Page 94 - DENG401_Advance Communication Skills

Unit 4: Working with Customers

4.1 Verbal communication Notes

Verbal communication can be defined as communicating your thoughts through words. Such
thoughts may be ideas, opinions, directions, dissatisfaction, objections, your emotions and
pleasures.

Example: Whenever you conduct a meeting, have a conversation over the phone, talk to
a friend, or any other form of conversation that you perform with others using words. In this
article you will learn how to acquire better verbal communication.
Verbal communication is an essential part of business and when it is executed correctly, good
things happen. Here are a few different ideas and styles to remember when speaking to anyone
in a business setting.
Because speaking is such an indelible activity, we tend to do it without much thought. But, that
casual approach can be a problem in business

Why is good verbal communication so important?

When it comes to business, verbal communication is very important for the reason being that
you are dealing with a variety of people through out the day. In some cases you may deal with
people who have different culture, ages and with different levels of experience. Now take for
example the way you converse with a family member or friend around your same age, you
interact with them with a lot of confidence, there is without doubt that verbal communication is
expressed with much ease, and perhaps you may speak differently from the way you speak with
a person related to business.
Imagine if you expressed yourself the same way with a customer who has different culture, is
much older than you and have many years of experience in his field. Most likely your thoughts
will be difficult to express. Thus it is necessary to have proper skill when using verbal
communication while dealing with different people
How to acquire better verbal communication

First of all you need to be aware of the fact that you must be flexible with people depending on
the circumstances. Let us say you are presenting a speech in front of an audience at work, and
you express your thoughts using business vocabulary. Now what if your audience where to be
unfamiliar with the terms you are using, it is without question you will notice the audience lose
focused attention to what you are saying , so then you must be flexible and change the way you
are expressing your thoughts by using words that are more comprehendible to the audience.
It is suggested to build skills by attending a college course related to business communication.
When you are attending the class you will then be forced to communicate more organized. Try
to use the opportunity to overcome the fear of talking to a big crowd and a stranger while you
are in class.
Besides attending a class that teaches business communication, you may also want to consider
working in a job-field that involves working with strangers, such job can be a form of practice
to gain confidence in yourself and help reduce shyness and intimidation.
Another form of practice can be talking to older relatives and friends, about a topic that involves
expressing emotions and strong opinions or a discussion that may concern experiences. Such
communication helps you to accumulate skills to express yourself in a more formal and proper
manner.

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