Principles of effective communication

Principles of effective communication:

1. Planning for communication:

Preparation is the basic for any good communication. Preparation comes from proper planning. While considering a plan we need to take four things in account;

• Purpose (Of communication)
• Audience (To whom): Whom to communicate, how well we know them and how long we know them etc. Depends upon it the audience and communication type changes;
  1. The form of communication: written, oral etc.
  2. Vocabulary used: by considering the receiver.
  3. Style and tone used.
• Structure (Flow of situation): materials to use. Salutation, body and closing of the communication.
• Style (Formal, informal etc)

2. Acquiring and maintaining information:
3. Identifying sources

i.    Define needs
ii.    Type of sourcePrimary
Secondary
iii.    Range of sources
Printed, electronic, permanent, volatile (TV, Book, Normal talk, Internet etc)
iv.    Specific source: Own notes or records
i.    Available resource: here we need to consider most feasible resource available like; books, record, library access, search (internet) access etc.
ii.    Libraries or references: Not only the access to the library and a book in related topic going to be informative. Knowing how to extract the information from it also is important. Usually we flip through the index to get a topic; if we need a sub topic we follow the glossary section at the back of the book.
iii.    Relevancy of resource: significance of the material we are looking for dependence on how fresh or how important it is for the communication. Anything repeated is just a recall, not information.
iv.    Effective reading: Reading must start with selective but specific material and concentration must be there to understand the text. Also to keep future reference taking some note can be beneficial.

2. Consulting Documents

1. Consulting people

How it is important to consult documents like record, books etc. It is also necessary to consult people and get their ideas. Anything comes from this source is a matter to perceive and understand in fastest possible time.
i.    Range of source and situation: source can be from a formal body like lecture, presentation, gathering (formal or informal) etc.
ii.    Observation: it is a better source of learning as well. Observation can be by doing as test or by watching the process. Many time observation work as reinforcement also.
iii.    Listening: A good listener is a good communicator. If we follow the assumption it is necessary to prepare for the listening. The whole process requires concentration, focus, enquiry and clarification of the doubt and note taking for future recall.
iv.    Questioning: Query always make the speaker to feel that his/her word were listen by the gathering where as audience come up with questioning to utilize the opportunity. Some times questions are welcomed by both the party but in formal meet usually it is ignored.Interview: It is a face to face or telephonic interaction. This only let us judges the interest or enthusiasm of the interviewee. It can be structured or planned or unstructured or unplanned.
Written: questionnaire, letter, memo etc. which is specific for each communicator.