Know your remote audience!
Working from home – how to communicate effectively with your team – top tips
Have you ever wondered why sometimes people don’t react to what you say in the way that you would expect them to?
With the current advice being to work from home, if you can, many of us are in a work situation that is very different from anything that we are used to.
To make sure that organisations and their people remain effective it is vital that we continue to communicate as effectively as we can.
Understand behavioural styles
It is easy to assume that everyone responds in the same way to the way we communicate but they don’t. One of the key factors is our behavioural style. This has an impact on our preferred communication approach which affects how we expect others to communicate with us. This is especially important when it is a manager or team leader communicating with us in the work situation.
Be aware of body language
As managers or team leaders of remote teams, one of the key sets of non-verbal signals that we use in communication – body language – is either partly or completely removed depending on the medium we are using. So it is more important than ever that we try to get our approach right for each person we are communicating with.
What can we do?
One of the tools that is particularly useful in identifying the behavioural characteristics of individuals is the Thomas Personal Profile Analysis (PPA). This can provide an insight into your and your team’s communication preferences.
The PPA measures preferences around four core behavioural and communication styles1:
TOP TIPS:
- Know your behavioural style and preferences
- Know your team’s behavioural styles and preferences
- Modify your style to match theirs when you communicate with them
Dos and Don’ts for communication with individuals with each style
These are dos and don’ts for communicating with your team. Bear in mind your own preferences will have an influence on your natural approach.
ACTIVE
PASSIVE
Next steps
If you would like to find out more about how the PPA could help you and/or your team please get in touch.
Steve Bax is an accredited practitioner for PPA (Personal Profile Analysis), HPTI (High Potential Trait Indicator), and TEIQue (Trait Emotional Intelligence Questionnaire) assessments (Thomas International).
With thanks to Thomas International for some of the content detail. For more information on using the PPA to help make remote working communication successful, see the excellent blog by Jayson Darby at Thomas International here
