Tweet

How to Improve Your People-Reading Skills

Guest post by: Dr. Maynard Brusman

Article Overview: Socially intelligent leaders know how to read the body language and emotions of their people. They are highly aware of social environments and highly attuned to the language used by people. They are curious about people and are great observes of human behavior.

How to Improve Your People-Reading Skills

People-Reading

Socially intelligent leaders know how to read the body language and emotions of their people. They are highly aware of social environments and highly attuned to the language used by people. They are curious about people and are great observes of human behavior.

I love to watch people. Maybe that's why I love to face the door when eating out at a restaurant. It always seems uncomfortable facing the wall.

A number of years ago, I did a stress management workshop in Paris. After the workshop, I had dinner at a delightful French Restaurant. I observed that couples would sit for hours talking and savoring themselves and their meal. They appeared to be fully engaged in their conversation and happy. It made me reflect on our culture where we are less present and more distracted.



4 Steps for Better People-Reading Skills

The following steps can help you improve your ability to observe and read people and situations. Practice at least one over the next seven days, and notice any changes in the way you perceive and experience others. You will likely be more present, and your experiences will become richer.

1. Start using your senses instead of going through the day on autopilot. Sit in an airport, a restaurant or a mall and watch people. Try to figure out their relationships in couples or groups. Notice their moods, clothing and the ways they position themselves with others.

2. Observe the spaces in which you find yourself. Who sits where in meetings? How are offices or work spaces laid out? How does this communicate status or authority?

3. Listen for the various ways people use language to signal their social status and authority. How do people use slang, figures of speech, specialized vocabularies and clichés?

4. Observe the nonverbal signals people use to define and reinforce their relationships. How does the boss convey approachability? How do others do this?

The more you consciously use your senses and observe people, the more situational awareness you will gain. After a while, you'll pick up on things you never before noticed. You'll begin to incorporate new sensitivity into your communications and most certainly raise your level of executive presence.

Are you working in a professional services firm or other organization where executive coaches provide leadership development for emotionally intelligent leaders? Does your organization provide executive coaching to help leaders develop a high performance business environment? Inspiring leaders tap into their emotional intelligence and social intelligence skills to fully engage employees.

One of the most powerful questions you can ask yourself is "Do I have good people-reading skills?" Emotionally intelligent and socially intelligent organizations provide executive coaching for collaborative leaders who create sustainable businesses.

Working with a seasoned executive coach and leadership consultant trained in emotional intelligence and incorporating assessments such as the Bar-On EQ-I, CPI 260 and Denison Culture Survey can help you create a culture where all employees are intrinsically motivated and fully engaged. You can become a leader who models emotional intelligence and social intelligence, and who inspires people to become fully engaged with the vision, mission and strategy of your company or law firm.

Related Articles
  The Key to Attracting Clients
  Learn the Powers of Effective Communication
  The Best Home Business Ideas To Be Your Own Boss
  Strategic Tips From Your Strategic Thinking Business Coach To Improve Personal Communications
  Communicating for Success!
  How to be a Sales Superstar: Break All the Rules and Succeed While Doing It by Mark Tewart
  The easy way to close more sales
  Why Improve Your Communication Skills?
  How to Practice your Closing Sales Skills
  Dr. Seuss's "The Cat in the Hat" Will Help You Get Your Point Across! (Yes you can, here is the Plan)
  How Are Your People-Management Skills?
  Blogging The Easy Way Is More Than A Trend
  Communication Categories - Which one are you
  1.5 Skills development for sustainable livelihoods: Working Out of Poverty
  8 Presentation Flaws that Steal Your Money
  Are You Living Your Ideal Life?
  How to Attract Clients
  “Why Business Coaching? Why Me? And Why Now?”
  For Job Seekers Only
  Sales Management for C-Level Selling - 6 Steps to Make Your Sales People Better

Article Tags: body language, emotions, human behavior, social environments



Related Forum Posts
Re: Five Personality Traits of Successful Business Owners - 1. Focus 2. Ability to Adapt 3. Hard Work 4. Good planning 5. People Skills
Re: What I Enjoyed Reading This Week - Oct 14 - I really enjoyed the Improve your vision with an app article in the New Scientist. I don't wear glasses and think a lot of people cripple their vision by wearing specs from an early age instead of exercising their eyes... Nice to see someone has developed an ap that will help.
Re: Books for Business Owners - Hi DougSchadle, Thanks for sharing your favorite business book with us! A good book I'm reading now is "Maximum Achievement: Strategies and Skills That Will Unlock Your Hidden Powers to Succeed" by Brian Tracy as it was a birthday gift from a friend. Tracy's book is helpful in identifying what's important in your life and then setting an action plan to achieve it.
Re: Reduce Bounce Rate - Website bounce rate matters most today. You can decrease by providing 1. Good Web Layout And Design 2. Relevant and unique content 3. Content clear and proper navigation 4. Improve website loading speed 5. Add relevant images 6. Analysis of keywords 7. Minimize pages 8. optimize your target keywords 9. Good quality of links 10. Take People Where They Want to Go
Re: How To Become An Angel Investor - To become an angel investor you need to have enough money to invest in business ventures and have experience that could add value to the venture you invest in.... Skills & Experience:- You should have business and management experience and contacts in your area of expertise. With your business experience you are more likely to be able to make a sensible judgment about whether the company seeking money is likely to succeed. You will also be able to contribute more to the management of the company. If your business experience is limited , the most sensible option would be to seek to invest alongside people who are experienced , in a syndicate......................


Share this article with your friends. Fund someone's dream.

Leave a comment below or share on the left and you'll help support entrepreneurs in Africa through our partnership with Kiva. Over $50,000 raised and counting - Please keep sharing! Learn more.

Newsletter

Get advice & tips from famous business
owners, new articles by entrepreneur
experts, my latest website updates, &
special sneak peaks at what's to come!

Name:
Email:

Popular Articles

Fighting the Saw-Tooth Affect

Leader's Success Secret: Celebration

Environment and productivity at the office

Suggestions

Email us your ideas on how to make our
website more valuable! Thank you Sharon
from Toronto Salsa Lessons / Classes for
your suggestions to make the newsletter
look like the website and profile younger
entrepreneurs like Jennifer Lopez.