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Feb 02

What’s in an Acronym?

Business Writing Skills, Communication Skills, Email Writing Skills No Comments »

If someone asked you for a document ASAP, sent you one FYI or offered you some TLC you would most probably understand them. If they asked for the document by COB (close of business) or EOD (end of day) you might be less sure. Asked for the MO (Modus Operandi), would you know how to respond?

© istockphoto.com/Dmitriy Shironosov

The Evening Standard has recently commented on the ubiquitous use of acronyms and the way in which they can confuse and exclude those who aren’t ‘in the know’. The writer was particularly aggravated by the use of acronyms in popular culture, citing her confusion at popular reality TV programmes, TOWIE, DOI and IACGMOOH. Look them up if you’re not sure!

For acronyms to be effective they should act as shorthand and speed up the exchange of information. With our ever faster pace of life together with the increased use of social media, particularly Twitter where the number of characters per message is limited to 140, it is not surprising that we have seen a multiplication of the number of acronyms used in every day language.

However, if we move to a professional setting, this increased use of acronyms can pose a number of problems. Firstly, what might seem a fun and friendly way of communicating between friends and personal contacts does not always convey a professional image in the workplace. Professional emails should be friendly but not overly informal. You might think that using acronyms such as LOL, TGIF or BFN help to build relationships but be aware that they might not create the right impression, particularly if your contact doesn’t know what they actually stand for.

Secondly, many professions or organisations create their own set of acronyms, all very useful for regular users but liable to baffle or perplex anyone from outside. Confusion grows even more when one acronym represents different expressions in different professions. CAT for example can signify Civil Air Transport, Cultural Awareness Training or Computer Assisted Training to name but a few. This can leave the bewildered newcomer or outsider confused and unsure whether to risk looking foolish and ask for an explanation or to remain in the dark.

Many organisations have now created their own in-house style guide to provide consistent guidelines to employees producing written communication. These style guides often include advice on when and how to use acronyms appropriately. However, the best advice is to use your common sense and if in any doubt spell it out in full. Why risk appearing smug and alienating your reader when a few more characters will make your message clear.

© Communicaid Group Ltd. 2012

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Jan 26

How do I Sound?

Communication Skills No Comments »

The British press including The Independent has recently been reporting on the current increase in demand for speech training and elocution lessons here in the UK. Over recent decades we have seen regional accents become less of a hindrance and sometimes even a plus point in sectors such as the media or in contact centres. However, the current economic climate, with jobs increasingly hard to find, is causing new job seekers and experienced professionals alike to re-examine their skills to ensure they can present themselves to the best of their abilities. And this skill set extends as far as how they speak with more and more people resorting to elocution lessons or speech training as a way of improving the way they come across.

How do I Sound?

© istockphoto.com/Catscandotcom

It is one thing to turn to elocution lessons or voice coaching to improve the clarity, accuracy and pace of the way we speak and it is a positive sign that young school leavers and university graduates are keen to invest in their speaking skills in order to improve their success at job interviews. Experienced managers and professionals are also seeing the value of improving the way they speak in order to further their career development. An ability to speak clearly during meetings and formal presentations – particularly now that so much business communication takes place through virtual methods – is integral to business success and can often make one candidate for promotion stand out from another.

However, it is slightly more surprising that a key reason cited for approaching a voice coach or speech trainer is to soften a strong regional accent or even lose it altogether. People from the West Midlands, West Country and Essex are particularly keen to neutralise the way they sound as they fear that their strong local accent might be holding them back in their careers. It is understandable that people want to present themselves as clearly and professionally as possible in order to do well in a shrinking jobs market and this might mean softening sounds that make their speech less intelligible. And a less pronounced local accent may give people more credibility. But it seems strange in this day and age that someone would want to eliminate completely an important element of their identity such as their accent.

Good elocution lessons or speech training should enable individuals to identify and improve the elements of their speech that make them harder to understand without trying to change them into someone they’re not. Gone are the days, after all, when we should be striving to sound like the Queen in order to get on in life!

© Communicaid Group Ltd. 2012

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Dec 09

Plain English or Gobbledegook?

Business Writing Skills, Communication Skills 1 Comment »

You may not be aware that today is National Plain English day. The BBC is reporting that The Plain English Campaign has announced this year’s booby prize for gobbledegook has been awarded to the Meteorological Office. The Plain English Campaign encourages organisations to communicate clearly and simply with the public and fights against the use of gobbledegook and jargon. Local councils, government departments, police forces, law firms, insurance companies and banks have all been taken to task in the past for baffling the public by communicating with meaningless and confusing language.

Plain English or Gobbledegook?

© istockphoto.com/Christopher Ewing

This year the Met Office’s use of expressions such as ‘probabilities of precipitation’ in its new weather forecast has been voted the worst offender. Would it not be simpler to tell the public that it is likely to rain or it might rain rather than that there are ‘probabilities of precipitation’? Communicating in plain English means using an everyday word rather than a less commonly used (often Latinate) equivalent. Of course, the Met Office has argued that precipitation is not just rain but encompasses all sorts of ‘stuff that falls from the sky’ including hail, drizzle, snow, sleet and so on. But for most of us, it means it’s going to rain! The other plain English rule broken by the Met Office here is to ‘avoid nomilizations’ or in other words use verbs instead of nouns. Using two nouns, saying that there are ‘probabilities of precipitation’ sounds quite abstract and is more verbose than ‘it might rain’ which has no nouns and makes us understand that this really is likely to happen. We particularly need to avoid abstract nouns if we want to achieve a more intelligible communication style. This often means nouns ending in –ment such as arrangement or improvement or –tion such as modification, elaboration, precipitation, implementation and so on.

In a nutshell, communicating in plain English means using:

  • Shorter sentences
  • Words the public will understand
  • Personal pronouns
  • The active rather than the passive voice
  • More verbs than nouns
  • Instructions where appropriate
  • Lists

Plain English does not mean overly simplistic or childish communication but instead it means communicating in a way that will allow the audience to understand the message immediately. It can be difficult to train ourselves to break old habits and communicate in a style that helps our audience to understand our message rather than to understand how clever we are. This is why many individuals and organisations undertake communication skills or writing training programmes. These courses can raise awareness of what the audience needs to understand the message and introduce practical techniques to reduce the gobbledegook and ensure we are understood.

© Communicaid Group Ltd. 2011

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Dec 05

Zero Tolerance to Emails at Work

Communication Skills, Email Writing Skills, Writing Skills No Comments »

How much time do you think you spend writing, reading, sorting and talking about emails while you are at work? Far too long is the most probable answer as many organisations and independent studies have reported that the average employee spends anything between two hours and more than 50% of their working day immersed in email correspondence.

© istockphoto.com/Dmitriy Shironosov

The Daily Telegraph has recently drawn to our attention that the head of Atos, one of Europe’s largest information technology services companies, is about to ban staff from sending each other emails. Thierry Breton has argued that sending internal emails is outdated and a waste of time, causing a huge loss of productivity. He has suggested that only 10% of the 200 or so emails his staff receive every day are likely to be useful and he is aiming to implement this ban in the next 18 months.

The dominance of email in the workplace can be extremely damaging to our productivity and is causing us to lose the ability to focus on any one task for an extended period of time. ORSE, an independent watchdog, has reported that 70% of new emails are reacted to within six seconds and it then takes us an average of 64 seconds to resume working at the same rate as before the interruption. It is not difficult to do the maths and work out the enormous cost of time wasted on constant email monitoring.

For the time being, a complete zero tolerance to email may be a step to far for most organisations but many companies are now putting in place email policies which guide their employees in the appropriate use of email. The tips below should help individuals to use email as an effective business tool rather than a crutch they can’t live without.

As a sender of emails consider making the following changes to save time and improve your own and your colleagues’ productivity

  • Consider very carefully who you copy in to your emails and don’t be afraid to remove recipients from ongoing email threads when you know it is no longer relevant for them
  • Consider even more carefully sending emails to large distribution groups such as the entire division or office. Does everyone really need to know that you have lost your stapler or your voice or that the sandwich vendor is running late?
  • Before you send a sensitive email think about whether it would be more appropriate to grab five minutes on the phone or even better face-to-face with the recipient – and never ever use email to express negative emotion
  • If you are sending an email to update your manager or team, make sure you are not simply ‘blowing your own trumpet’ or sharing trivial information but that you really have an important message to share
  • Never chase or ask for progress updates long before the agreed deadline – this is only likely to frustrate or worse distract the recipient from completing the task
  • Make sure you have all the information you need to send to your recipient before you hit the send button – it can be irritating to receive three emails on the same topic just because the sender was in too much of a hurry to think it through

As an email recipient, help yourself by following the tips below:

  • Turn off all your email alerts so that your senses are not distracted each time a new email arrives and you can continue to focus on the task in hand
  • Discipline yourself to check your emails only once an hour or ideally once every couple of hours. It is rare that something is so urgent it can’t wait an hour or so and if it really is imperative that you respond the sender can usually find another way of contacting you. We also need to train our colleagues not to expect immediate responses from us
  • Respond to your emails in batches if possible – when you open an email that has an easy answer reply directly and delete or file it rather than closing it and then reading again later
  • Create folders with rules so that updates, newsletters and other emails you know are not urgent can be automatically directed into a dedicated folder to be read at a later stage – if you find you never read them then unsubscribe
  • If you know that the morning, for example, is your most productive time of day don’t waste the first hour or so of your day responding to non-urgent emails

Email writing, etiquette and management can be a minefield and it can take an outside perspective for us to take on quite simple tips and strategies that will help us to ensure that email helps rather than hinders our professional life. Professional email writing training programmes can help you to re-evaluate the way you currently manage your email and to put in place better practice for using this business tool more effectively and efficiently.

© Communicaid Group Ltd. 2011

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Oct 28

Councils ‘Waste’ £500,000 on Training Courses

Communication Skills No Comments »

Once again the popular press including London’s The Evening Standard is up in arms about the amount of money local councils have been spending on training programmes during these times of cuts and economic hardship. The article cites all sorts of external and internal training courses council workers have been sent on including ‘key fob training’ seminars, a ‘Using Social Media’ day, ‘Licensing Law for Sex Establishments’ training and as well as more mainstream communication skills training programmes and executive coaching sessions for a cabinet minister.

Councils ‘Waste’ £500,000 on Training Courses

© istockphoto.com/Pali Rao

Of course, we, as the general public, deserve to know that our taxes are being spent wisely and prudently particularly when many of us are seeing local services reduced. It is natural that hackles start to rise when we hear about government or council workers spending valuable time sitting in tick box training courses that are not aligned to the real needs and context of the individual employees. Many local authorities offer a per employee annual training allowance and while this may be a modest amount of money, employees should not be encouraged to think that it is there to be spent regardless as this can be an easy route to wasting money. Best practice suggests that organisations that prioritise developing their people should set aside the equivalent of 1 -3% of their salary bill as the annual training budget – but not that this budget should necessarily be presented as a per head allowance. Furthermore, training, or more importantly learning, does not necessarily need a monetary value to be effective. For example, internal mentoring or coaching programmes can often be as valuable if not more than bringing in an external expert.

However, it seems simplistic to deny government and council workers access to learning and development opportunities available from external agencies. Roles and responsibilities are becoming increasingly complex with civil servants communicating with and on behalf of the departments and localities they represent. They need to be well-informed about the issues they face but equally need to be highly skilled to be able to communicate with impact to a wide range of stakeholders. So, while it is easy to joke about a council worker attending a training programme at the Institute of Licensing to understand the correct use of the law relating to sex establishments, is it not important that someone who is potentially responsible for monitoring or even closing down these businesses should have a full understanding of the legal context? Equally, a senior civil servant or government minister who has been successful due to his or her technical knowledge or subject matter may need targeted coaching support to manage the complex communication challenges they confront on a daily basis.

The media is right to question how the national and local government spend taxpayers’ money. But perhaps the questioning needs to be a little bit more intelligent and rather than throwing their hands up in horror because council workers are seemingly being trained on how to use a Blackberry or create a Facebook page they should look a little bit deeper into the training policy within that particular department or authority to ensure that any training budgets are spent effectively. Good questions to start with might include:

  • How are external training companies assessed and selected?
  • Are training fees negotiated and are there discounts in place?
  • How are training objectives set out and mapped against business objectives – for individuals, teams and the organisation as a whole?
  • Is there a focus during the course on workplace application?
  • How is the impact of the training measured after the course has taken place?
  • How accountable are individual employees for taking ownership of their own learning and development?

If the answers to these questions are unsatisfactory then is more cause for concern that if some of the training titles on offer appear suspicious.

© Communicaid Group Ltd. 2011

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Sep 05

Communicating from the Top-down

Communication Skills No Comments »

The Evening Standard has recently identified good communication skills as essential for ensuring managers are not seen as ‘horrible bosses’. The article is clearly very light-hearted but it highlights important messages to all managers about the importance of creating excellent professional relationships and developing an authentic and credible communication style.

Communicating from the Top-down

© istockphoto.com/ Sean Locke

Successful senior managers and leaders develop their communication skills not only to inform and instruct but to inspire and engage with their staff. If leaders want to ensure that the operational, behavioural and strategic changes they envisage are implemented they need to ensure that they communicate these messages clearly and appropriately through the right channels to the right people at the right time. They need to be sure that their non-verbal communication matches the words they use or if they communicate by email that their tone of voice has the right balance of credibility and approachability.

When good leaders communicate they put themselves in the shoes of employees and think about how they can encourage their staff to engage with and believe in their messages – and in turn, engage with the organisation. Engaging and empathetic communication from the top is more likely to inspire loyalty and to motivate employees to work better and harder for their organisation

Good leaders are also good listeners and are conscious that communication is a two way process. They are able to ask the right questions and they value and give credit to the fact that many of their staff may have expertise that they do not share or solve problems where they have struggled.

Creating the right impact as a leader or senior manager is about much more than being liked or something ‘touchy feely’ but it is also about ensuring the credibility not only of the individual but also the organisation they represent. Good communication skills are not a ‘nice to have’ but an essential set of tools for any leader managing teams, projects or campaigns. Leaders or senior managers who have risen through the ranks more for their technical than their interpersonal skills will benefit from targeted communication skills training programmes that will enable them to become more aware of their own communication style and develop skills to create more positive impact on those they are leading.

© Communicaid Group Ltd. 2011

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Aug 05

Manchester Accent Banned from Selfridges

Communication Skills No Comments »

The popular British press, including the Daily Mail, has recently picked up that Selfridges’ store in Manchester has banned staff from using expressions that are considered to be ‘too Mancunian’ such as ‘hiya’, ‘see ya’ or ‘cheers’. This has caused quite a lot of controversy. Etiquette experts on the one hand have supported the decision claiming that these expressions sound too informal and unprofessional. On the other hand, local customers and dialect experts, as well as the employees themselves are scandalised by the decision and are proud of their local accent.

Speech Training Programme, English Accent, Manchester Accent, Accent Reduction and Recognition

istockphoto.com/Catherine Yeulet

Selfridges’ decision was driven by the desire to raise standards of customer service and ensure that employees are friendly but maintain a professional image. But are the etiquette experts right to say that a formal ‘goodbye’ makes for better customer service than a friendly ‘see ya’? Does formal always equate with professional and informal mean unprofessional? The words we use when we communicate are part of a bigger package and the main objective should always be to create empathy with our customer. Good customer service is just as much about making friendly eye contact, having a smile on our face and a warm tone of voice. Most of us would prefer to be greeted with a warm ‘hiya’ than a cold and distant ‘good morning’ from someone who is not focused on us and what we need.

What is more, many locals have criticised the decision saying that Mancunians should be proud of their local identity including their accent and colloquialisms. Research has suggested that northern accents often appear to be more friendly and trustworthy than other regional accents. In addition, customers often appreciate being served by someone who is ‘like them’ and is therefore more likely to empathise with them.

Customer facing employees who are concerned that their accent or speech patterns are hard to understand can increase their intelligibility by following a speech training programme. This type of training should not attempt to eradicate a regional accent but should ensure that individuals speak in a warm and clear manner and are aware of any sounds or expressions which will make them difficult to decipher.

© Communicaid Group Ltd. 2011

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Jul 25

PowerPoint: Communication Friend or Foe

Communication Skills No Comments »

The BBC online magazine recently picked up on a light-hearted attempt to ban the use of PowerPoint in Switzerland. A political party is apparently lobbying to have this pervasive business tool outlawed and replaced instead by the flipchart which is more effective in creating impact, excitement and understanding.

PowerPoint: Communication Friend or Foe

© istockphoto.com/Nyul

We have all sat through interminable meetings and training presentations where we have been subjected to ‘death-by-PowerPoint’ through multitudes of badly written and designed slides. Probably the worst PowerPoint sin of all is when the presenter mechanically reads through a dense list of bullet points word for word. Other offences include the over-use of animation, colour and images or using text or graphs so dense that they are illegible.

However, PowerPoint used sparingly and used well in the right context can make a great visual tool and should enhance rather than detract from the presenter. Following a few golden PowerPoint rules can make all the difference between losing your audience to boredom and inertia or engaging and winning them over.

  • First of all, think about your objectives and key messages and let these drive your presentation rather than your use of slides
  • Use a consistent template – make sure it is clean and simple but professional; your audience should be focused on you and your message rather than a fussy background or border
  • Keep the number of slides as well as the content of each slide as minimal as you can: many PowerPoint gurus suggest that ten is the optimal number of slides
  • Use visuals but make sure any images or graphs add value and meaning to your message rather than simply fill the slide
  • Check and double check your slides for spelling and grammar mistakes or other inaccuracies; there will always be someone in your audience who delights in pointing out that you have made a mistake
  • Finally, when delivering your presentation make sure that you position yourself away from the screen. When you are speaking, the audience should be looking at you and not staring at the screen.

Don McMillan’s YouTube hit “Life after Death by PowerPoint” is a very entertaining summary of what not to do when giving a PowerPoint presentation. If you are serious about improving your use of PowerPoint and developing your communication skills a presentation skills training programme can provide you with valuable tips and techniques to ensure you engage your audience and avoid ‘death by PowerPoint.’

© Communicaid Group Ltd. 2011

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Jul 11

Why Organisations need a Corporate Style Guide

Business Writing Skills, Communication Skills No Comments »

Among employees of many organisations there is often a perceived tension between the need for business writing to be personalised to the writer and reader and the need for a consistent professional style.

Many professionals are understandably cautious about producing bland, ‘vanilla’ documents full of corporate speak and meaningless buzzwords. However, maintaining a personal style adapted for your reader is not incompatible with following corporate guidelines that ensure written communication reflects the professionalism and values of the organisation.

Why Organisations need a Corporate Style Guide

© istockphoto.com/ Dmitriy-Shironosov

Objectors may say that they do not need to be shown how to write as they are well educated and have been writing for business for many years. However, trends in business writing change. An obvious example is the more minimalist ‘open’ approach to punctuation used in business writing today. This would have looked sloppy and unprofessional 20 years ago but today is part of the cleaner, fresher ‘plain English’ approach to business writing. In addition, there are sometimes several ‘right’ ways of writing such as whether or not we hyphenate certain words. Co-operation or cooperation are both technically correct but it looks more professional if the same form is used consistently – not only within a specific document but in all written communication produced by the same organisation. A style guide includes useful lists of these technical nuances which can be time consuming for each individual to check.

Other detractors may claim that if they adopt a slightly different writing style their clients and/or superiors may not like it. Of course, any new communications initiative such as a corporate style guide needs to be embraced from the top down. As for clients, it is not uncommon for lawyers, as an example, to suggest that they will lose credibility if they take a more modern plain English approach and use simple language in shorter sentences. These very clients may actually prefer documents that are fresh and easy to read and that reflect the modern, forward thinking ethos of the company they have engaged.

There are many reasons why a style guide adds value to an organisation’s internal and external communication but here are a few.

Saves Time – A style guide saves time by providing quick answers to format, style and accuracy questions that occur when writing.
Saves Money – A style guide enables employees to spend fewer hours writing, reviewing, and correcting documents. It also reduces the expense of training and avoids potentially costly mistakes.
Ensures Consistency – A style guide promotes consistency throughout the company
Guarantees Professionalism – A style guide ensures that the company enhances its external image by developing and an appropriate style that consistently delivers quality documents and reflects the brand values of the organisation.

Writing a corporate style guide from scratch can be a daunting task and so many organisations work closely with expert consultants or follow business writing training programmes that highlight the key elements of a style guide.

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