at the beginning of the workshop to determine the “Communication Preference Characteristics” in each person, and what type of communicators and listeners they represent.

The types are:

• Visual: Memorize by seeing pictures and are less distracted by noise. APPEARANCE is important.
• Auditory: Typically are distracted by noise. Learn by repetitive listening. Like to HEAR how they are doing.
• Kinesthetic: Often talk slowly. Respond to physical rewards and touching. Memorize by doing or walking through something. FEELS right or gives them a GUT feeling.
• Auditory Digital: Spend a fair amount of time talking to themselves. Memorize by steps, procedures and sequences. Program has to MAKE SENSE.

Every one of us could have a combination of each of these communication preferences so it is important:

• to know your audience,
• to learn how people perceive communication,
• to understand their preferences and,
• to have simple techniques to build instant rapport with others!

For more information on communication in sport contact SIRC!