We want people to listen to us. We want to be understood. We want to be seen and appreciated as our best selves. Why doesn’t it happen? What goes wrong?
And old-fashioned fountain pen.
To be heard, you have to speak in a way your intended audience can hear. If your audience doesn’t understand, most likely you are not connecting. Not using the metaphors, vocabulary and logic they can understand. Last week, I sat next to someone who had never seen a fountain pen. I was writing with one at the time. The person did not ask questions or think I was smart or clever–not having seen one made me someone to doubt and possibly fear. We like people who are like us. We doubt people who aren’t like us.
Why can’t we just be ourselves? Because if we ask our audience to work too hard–to go out of their normal train of thought, to veer off into a new way of thinking–they won’t. They’ll do what they always do and skip to a conclusion they are comfortable with, rather than work at coming to a new conclusion. Because audiences do what’s easiest for them.
If you want your cats to hear you, open a can of cat food. It’s a sound they are familiar with, one that leads to a reward–food. So they listen. If you want a colleague to listen to your ideas, you will have to explain it in a way she can understand each part. Is she a big-picture person? Start with the overall outcome, then move to details? Is she a process person? Start with how this project will work, then go to results. Is she a micro-manager? Start with some details, then grow the vision into a big picture.
What if you don’t know what kind of person your colleague is? Ask. Going for clarity always makes it easier to understand. “Would it be more helpful if I start with the big picture?” is a question that asks for help. You might want to give your listener a choice. “Which is more helpful, starting with a big picture or starting at details and building to the big picture?” Most people know what makes sense for them, and will be pleased you asked. They will then be ready to listen to you.
Sure, it’s easier to explain it the way you like best. But that won’t get you heard. Because being heard comes after being a good listener.
–(c) 2008. All rights reserved. Quinn McDonald writes about communication topics and runs workshops on business communications. She is also a certified creativity coach. See her work at QuinnCreative.com
It’s a new environmentally friendly surface-skimming writing system that uses an osmotic ink delivery system and reusable ink source for zero landfill impact.
I KNEW you’d do a mind-spinning job!
Widgets are little “mini applications” that work on your home screen. If nothing happens you probably are supposed to download some widgets from an online store. They’re typically very simple things; they might show you the weather forecast or tell you about unread emails or something. Just “at a glance” conveniences; not crucial.
Thank you Pete. For now widgets are nothing indispensable.
I am addicted to my desktop “where is the sun” widget. It shows me a world map and the placement of the sun at any given time. It shows a shadow where the sun is not, and I learned how much the sun drops down south in the winter.
Pete, what are widgets? I have a mobile phone with a touchscreen and under the menu on the right side there is an option ‘widgets’. When I press on it nothing appears.
That can’t be easy Quinn to explain a whole picture from so many different starting points.
That young man didn’t have a clue whom he was sitting next to and how qualified she really is.
Signage design and wayfinding must be something you are very familiar with Pete.
Pete would have explained the fountain pen better than I did. I said, “It’s a writing instrument for people who like to use ink.” that doesn’t explain much, but it was enough to see if he was interested in writing instruments.
A common rule of thumb I use in designing interfaces is to try to understand how people with different ways of taking in information can use a piece of software equally well. Some of the considerations:
– do they read the words
– CAN they read the words
– do icons represent something understandable to them (this is a big deal with internationalization; there isn’t really a universal image that represents “mail” to everyone. Some places don’t have mail.
– can they see the divisions on the screen as divisions? For example, the first time you use a computer with a windowing system, you probably don’t perceive “what is a window” and “what is not a window”
– do they scan right-to-left, top-to-bottom, or some other direction?
– are the colors representative and perceptible (lots of users are red-green colorblind, for example)
– if something is animated, is it perceived as “a thing moving” or as a set of things blinking in some way? (the frame rate varies on different systems)
– does the overall task flow make sense in the user’s context? Sometimes we design tasks that whole populations don’t get at all. This is a big deal in maps; the idea that buildings are on streets and are numbered sequentially by location is not universal.
– Software sometimes needs to ask questions – are the questions AND the answers understandable? (this is often an area where software design falls short)
And just for the record, I’m working on mobile software that’s not going to be available for up to 2 years, and I carry a fountain pen! (actually a really cool one; the Pilot Vanishing Point http://www.coloradopen.com/category/Pilot_Vanishing_Point_Kit)
I never thought of asking someone how they would best want to learn about a project – the little parts, the big picture? It would even work that way when expalining art.
The person who has never seen a fountain pen must be rather young… or not?
Why did he see you that way?
He made all of his decisions based on the fact that I was writing with a fountain pen and he had never seen one. In his mind, he was hip and up on all the new equipment. He saw me as my physical appearance–not his age, not his gender, and therefore, not cool. Yeah, he was young–I have shoes older than he is.