Akshay Nair, our intern and final year Business Administration student from Singapore Polytechnic, shares about the significance of relational communication at the workplace
“Words are free. It's how you use them that may cost you." This is a quote from the book The Power of Words by J. Martin. It’s likely we have all been victims of others’ poor choice of words, at some point. Recall the last time you were taken aback by what someone said and how that made you feel. Or, perhaps, you may have recently communicated something in a less than ideal manner, which resulted in a misunderstanding with your colleague/ friend/ loved one. If you resonate with either or both of these examples, it’s understandable because the way that we verbalise our thoughts will have a significant impact on the emotions of the receiving party. They may not always interpret our spoken words in the way we want them to.
There are also instances where certain words have become normalised in our conversations. Some examples include, “underprivileged individuals”, “clients”, and “beneficiaries”. While these words are not inherently wrong and may seem common in our vocabulary, if we consider them carefully, these terms may have underlying negative connotations. At Skillseed, we refer to “underprivileged individuals” more accurately as under-resourced individuals, since they may lack resources but they still have dignity and can be resourceful. We see our “clients” not merely as clients but as client-partners because we desire a long-term relationship with them, seeing them as equal partners on the same side, contributing our assets in different ways. Finally, shifting from “beneficiaries” to primary stakeholders, or (even better) co-creators of change. The former suggests them to be one-sided recipients of aid but the latter believes that every individual, despite their challenging circumstances, has gifts and assets that can contribute towards sustainable change.
In the long term, we feel that these seemingly small and subtle changes in word choice can compound positively. Hence, we need to be mindful of the words we use, both in internal and external communications. In a nutshell, we believe in (and practise) relational communication.
What does it mean to communicate relationally?
Relational communication is referred to as a subset of interpersonal communication — a field which focuses on the study of verbal and nonverbal communication in personal relationships. Relational communication is crucial to maintaining social bonds and interpersonal relationships. To communicate relationally, we need to be mindful of our choice of words, and how we phrase them so that it does not result in a miscommunication or misunderstanding. This includes practising discretion in written and verbal communications with colleagues, external stakeholders, and in promotional/marketing materials targeted at our audience.
What can your organisation do to improve internal communications?
Firstly, it is important to have self-awareness by checking in with ourselves on how we are doing emotionally. At Skillseed, we check-in as a team every Monday morning, to share about how we are feeling emotionally at the start of the week. This takes precedence before we dive into the details of discussing our work tasks.
By doing so, it allows us to take a pulse on how everyone is doing and if we can be of support in any way to a fellow colleague. It is a simple activity that takes no more than a few minutes, but it allows us to better understand and support each other. For example, if a team member shares that he/she is feeling slightly under the weather, other colleagues can be more patient and understanding when communicating with him/her. Practising empathy is the first step taken towards building a strong foundation for relational communication.
A recent Team Scrum that the Skillseed Team had on a Monday morning. We shared about how we were feeling before moving on to discuss our work tasks for the week ahead.
Another important aspect of improving internal communications is to be direct, which helps to provide clarity in our communications. For example, when requesting help from a colleague, how we phrase our request is key, since we want to be clear and avoid miscommunication. Instead of saying: “If you want to help us out on Saturday, that would be great” — which we all know is more of a passive and ambiguous request, we could instead be more direct and say: “I would be grateful for your support on Saturday, so please come into the office. Thank you so much!”. Even though we may prefer to phrase our words indirectly in order to avoid sounding brutish, sometimes being direct would reduce uncertainty and avoid possible misunderstandings of whether you actually want them to come into office on Saturday. Being clear and direct also saves the receiving party time and mindspace to decipher what we actually mean.
In relation to the above, we should also make it a point to utilise words that lift the spirits of others. A simple “Thank you”, or “Good job” goes a long way. It is the reason why words of affirmation are one of the five love languages. Being kind to others and appreciating them for their good work will make them feel encouraged.
An example of a Slack message that my supervisor, Faith, sent after reviewing a research document that a fellow intern, Siva, and I had put together. The research topic has been covered for sensitivity reasons.
The words we use matter, especially in a leadership role where our team members react and listen closely to what we share (and sometimes even how we share it). If we simply start paying attention to the reactions we receive when speaking, we can be mindful to discern and minimise usage of words and phrases which spur a negative response. Similarly, we can also observe which words garner a positive response from our peers and colleagues — and use them more intentionally in the future! Making this intentional effort to observe and adapt the words that we speak will help us to improve internal communications.
What can your organisation do to improve external communications?
Arguably, the most important part of external communications is being able to respond to stakeholder requests. Projects and programmes are often not as smooth sailing as one would hope. Hence, being able to respond relationally is even more critical when one has to relay bad news to stakeholders, or when your stakeholders are already upset or angry over a certain situation. In engaging stakeholders, there may also be occasions when an unreasonable request frustrates us, and we feel tempted to lash out, or reply in a dismissive, and sarcastic manner. In such a scenario, being able to respond relationally is essential to preserve the relationship between the stakeholder and your organisation.
We should also use “hot-button words” sparingly. For example, it is important to be mindful not to use words like “why”, “just”, “but” and “problem” excessively. Using the word “why” to start a sentence frequently can cause people to become defensive, guarded, or worse, unintentionally trigger them to justify their actions. We might not realise it, but the word “just” has a similar effect. This word becomes problematic when we use it inappropriately in certain contexts. For example, “She is just a fresh graduate,” “You just need to figure it out,” or “Just wondering if you’ve reviewed the meeting notes.” Last but not the least, the dreaded “but” — “You did a great job, but..” “Sorry I'm late, but..” or “I wanted to help, but..” When we use this word, “but” — often, it negates the phrase before it.
It is important to ensure that materials which are sent externally to an organisation’s stakeholders — including emails, Electronic Direct Mails (EDM), and marketing collaterals are reviewed diligently and conscientiously to ensure that the words used are not abrasive, and do not carry an underlying negative connotation. Using relational language in our external communications is a practice that should be adopted by all team members. It is especially important for new team members to be aware and mentored on how they should do it. At Skillseed, new team members are informed of the importance of relational communication (the whys and hows) as part of our onboarding process. This would align all team members on the same page, since we represent not just ourselves when we respond to our external stakeholders, but the organisation as a whole.
As cliché as it sounds, words reveal our true character. When we don’t pay attention to relational communication internally and externally in an organisation, it can affect the organisation’s culture, morale and reputation. It is, therefore, important to make a conscientious effort to be relational by our intentional choice of words in communication. While it takes more time and effort, we argue that it is a worthwhile investment that will pay off in the long run in building trust and partnerships in and outside of the organisation, together with its people and stakeholders.
Curious about how you can equip yourself or your team members with the skills to become more proficient at relational communication? At Skillseed, we have modules to address the importance of improving one's sensitivities, competencies, and contextual awareness through our Human-centred Leadership and Community Engagement (HLCE) training programmes.
Our Relational Communication Competencies module offered as part of the HCLE training programme equips participants on building empathetic, mutually empowering, and sustainable relationships among different stakeholders, and will be an excellent introduction to effective stakeholder management.
If you are interested, please reach out to us at info@skillseed.sg to customise a workshop for your organisation / team!