When delivering a message or gathering information from a specific group, the way in which you deliver your message is just as crucial as the message itself. If I were to ask: What are your immediate goals? How is what you’re doing right now impacting that outcome either positively or negatively? And what could you do, or how could you do it differently? Now let’s say I was asking the same questions to a group of kindergarten children, or to a classroom of high school seniors, or to small business owners? Do you see the difference? Not only would my wording and body language vary from group to group, but their responses would vary as well. The way in which I would expand upon each question would be fitting to my target audience.
For example, the way in which I might ask those same three questions to a kindergarten child it may look and sound more like this: “Hello!” (I am comfortably positioned at their eye level, smiling, and eager to hear their response with genuine interest). “What are you doing over here?” “How is that working out for you?” “How else do you think you could you do that?” This could be in a situation from making an elephant from a blob of playdough, to putting books away on a shelf and so on. Of course the questions could be changed to suit the situation as well, but the point is the language would be appropriate to the audience. A five-year old’s “immediate” goals are very different from that of a high school seniors or an adult business owner. A five year olds perception of time, what “immediate” means to them is different than that of say a middle-aged adult.
It doesn’t matter what your message is if the message is not being heard. The first step to effective communication is making a connection with whom you are speaking to, and knowing your target audience. Deliver your message in a way they are more likely to understand and relate to.
Christine Losciale-Thoemmes BS, MA, CPC
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