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Communicating on the Shop Floor

Guest post by: Robert Whipple

Article Overview: This paper is about some tips to enhance communication with people on the shop floor. These interfaces are critical for leaders as they define how the workers react to the leader.

Communicating on the Shop Floor

First, be accessible. Regardless of how busy you are, find time to interact with people when needed. People need to know there is an open channel. Be gracious with your time since it really is all you have. Show up in their workplace from time to time, just to chat. You will find people appreciate it, and you will be setting an example of good leadership.

In these interfaces, it is essential to show a genuine interest in what the people are thinking. Draw people out enough to hear their problems and let them know you are grateful for the input. Smalltalk is okay to get the ball rolling, but you are mostly there to find out issues and understand people better.

You enhance trust between yourself and other people when you show genuine interest in their point of view. This requires more listening and less talking. To practice this, assess the quality of your communication immediately after you interface with someone. Strive to have your listening time be at least twice your talking time.

Practice "management by walking around."

Keep yourself plugged into what people are saying. If a manager's visit to the shop floor is a special event, honest communication will suffer. Show enough presence so it is not a special event when you are around. A litmus test for this is to watch the body language of workers as you approach them in the workplace. If they maintain constant body language, they are comfortable with you. If they stiffen up, there is a barrier to open communication.

If you are a high-test leader, you have little time for breaks. You probably work straight through lunch and never slow down for about 12 hours per day. Even with that intensity, try to find a few minutes several times a week to go to a break room and sit with whoever is there. Ask, "Mind if I join you?" and "What's happening?" Then shut up and listen. If you do this often enough, people won't see it as unusual, like you are checking up on the length of their breaks, etc. It is amazing how much information you can pick up in that forum that is unavailable any other way.

If you don't have time for this, it's a problem of priority. Mark your calendar and tell your administrative person this "people time" is not to be bumped. Working with people is more enjoyable than most meetings anyway. Sending a substitute to a management meeting so you can improve understanding of your people gives a strong positive signal of your priorities. However, be careful not to over use this technique and end up in trouble with management. Balance your time carefully, but be sure to interface with people regularly. Prepare yourself to internalize the whole message, not just the words. Become a master of reading body language.

Study Body Language

Understanding body language is essential to good communications. In his book, "People Skills," Dr. Robert Bolton stresses the importance of body language:

"A person cannot not communicate. Though she may decide to stop talking, it is impossible for her to stop behaving. The behavior of a person - her facial expressions, posture, gestures, and other actions - provide an uninterrupted stream of information and a constant source of clues to the feelings she is experiencing. The reading of body language, therefore, is one of the most significant skills of good listening."

People constantly scream out their reactions with gestures. Learning to read these clues is an art form you must master. Formal study is an easy way to enhance your skill. A helpful book is "How to Read a Person Like a Book," by Nierenberg and Calero. There is also an assessment tool to test proficiency, called "Silence Speaks Louder Than Words," published by Organization Design and Development, Inc.

While on assignment in Mexico, I learned the power of nonverbal information. Not knowing enough Spanish to follow the business arguments in heated meetings, I just observed body language, including voice inflections. Incredibly, when someone stopped to brief me in English on the last 45 minutes, there was no need. I knew exactly what they were talking about, who proposed what, and their rationale. Much to their amazement, I described the politics at the root of the disagreement accurately without understanding a word.

Words can even hinder understanding because they distract conscious attention away from what is going on in the hearts of people. Dialog creates the necessity to focus on words, internalize them, and figure out an appropriate response. While most of us are "listening" to others, we are usually preparing to talk. That reduces focus on the majority of the message which is nonverbal. Balance attention among all forms of input and continually hone your skill at picking up nonverbal cues.

My mentor had an uncanny ability to read people. It seemed there was no way of fooling him. He always had your true feelings digested before you had gotten past the hors d'oeuvres. I once asked him how he could tell if someone was putting him on. He said, "I just watch to see if the words match the body language. If they do, I know I am hearing truth. If not, I know there is another agenda going on." He had learned the art of balancing conscious attention between verbal and nonverbal cues. It had become second nature, giving him a significant advantage.

Reading body language is a critical part of the technique called "reflective" (sometimes called "active") listening.

Reflective Listening

Most leaders could improve their listening skills. Few are experts at reflective listening, which is the most positive method of ensuring tight communications. With this technique, you pay close attention to body language around what is being said, internalize it, then, at an appropriate time, feed back your understanding by paraphrasing the point. Establish a daily routine of practicing reflective listening and you will enhance your leadership.

Ironically, we tend to avoid reflective listening in situations where it could be of highest value. Listening skills are most needed in highly emotional discussions, when people bring up a major problem. Most leaders get embroiled in the discussion and focus on fixing the issue, rather than truly hearing what the other person is saying. Often the frustrated employee leaves the office unfulfilled because the domineering boss resolved the wrong problem. "She spent all our time together helping me reword the proposal and never heard my main point, that we need more time to get the right data before the proposal will be valid." Everyone can relate to that kind of problem.

Reflective listening must be done well to be effective. If the reflections are clumsy, poorly timed, or overly done, they can confuse or annoy the other person. The best antidote is to watch the body language of the other person carefully.

Good listening skills are also important when communicating with groups. Learn to take cues from your audience both as a group and as individuals.

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Article Tags: Leadership, listing, shop floor, trust



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