If we communicate consistently, but we don’t communicate concisely, we will lose our partners and team members. There is just TOO much information that comes our way every day for us to filter through three paragraph long emails (or more!) or hour-long conversations about a topic that could have been covered in 30 minutes. None […]
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Every job description I have ever seen – and ever applied for – has said something like “strong communication skills.” This goes right along with “highly organized,” and while we all recognize that communication skills are important, when do we talk about the specific, practical things we need to do to communicate well? Over the
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Based on last week’s post, you know why it’s important to follow-up; however, you may be getting stuck when it comes to actually doing it. Even though we philosophically agree that follow-up is important, it’s easy to get so focused on our next project, meeting or commitment that the follow-up for what we just did
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We have spent the past seven weeks on “asking the right questions” and before that, we focused on “skillful listening.” The most important next step after listening well and asking the right questions to the right people at the right time in the right way is to follow-up on what you learned. This does not
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This week, we are continuing to uncover more ways that we can ask the right questions of our teams and coalitions. As I emphasized in last week’s post ask the right questions, it is really important to understand your situation and your audience to determine the best way to get input from your partners. If
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We have gone through the many types of questions in order to ask the right questions. The why, what, who, when and now this week we are focused on the “how.” The way you ask the questions depends a lot upon your situation. Who are you asking and what is their preferred method of communication
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We have talked about why, what (Part 1 and Part 2) and who when it comes to asking the right questions. When should we ask the right questions? I don’t know about you but sometimes I am overwhelmed by all the people who want my opinion and I am also guilty of wanting to send electronic
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By now, you have figured out why you want to ask the right questions as well as what questions to ask (Part 1 and Part 2). The next thing to consider is who you ask. Since we all have limited resources, we cannot ask everyone these questions all of the time. Also, if you keep asking
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Last week, we considered the first two “right” questions that can be asked of your team or coalition members. While there could be many more – and some of these will vary depending upon your situation or who you are asking – this week we are focused on two more “right” questions that can be applied to many different
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Last week we focused on three reasons why it is important to ask the right questions. While it is critical to understand why we would want to ask questions of our partners and colleagues, in order to benefit the most from the questions, we need to ask the right questions. While the “right” questions can definitely be different depending
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