Culture of business communication

Entering the world of business people without having an idea of ​​the culture of business communication means dooming yourself to annoying blunders and major failures. At best, this will end with your embarrassment and bewilderment of others, at worst, your career will end without starting, and your reputation will be damaged.

Avoiding trouble is simple, you need to understand that the business world is the realm of regulations and certain etiquette. If you do not dream of the image of "office crazy", "mouse under a broom" or "loose gouging".

Consider all the pitfalls, and learn how to culturally and gracefully avoid them - for this you need to formulate a few rules that will help you communicate in a business style.

People mistakenly think that communication is the words they exchange with others. Sure, but that's just part of the message you're sending to those around you. You have facial expressions, gestures, general plasticity. Your appearance also says something about you to people.

And you should not be surprised if you are impeccably polite and correct, but for some reason colleagues hide their smiles when you enter the office, and the boss looks at you as if you are the one who crushed his leg half an hour ago (a piece of furniture; a character in the film horror; substitute your own version).

See how you are dressed. In many serious companies there is a dress code, more or less strict. It is advisable to choose clothes according to him. If not, expect penalties or just a frivolous attitude towards you. And decide in advance whether you came here to work or rebel against the system. If the former, dress appropriately. A man in holey jeans looks wild among people in formal suits, but an employee of an IT company strangled by a shirt and tie will look no less ridiculous if it is customary to dress in casual style here.

Let your clothes be appropriate!

You are properly dressed and polite in communication, but you still feel the frivolous attitude of your colleagues and superiors towards you, and sincerely do not understand what is the reason.

Look at yourself from the side. Is your behavior cultural, which you simply don’t notice out of habit - namely, the “habits” of your body. Perhaps in a state of excitement, passion for work, light stress, you do something strange.

Even if you find out that you are nibbling your glasses, chewing your tie, waving your arms, as if driving away a swarm of wasps, twisting something in your fingers, eating and drinking noisily, or, on the contrary, pretend to be a statue of a stone sphinx due to tightness - do not be embarrassed, you just need to fix this is.

A person who does not control his body gives the impression of an insecure, twitchy neurotic - and this is clearly out of business style, which implies calm self-confidence, a willingness to make contact, the ability to hear and understand tasks and make decisions. In addition, many of these unconscious habits are really ugly and uncultured - and not only in the office. A business partner picking his nose thoughtfully is unlikely to make anyone want to cooperate.

Give yourself an easy task, put a calm reminder on your gadget - every ten, say, minutes, check what your body is doing. And if you caught him on some nonsense - just relax so that his violent activity comes to naught. If necessary, apologize to colleagues if they notice this. Do not be embarrassed: "Yes, this is my bad habit, I will be very grateful if you tell me that I am doing it again." Control yourself - and let your gestures become restrained, and small neurotic habits gradually come to naught.

Watch how you stand - if in the pose of the jackal Tabaqui, straighten up. How do you walk - do you burst into the office, as if escaping from the ward for the violent, stumbling over other people's chairs, things and legs?

Behave as if you have a mirror in front of you, and you want to like yourself in it!

Your clothes and manners are in order - but the attitude of colleagues and the boss nevertheless leaves much to be desired. Do not forget: non-verbal communication includes your actions towards them.

Answer yourself the question whether you are punctual, whether you save your own and other people's working time. If you are chronically late for work or dig when they are waiting for you, you can hardly count on a good attitude. Nobody needs such a business partner. A frivolous attitude towards you is guaranteed.

And keep in mind that not every boss will agree to obediently pose as a sculpture of Zhdun, submissive to fate: in really serious companies, lateness, delays, delays are fined or even fired. And colleagues rarely like chronic "latecomers." After all, your behavior is also a message. And it is read unambiguously: “Yes, I didn’t give a damn about you.”

Try to do everything on time!

Not everyone who can speak is fluent in speech. And this is not a paradox. If you do not know how to communicate in the way that a certain situation and regulations require, then you speak poorly. The culture of verbal communication in a business style is a useful skill, it can be acquired and should be worked on. Otherwise, you simply will not achieve what you want, do not solve the tasks. But the ability to communicate culturally gives you advantages, regardless of your position.

Let's talk about how to communicate according to the norms of the culture of business communication.

Even an ideal appearance and manners will not save if a person does not have a communicative culture: literally with the first words spoken, you can “kill” a good impression of yourself.

How to avoid this in any of the above situations:

• speak clearly and legibly so that every word spoken is clear - the interlocutor has come to solve business issues with you, and not to play a damaged phone;
• try not to sound monotonous - mumbling puts you to sleep, and moderate emotional coloring of speech shows that you are really interested in the issue under discussion;
• watch the volume - in business communication, both inaudible muttering under your breath and screams, as if at a football match, are inappropriate for anyone but you;

• it is better to take a moderate pace of speech - slow speech irritates the listener, and the tongue twister will not allow others to keep up with the course of your thoughts or will make a frivolous impression on the interlocutor;
• alternate long phrases with short ones;
• learn to ask questions - competent and to the point, empty questions speak of the empty head of the questioner;
• listen to the interlocutor with interest, and not formally - because his opinion is important to you;
• never interrupt;
• do not give advice, even if required - try to make the advice sound like a suggestion, not an arrogant lecture.

What can help you feel more confident in face-to-face situations?

1. Work on expanding your vocabulary. A harsh statement can be softened by replacing an overly expressive word with a synonym, the problem can be described as both an "elephant" and a "fly" using other expressions - a large active vocabulary allows you to achieve any goal!
2. Watch your vocabulary. The three enemies of cultural business communication are vernacular (“put your contract here!”), jargon that is not related to the activity under discussion (“kayfovenky project!”), parasitic words (“well, there, in short ...”).
3. Pronunciation. The old Moscow dialect is desirable - you know perfectly well what it is, and you have heard it many times. If your speech differs significantly from it - accent, talk - try to at least soften them.
4. Stylistics. If you communicate in the style of Master Yoda from Star Wars, this is not funny, but very sad.

Well, let's not even talk about grammar. It is unlikely that you say “the boss went to production” ...

Take the culture of telephone conversations seriously: the fact is that this is a direct form of communication, but without a non-verbal component. The interlocutor does not see the expression of your eyes, facial expressions, gestures, posture - he is guided only by the voice.

And therefore, all the rules listed for ordinary communication should be observed even more strictly! And even more so, do not violate the generally accepted telephone etiquette - do not be silent, mysteriously sniffing into the phone, do not drop it, cutting off the interlocutor in mid-sentence, do not misrepresent his name and surname, if he called himself - they did not hear, better ask again.

Business correspondence of an educational and scientific style is also a very responsible type of verbal business communication. Remember: By sending a letter, you represent a company; your text and the way it is presented will create a certain impression about your company. And if you are illiterate or cheeky in written communication, like those Cossacks who wrote a letter to the Turkish Sultan ...

Usually business correspondence is conducted according to certain templates - check them out.

If you are not sure of your own literacy, do not be too lazy to check what is written in a text editor that highlights errors. The person who received the letter does not see you, he does not know what a wonderful pro you are and how much you are valued at work. And if he sees a “filkin’s letter” instead of a correct business letter, he will never believe it. In oral speech, everything is a little simpler. The types of speech communication are easy to remember.

For the most important business communication skills you need to know, see the following video.