Develop Your Interpersonal Communication Skills for Success at Work and at Home
Develop Your Interpersonal Communication Skills for Success at Work and at Home
As a business owner, you probably haven’t done this in a while, but take a quick peek at the job postings in the paper or at one of the online career search sites. What is the one skill required of almost every job? Good interpersonal skills. What is the one skill that will make a marriage great? It's not being a fantastic cook or a fabulous lover (although both could have benefits!). It's good interpersonal communication skills. It's no accident that it takes the same skill set to be successful at work and in personal relationships.
With good, solid, interpersonal communication skills, you will be more likely to succeed in both your career as a business owner and in your romantic life with your spouse or partner. What are some of these skills? Take a look at any basic interpersonal communication book and read the titles of the chapters. You'll see perception, listening, language, emotions, non-verbal communication, self-disclosure, communication climate, conflict resolution, and others. Being excellent at these skills will make you excellent at being a good friend, good spouse, and good business owner, too.
How do you become excellent at interpersonal communication skills? By learning them and putting them into practice as often as possible.
One fact about communication skills is that there are no "born communicators." We are almost all born with about the same capacity to speak and understand others. But the skill part-- well, that we have to learn. Some people may have a head start because they lived in an environment where the people closest to them model good interpersonal communication skills regularly. But what if you grew up with people who were not the most effective communicators? You didn't get a chance to see what a model of good interpersonal skills looked like, so why should you be expected to know them, do them, and live them? All you need is a little knowledge and a little practice, and you'll be on your way to relationship success at work and at home.
Here are some suggestions for developing your interpersonal communication skills:
• Self-help books: Visit your local library, book store or favorite on-line book seller and search for subjects like: communication, public speaking, relationships, etc.
• Classes: Community colleges provide excellent resources to foster adult learners and life-long learning at affordable prices and often have no entrance requirements other than living in the district.
• Textbooks: You don’t have to take a course to get the benefit of reading the textbook! Visit an academic bookstore, library, or favorite online bookseller (again, your local community college is a great resource for this). Look for titles about interpersonal communication, introduction to human communication, etc.
• Websites: Many professional and academic sites offer helpful tips and information. Plug a key word or phrase into your favorite search engine and surf away.
• Get your association or networking organization to help: Suggest that your professional association or network group consider hiring a speaker, trainer or consultant to help all the members gain similar skills. Consultants can provide a needs assessment and create a training program customized to the needs of your group.
• Get private help: Communication coaches are trained professionals, most with years of experience, in helping people learn the skills you want to gain. Many coaches offer group and individual coaching so you can gain the skills you want very quickly.
Once you have an opportunity to develop your interpersonal communication skills, all you have to do is regularly put into practice what you have learned. One benefit of gaining better interpersonal skills is you’ll soon start to notice shifts in the way others interact with you. You will be seen as more powerful, more intelligent, and more approachable all at the same time. If you have not had the opportunity to learn effective communication skills, it is never too late. Start your journey today—you’ll be glad you did!
Develop Your Interpersonal Communication Skills for Success at Work and at Home - To learn more about this author, visit Felicia Slattery's Website.
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Of course as small business owners we “get” why good communication skills are important. We need to know how to best communicate with our clients, prospects, vendors — and everyone we come into contact with for our business. Yet, it’s important to realize that communication skills are easily transferable to your home life as well. Just how are the interpersonal skills someone learns useful at both home and work? It's not that big of a stretch, really.
As a business owner, you probably haven’t done this in a while, but take a quick peek at the job postings in the paper or at one of the online career search sites. What is the one skill required of almost every job? Good interpersonal skills. What is the one skill that will make a marriage great? It's not being a fantastic cook or a fabulous lover (although both could have benefits!). It's good interpersonal communication skills. It's no accident that it takes the same skill set to be successful at work and in personal relationships.
With good, solid, interpersonal communication skills, you will be more likely to succeed in both your career as a business owner and in your romantic life with your spouse or partner. What are some of these skills? Take a look at any basic interpersonal communication book and read the titles of the chapters. You'll see perception, listening, language, emotions, non-verbal communication, self-disclosure, communication climate, conflict resolution, and others. Being excellent at these skills will make you excellent at being a good friend, good spouse, and good business owner, too.
How do you become excellent at interpersonal communication skills? By learning them and putting them into practice as often as possible.
One fact about communication skills is that there are no "born communicators." We are almost all born with about the same capacity to speak and understand others. But the skill part-- well, that we have to learn. Some people may have a head start because they lived in an environment where the people closest to them model good interpersonal communication skills regularly. But what if you grew up with people who were not the most effective communicators? You didn't get a chance to see what a model of good interpersonal skills looked like, so why should you be expected to know them, do them, and live them? All you need is a little knowledge and a little practice, and you'll be on your way to relationship success at work and at home.
Here are some suggestions for developing your interpersonal communication skills:
• Self-help books: Visit your local library, book store or favorite on-line book seller and search for subjects like: communication, public speaking, relationships, etc.
• Classes: Community colleges provide excellent resources to foster adult learners and life-long learning at affordable prices and often have no entrance requirements other than living in the district.
• Textbooks: You don’t have to take a course to get the benefit of reading the textbook! Visit an academic bookstore, library, or favorite online bookseller (again, your local community college is a great resource for this). Look for titles about interpersonal communication, introduction to human communication, etc.
• Websites: Many professional and academic sites offer helpful tips and information. Plug a key word or phrase into your favorite search engine and surf away.
• Get your association or networking organization to help: Suggest that your professional association or network group consider hiring a speaker, trainer or consultant to help all the members gain similar skills. Consultants can provide a needs assessment and create a training program customized to the needs of your group.
• Get private help: Communication coaches are trained professionals, most with years of experience, in helping people learn the skills you want to gain. Many coaches offer group and individual coaching so you can gain the skills you want very quickly.
Once you have an opportunity to develop your interpersonal communication skills, all you have to do is regularly put into practice what you have learned. One benefit of gaining better interpersonal skills is you’ll soon start to notice shifts in the way others interact with you. You will be seen as more powerful, more intelligent, and more approachable all at the same time. If you have not had the opportunity to learn effective communication skills, it is never too late. Start your journey today—you’ll be glad you did!
Develop Your Interpersonal Communication Skills for Success at Work and at Home - To learn more about this author, visit Felicia Slattery's Website.
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John BrennanJohn Brennan Ed.D. Dr. Brennan is President of Interpersonal Development, LLC, a training and development firm. Interpersonal Development has provided sales training and coaching to more than 3,000 sales reps from over 100 companies. A native of Australia, Dr. Brennan received his doctorate from the University of Rochester. His dissertation researched the effectiveness of Behavioral Modeling Technology in training people in interpersonal skills. While he has spent most of his career designing or delivering training, he was also a Vice-President of Sales of a training and development franchise with operations in 25 markets. Dr. Brennan has designed and delivered sales training in North America, Asia, Europe, Australia and the Middle East. He has been a guest speaker at numerous national and regional professional conferences. When Microsoft wanted Best Practices articles on sales for their web site, they called Dr. Brennan. The results are at http://office.microsoft.com/en-us/FX011387391033.aspx His firm’s clients have included Volvo, The Prudential, Merrill Lynch, Eastman Kodak, Gannett, Equifax Europe, the Economist Group and countless small businesses. - Visit John Brennan's Website |
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Staging DivaDebra Gould, aka The Staging Diva®, is President of Six Elements Inc., an internationally recognized home staging company. Inspired by many requests from aspiring home stagers wanting to start similar businesses, Gould created the Staging Diva Home Staging Business Training Program. Gould has trained over 1000 Staging Diva Graduates worldwide to start staging businesses. Buying decorating and selling six of her own homes in four years lead to an interest in real estate staging which she turned into a career with the launch of sixelements.com in 2002. Since then she has staged hundreds of homes in addition to teaching home staging training. Gould is the author of several home staging resources including a series of popular ebooks made up of a Design Guide, Color Guide and Portfolio Guide. For more information about Debra Gould visit stagingdiva.com. - Visit Staging Diva's Website |
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John PowerJohn Power, founder of Biltmore Franchise Consulting, has extensive experience developing and marketing franchises and business opportunities. He has been in and around franchising for over twenty years. From 1980 through 1990 he conceptualized, organized, and developed the American Video Association. He grew AVA to 2,000 national members, before selling the company it 1990. It was later merged into another home video marketing company. From 2000 to 2005 he worked as a contract marketing and human resources consultant to several local and national companies. In 2005 Mr. Power began working as a franchise development consultant on a full-time basis. Since that time he has helped more than three dozen companies initiate and develop their franchising program. He notes that there are many companies interested in developing a franchise program, and who need his specialized assistance. Mr. Power is a “hands-on” franchise consultant. He said, “I am the ‘nuts and bolts’ person who tends to the details for my clients.” Mr. Power holds a B.S. degree with a major in Marketing. See: www.biltmorefranchise.com You may contact Mr. Power at: jpower@biltmorefranchise.co - Visit John Power's Website |
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Stephanie RobeyStephanie Robey is President and CoFounder of Pivot Positive, LLC - an Internet marketing business focused on helping people start work at home ventures. Previously, she was employed at The Search Agency with over 20 years experience in graphic design and 10 years experience in online marketing. She was responsible for launching the Conversion Path Optimization (CPO) unit where she and her team have conducted hundreds of optimization tests for online companies across multiple verticals. She is a successful entrepreneur having started and sold 2 companies and remains on the board of directors of the third, PhotoSpin.com Stephanie began her career in the direct marketing realm creating and producing direct mail for many of the major cable television companies and directly attributes her understanding of Internet marketing to those early offline experiences. Stephanie is a graduate of San Diego State University with a BFA in Graphic Arts and also holds an Executive MBA from the Graziadio School of Business and Management at Pepperdine University. Read Steph's Blog Meet Steph and Dave Sign up for our Free 7-Day BootCamp: Self Employed & Rich - Visit Stephanie Robey's Website |
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Dianne CramptonDianne Crampton is an executive leadership coach, team culture consultant, author and president of TIGERS Success Series, Inc. Dianne has been helping CEO's and Executives connect their employees to their core values and goals for over 20 years using the trademarked TIGERS team culture process, which stands for trust, interdependence, genuineness, empathy, risk and success. To download a free white paper on behaviors that build strong teams and behaviors that will predictably tear them down go here. Dianne's contribution to the 2010 Pfeiffer Consulting Journal (an imprint of John Wiley and Sons Publishers) entitled TIGERS Hearted Teams is available in November 2009. Her new book TIGERS Among Us: 5 Winning Business Team Cultures And Why, Three Creeks Publishing will release in March 2010. To receive publishing discounts, subscribe to the free TigerTracks Newsletter here. - Visit Dianne Crampton's Website |
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Jeff FosterWebBizIdeas.com is a Minneapolis website design company founded to help people start an internet business by providing them with website, business, and internet resources that help foster the growth of successful online businesses and develop innovative Internet business ideas. We specialize in internet consulting & internet marketing. - Visit Jeff Foster's Website |
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John AlexanderJohn has taught keyword research and SEO skills to small groups of business owners and Webmasters from over 80 different countries world wide since 2002. John is also the Director of Search Engine Academy ; Co-director of Training at Search Engine Workshops offering live, SEO Workshops with his partner SEO educator Robin Nobles, author of the very first comprehensive online search engine marketing courses at SEO Training Online and the SEO Workshop Resource Center. I look forward to hearing from you! - Visit John Alexander's Website |
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Anne BarrAnne Barr has over 26 years experience in sales and marketing, six years as a franchisee. She has assisted over 367 business owners and purchasers to achieve their goals in career change, transition and exit strategy. She holds the designation of Certified Franchise Executive from the International Franchise Association, Certified Business Intermediary from the International Business Brokers Association and Board Certified Broker from the Texas Association of Business Brokers. Anne is active in professional organizations, networking groups and volunteers for non-profit entities. As owner/operator of four successful businesses, Anne has proven people skills and enjoys helping clients find the right "fit" in business ownership. Visit www.FranchiseOpportunitySpecialist.com for more information about me and my company. - Visit Anne Barr's Website |
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