Talk the Talk: Tips for Effective Communication by Jane Toohey AIMM, delivered at the Australian Institute of Management Open House in Brisbane on Wednesday 7 August 2013.

1. Talk the Talk: Tips for Effective Communication

2. Agenda
 It’s more about listening
 Firstly in order to clearly and efficiently communicate with others you must first
understand who they are
 Do your research
 Understand the environments your target audience operate in
 Communicating clearly
 Speaking with confidence
 Active listening (Ensure you listen (that means don’t talk) and repeat back what
you heard)
 Body language
 Getting your message across so it can be heard
 Knowing your platforms – multi-channel communications world.

3. Effective communication
 It’s is all about LISTENING then
speaking.
 The business of living—our work, our
actions, our relationships with friends,
associates, and customers—is
accomplished through speaking and
listening.
 It is through language, through those
acts of speaking and listening, that life
really happens—in the side rooms, the
hallways, the relaxed spaces of being
human.
 Clear communication is how life is lived
and business is done – possibility is
created through a conversation.

4. The audience
 Whether you are wanting to communicate with one or many
 It’s still all a conversation
 One way communication is telling, selling, yelling and there is
little place for it in the new world of integrated media
 A single message pushed out to an audience will no longer
do the job – that’s not engagement

5. Understand who you are speaking to
 To clearly and efficiently communicate with others you must first
understand who they are
 Do your research (whether an individual, a company or a target
market)
 What are their habits? (places, media, work)
 What drives them?
 Where do they hang out?
 Where do they go online?
 Build a profile

6. Your
Customer /
Client
What is their
profile
What are
their media
habits
Identify their
needs and
wants
Social media
user?
General
online
habits
What is their
language
What is their
style / status

7. Our inner voice
 We are essentially in conversations with ourselves
most all the time— conversations about what’s going
well and what’s not, what others think, what we think,
how we feel, the invariable ‘what ifs’, how abouts, are
you kiddings? etc. That voiceover, that running stream
of thinking and history and rumination, is not
necessarily bad—it’s just sometimes we’re so
unaware.
Consider:
 Often you think your listening but your not – actually
you’re listening to what you are thinking as a result of
what ‘they’ are saying vs what they are actually
saying.
 As soon as they speak you start thinking about how it
relates to you and what you should say next.

8. Be aware of your inner voice
 Often we listen only through the filter of what’s in
our heads, what we’ve already decided.
 If you are aware of what that is you have the chance
to change it.
 Listening purely to what is being said takes practice
and self awareness.
 Listen in now to yours –
What have you already decided about
the person next to you? What are you
thinking about being here?

9. Communicating clearly
 Prepare
 What are you trying to achieve in the
conversation?
 Be clear on your key messages
 What do you want them to be left with?
 What do you want them to remember?
 Clear, non-jargon based language
 Do not make assumptions on what they
already know
 Be efficient – don’t use 100 words when 10
will do
 Be comfortable in the silence.

10. Active listening
 So, back to the “listening” part.
 Bottom line, how we listen is essentially determined by our
concerns
 Being successful, being liked, wanting to know what’s in it
for us, how things will turn out. We can’t really listen to
another when we’re preoccupied with our concerns.
Listening without those predispositions, preoccupations,
and filters has enormous power.
 Active listening is creating a space for understanding.
 Listening without filters is the staple of corporate
success—in the new media, listening is probably the most
important factor in the toolbox.
 Active listening is what allows others to be heard — it’s
where both the speaker and what is spoken come alive,
exist, and flourish.
 True listening allows others to be great and a new
possibility to be seen.

11. Active listening
Now
 Listen to your inner voice
 Be aware and let it go
3 mins each way
 Actively listen to the person next you tell you why they came
along today
 What they are struggling with in communication or want to
improve
 That person say about 3 core points.
3 mins
 Now speak back to them why
 Tell them the main reason and what you heard
 Observe only.

12. Speaking to be heard
 Now to the “speaking” part.
 Speaking is more than just talking, more than the exchange of symbols or information,
more than persuasion or saying what we really think, more than just a vehicle for
describing something.
 Through speaking you are able to have people see a possibility in something, a new
way of thinking or doing things, a different future.
 In the act of speaking you can reshape the course of events through a conversation.
 But you must speak in their language
 so they can hear you.
 Mimic their image and body language
 so they feel comfortable
 Be aware of your inner voice.

13. Speaking to be heard
 Now explain to them something you have seen in the
conversation we have had so far that can help them with one
of the core reasons them came along today
 What I heard was …. this is what I have seen….
 Give each other some feedback also
on how they listened to you.

14. Body language
 Be aware of how you look to people, ask
others how you look and how you occur.
 Take this on: Interview 10 people across
your life and practice listening!
 Be prepared to adapt aspects of yourself
that shock you.
 Be aware of what emotions are going on for
you and how they might show on your face
(& on the phone, even in your written word).
 Be aware of your how you stand or sit.
 Handshakes, gestures, all have an impact.

15. Speaking with confidence
 Having the confidence to speak up is all about preparation.
 Be sure you know exactly what you want to say and the outcome you want.
 Know the audience.
 Believe in yourself, let go of the inner voice, be passionate.
 Such clarity, about what you want to say, how it relates to others, and why people
should believe in your message - drives and fuels PASSION in them .
 Allow the silence in the conversation.
 Leave them with a powerful reason to take action.
 Check your arrogance monitor.
 This is engagement.

16. Engagement
 Engagement - don’t preach or sell.
 A two way communication.
 Speak into a listening, to do this …
 First understand what they are
listening for!
 So know the brief, know the target
market.
 Creates trust.
If you’re trying to engage someone, you
really need to believe in yourself before
what you say becomes believable.

17. Communicating cross platform
 What about the one to many
scenario?
 People on average must see or
hear a message 7 times to
remember it.
 It also needs to cut through the
1000s of messages we receive
every day
 So understand the media and the
style you’re communicating in
 Multiple platforms - now we have
to understand how to adapt to each

18. Multiple Platforms and Channels
 Print (magazines, newspapers)
 Online magazines & blogs
 Outdoor, billboards, cinema
 TV: Free to air, PayTV, Digital, Internet TV
 Radio: there are 100s of stations in Qld
alone and now digital radio
 Branded websites
 Aggregate websites
 YouTube
 iPhone apps
 Social media such as
 Facebook
 MySpace, Google Plus
 Linkedin, Twitter

19. Print media
 One to many communication
 Advertising
 Must be clear on the message
 Single proposition
 Unique positioning
 The level of TRUST in advertising has dropped below 11%
 Editorial is more trusted
 The best PR’s can write in a style that suits the publication they are
targeting by understanding the audience
 Again it’s all about knowing the style, the language and the tone of the
target audience.

20. Digital media
 Websites, mobile apps, email, eNews
 Responsive design across platforms, allow for how your
audience wants to receive it – responds to them
 Needs to be innovative, be edgy, be different
 Highly targeted messaging
 User generated content
 Be relevant
 Don’t over complicate.

21. Social media
 50% of the population use Facebook, and 23% of
them check it more than 5 times daily
 10 million Aussies are on Twitter
 4 million Aussies have a LinkedIn profile
 5 million photos are loaded onto Instagram worldwide
every hour
 The power is in conversation, engagement and
support
 Know the channel intimately
 Don’t be on it unless you do!

22. Facebook
 Posts between 100 and 250 characters
 Share photos / images, videos, links, valuable relevant
content that can be shared, competitions
 Not just about selling, but should be something that relates
to your brand and to what the audience are interested in
 Allows your brand to be more personable
 Engage in a conversation
 Create relationship
 Better to have less fans who are engaged.

23. Twitter
 Younger demographic, only 140 characters, use of hashtags
 Ok to use abbreviations, ok to repeat tweets
 Tweets don’t sell a product but they encourage brand
followers to buy a product down the road
 Great to create thought leadership, announce blogs
 Great to get a message out to the journalists in your
industry
 Live tweeting at events, announcing sales
 Customer service opportunity
 56% of customers tweets to companies are being ignored yet it is
a opportunity for great customer service!
 50% of customers will give a brand 1 week to reply before they
stop doing business.

24. Linkedin
 Business orientated
 Professional profiles
 Company pages
 Jobs and new roles
 More formal and more about your business activity
 Brands can advertise directly to highly targeted
prospects
 Sharing intelligent content - presentations, blogs and
articles
 Creates trust amongst those your linked with.

25. Check back in
 So whether it’s one on one or one to many
 Never assume people think how you think
 Or hear what you hear
 Ask them what they heard
 Listen and check that it is what you intended
 Remember they will have their own filters and internal
conversations going on from the moment you walked through the
door, sent the email, wrote the post or sent out the mailer
 What conversation are you having with yourself now?