Business communication basics and tips to improve your communication skills.
A recent study showed that 60% of companies do not have proper communication procedures within the company, and 29% of employees complained that ineffective business communication in their companies led to the failure of various undertakings.
Do you think that your company leaves much to be desired in the field of corporate correspondence, and want to fix it?
Or do you just want to communicate better in the workplace?
If so, read on to find out how you can achieve these goals.
Let’s start!
What is business communication?
The definition of business communication refers to the transmission of messages among colleagues in the firm as well as with external parties.
And that’s really all you need to know.
Having a good internal communications system is critical to the expansion and prosperity of a company.
What is the difference between interpersonal and business communication?
While daily interpersonal communication does not necessarily have ulterior motives or intentions, business communication always has a purpose.
The importance of business communication is as follows:
- Sharing features
- Drawing up plans and distribution of tasks
- Order processing and fulfillment
- Sales
- Practical meetings
Simply put, the goal of good business communication is to achieve better corporate results and reduce errors.
Let’s dive into this idea.
What is the importance of communication in business
The three main forms of business communication that are commonly found in the corporate world include oral, written, and physical or live correspondence.
Would you like to know how communication can affect the workflow in an organization? Some possibilities include:
- Within the firm: Clear business communication within the firm can serve as a form of motivation for employees and strengthen relationships between management and employees.
- Between employees and their bosses: Well-designed business communication between employees and their bosses can limit misinterpretation and reduce disagreements.
- During work meetings: The importance of communication in discussions is that they can allow all parties involved to have a meaningful and useful conversation about company issues.
- With Clients: Being able to communicate well with clients can enable a firm to better understand the needs and desires of clients in order to give them the best possible outcome.
- With Vendors: Vendors and third parties also need companies to be clear about the needs, expectations, and deadlines of their projects so they can complete their projects on time and with satisfactory results.
In all of these scenarios, having effective business communication practices allows all parties to achieve their goals with unanimity.
Pro-Tip
To learn more about this concept, read The Communication Skills of Business Professionals by Celeste Lawson, Robert Gill, Angela Fickery, and Mika Witsel. This is one of the most well-written textbooks on business communication today. It serves as a solid introduction to business communication and helps you build a solid foundation of skills that will be put into practice in your workplace.
Knowing why communication is important in business, let’s now move on to how to improve business communication as well as the most important techniques you should learn.
How to develop business communication skills and which ones are most important
In order to communicate better with other people, you need to be attentive and put in some effort every day.
Important Business Communication Techniques You Should Know:
- Know how to listen to others
- Ability to write well
- Ability to communicate professionally with others
- Interpersonal skills
- Ability to read body language
- Ability to share ideas
- Be a good seller
The following tips will help you communicate better in the workplace:
Learn to Hear Better: By being someone people can talk to freely, you can show others that you are open and accepting of new ideas. This can increase the willingness of your colleagues to work with you towards results and a common goal.
- How to achieve this: Take breaks in your speech so that others can intervene, confirm what others are saying, and ask questions to interest the interlocutor.
Become a better wordsmith: A business letter should be concise and focused so as not to detract from the key message.
- How to achieve it: Respond to incoming emails, make sure your email is free of errors, and keep it direct and clear. Knowing how to write a business letter is also a good start.
Be aware of your own body language: Hand movements, visual cues, verbal cues, posture, breathing, and other signs of body language can signal your mood, intent, and even your level of interest in the other person in a conversation.
- How to do it: Avoid getting defensive when talking to others, and maintaining eye contact while making quick hand movements is a good start.
Build better interpersonal relationships: Build good working relationships with other parties and colleagues in the corporate world.
- How to achieve this: be more attentive to the feelings of others and address your peers not only as a business partner, but also as a friend.
Become a better speaker: share knowledge and concepts with others in a clear, informative and interesting way.
- How to do it: Master some storytelling skills, back up your arguments with facts, and add a personal touch or anecdotes to sway the audience to your point of view.
How to Become a Better Salesperson: Use your abilities to persuade various parties to take a desired course of action or purchase a product or service.
- How to get it: Put on your salesman’s hat and use your skills to get your peers to encourage you, your peers to join your cause, or your bosses to suggest new products or services.
Be able to communicate professionally with others: Show your worth to others and encourage others to contact you. To get better at this, you need to offer value to others and be interesting enough that others want to connect with you.
- How you can achieve this: Master some basic chatting skills, engage in social activities and join in to help if the situation calls for it.
What are the main barriers to communication in business in the work world and how to overcome them
Good business communication can enable the various stakeholders to carry out their tasks and responsibilities well.
On the other hand, the lack of proper procedures can hinder the flow of ideas and knowledge and can lead to confusion.
Here are a few ways this can manifest in the real world.
You may find it difficult to get your message across to remote workers
Let’s imagine a situation: you saw tasks for remote employees, but as a result, you received poor-quality work. You’re trying to figure out what the problem might be, but the employees’ responses don’t provide any clarification.
Maybe something is wrong in your chain of correspondence?
Here is how you can fix this issue:
Decide on the key formats of correspondence you will use with your freelancers and make sure they are aware of these communication methods.
Make up a chain of correspondence consisting of response time, communication methods that can be used, and write down the procedure.
Write down all the steps you took in this process and share the notes with the entire company.
Use a reminder or event on your mobile device to be reminded to review these notes every quarter to make sure they’re up to date and effective. Edit notes as needed to reflect changing circumstances.
You are inundated with messages, but do not quite understand what is expected of you
Perhaps you have been flooded with messages from colleagues and superiors? If your head is spinning from the number of messages and you do not understand how and in what order to take on tasks, then you definitely have problems in communications.
What actions can you take to resolve this issue?
Here are some tips :
- Learn more about your company’s structure and its various components so you know who is delegating tasks to you.
- Arrange a meeting with this person so you can express your concerns and ask for prioritization of tasks.
- Suggest a way to solve the problem. This may entail moving to a standardized messaging and scheduling platform using a single messaging app and detailed assignment in a common document.
To sum it up, why is communication key in business?
This is because the lack of proper correspondence can lead to misunderstandings.
On the other hand, clear and concise business communication can improve relationships with both employees and customers. This can lead to a positive outcome for the firm, including increased profits.
With these tips and tricks, if you are ever asked to “describe a time when you experienced effective communication in a business environment” in the future, you will be able to share your successful experience!