xceed way - communication (1)

OUR PEOPLE ARE YOUR ASSETS

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[email protected] www.xceedgroup.com © Xceed Consultancy

Services Ltd XIPXW00 : Version 1 – Feb 2012

our people are your assets

Xceed Way

Communicationby Dan Russon

October 2012

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Services Ltd XIPXW10 : Version 1 – October 2012


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Introduction

Communication is the most important skill for Xceed Consultants. It is frequently cited by clients & colleagues as the most important competency for Consultants. It also goes a long way to making a good, or bad, first impression.

If ‘perception is reality’ then mastering communication is the key to ensuring a positive perception. Delivering results is very important, but can only be demonstrated over time and, with poor Comms, that’s time you might never get.

This isn’t an exhaustive manual for Comms Best Practice, and we’re always keen to hear new ideas. However, we hope you find the research and suggestions outlined in this document informative, interesting and useful.

We’ll cover the essential basics with practical tips & tools. We’ll also introduce some more unusual, but empirically proven, concepts that would need a book to explain in detail. So we’ve also listed key sources and references for those keen to delve deeper into the deceptively complex world of Communication.

Communication is something so simple and difficult that we can never put it in simple words. T.S. Matthews.

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Contents

The Shapes of Communication The Matrix, The Triangles, The Square & The Circle of great communication.

Guiding Principles Never, Always and Consider – basic principles to work by

Practical Tools & Tips Stakeholder communication plans & mapping

Writing Style & Grammar Orwell’s Rules updated & Seven Simple Steps – Put the reader first

Packaging & Non-verbal Communication Cognitive Ease & Packaging: Body Language, Intonation, Choice of Words & Ambience

Assertive vs Aggressive The difference and tips for improving Assertiveness

Listening The number 1 key to effective Communication

Recap of Key Points A summary list of all Key Points from the document

References & Further Reading For those keen to explore further

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Shapes of Communication

The Matrix: Where are you? Where do you want to be?

Communication is a skill with many parts. Like all important skills it requires practice and reviewing. Everyone can improve.

If you can demonstrate high skill at the same time as being ‘genuine’ then your presence, impact and charisma will shine through.

The more compelling the communication, the more memorable & believable it becomes.

Good communication is as stimulating as black coffee, and just as hard to sleep after. Anne Morrow Lindbergh

KEY POINT :

Communication is a skill. Like all skills, it requires practice to maintain & improve.

High Skill

Low Skill

Performance Being Real

Polished

Uncomfortable

Presence

Homespun

Slick

Awkward

Impact

Naive

Credibility

Amateur

Charisma

Convincing

Bless them

Embarrassingly

Painful

An Act

Unconvincing

Con Artist

The Triangles of Communication The volume & medium of communication should be proportional to the importance of the message. Also consider the available time, relevance & interest of the audience. Triangles of

Communication are one way of remembering this.

Audience Type Message & Medium

Project Team

Department Heads

Organisation

Project Report & Plan

Project Summary by e-mail

Newsletter/ Intranet

==

=

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The Square of Communication

There are five key areas to consider for all key communications, best illustrated by another shape; The Square of Communication.

Never try and get important points across when your audience is pushed for time. You need time to listen to them as well as making your point so timing is key. Timing can also be strategic; many messages have an optimal time and place, identifying it and waiting for it will increase impact & acceptance.

It’s easy to get side-tracked and lose focus; if you’re not clear on your agenda your chances of success are limited. It can be helpful to openly state your agenda at the outset, even having it written down. It can also be beneficial to ask them their agenda or goal from the conversation. Satisfying their agenda first often makes them more receptive and responsive to yours.

Think seriously about the best medium for your message. Face-to-face, email, phone call, letter, text or Tweet? We encourage face to face wherever practical but there are times when not being in the same room can help. It allows you to carefully construct your message, seek peer feedback or refer to detailed notes. It gives your audience time to digest your message before responding. It can also remove emotion and give you a valuable audit trail. Sometimes you will get the best results by communicating via a third party.

Does your message need peace, quiet and privacy? If it’s important you need to minimise distraction & interruption. If it’s a negotiation, neutral territory can be beneficial.

Right Person The most common cause of miscommunication, and a frequent source of frustration, stems from people not identifying, or avoiding speaking directly to, the right person. It’s easy to talk to someone you know or someone friendly, but are they THE best person for what you need?

Right Time

Right Agenda

Right Place

Right Way

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The Circle of Communication

Another common cause of frustration is the assumption that by sending a message your job is complete, it isn’t. Just because you’ve told someone something, or sent them a message does not mean they will have seen, understood or accepted that message. Apply this to all of your communications and you’ll rapidly see results, eliminating wasted time, misunderstanding and your own frustration.

To illustrate we’ll call you the Sender and your target audience the Receiver. When in the role of Sender many people work on a linear basis and assume their job is complete:

Great Consultants appreciate that following up to ensure reception and comprehension is part of the Sender’s job. Don’t get frustrated at a lack of response if you haven’t followed up to confirm or offered more time to clarify. This is especially true with senior stakeholders, a simple “Can I check you got my note on X? Let me know if you have any questions” never hurts. Don’t be shy of following-up and never expect others to be as responsive as you may be.

Receiver Role

As Receiver you can help the Sender and present a helpful professional image by acknowledging receipt of the Message. Be pro-active with clarification questions and where appropriate an ETA for any action or response requested of you. If a question is asked, or an action requested, a lack of response can be interpreted by the Sender in a number of ways, none of them positive. If in any doubt, check with the Sender before considering the Receive function to be complete.

Sender ReceiverMessage

It’s your job as Sender to

check receipt and understanding. You may

need to clarify, you will often have to chase.

This is especially true for email but is also useful face-to-face. Recap and check mutual understanding

don’t assume it.

Sender

Receiver

CheckClarify

Chase

Nothing is so simple that it cannot be misunderstood. Freeman Teague. Jr

The single biggest problem with

communication is the illusion that it has taken place.

George Bernard Shaw

KEY POINT :

Just because you’ve sent a message, doesn’t mean it’s been received or understood. It’s your job to Check, Clarify & Chase.

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Guiding Principles

AlwaysSimple is best; clear and to the point is important. If you have an important point, don’t crowd your message with context and qualification.

Know your audience; there’s no better way than asking them how & when they prefer to receive communication. One size & style does not fit all.

Short is sweet; however short and meaningful is very difficult to achieve. Start long and edit until only the critical points are left. If you’re repeating something, do it consciously for impact rather than due to poor proof reading.

Be prepared; preparing yourself is the best thing you can do to enhance your chances of success in an important conversation or communication.

Positive & polite; basic but critically important. It’s fine to constructively point out challenges, hurdles and obstacles. However, don’t criticise or apportion blame and never be negative in your communication.

Too much is better than too little; if in doubt as to the desired frequency of communication with a stakeholder, being too informative is far better than needing to be chased. If it’s too much they’ll tell you; if they have to chase you, you’re off to a bad start.

Peer Review; get a trusted colleague or contact to review key messages for you. Pilot your key communications with a small and safe audience, they can almost always be improved.

If you can’t explain it to a six year old, you don’t understand it yourself. Albert Einstein

I am sorry for the length of my letter, but I had not the time to write a short one. Blaise Pascal

KEY POINT :

Cut the fat. Keep it simple. Say what you mean.

Lincoln’s Gettysburg Address took just over 2 minutes to deliver and consisted of approximately 270 words. That’s just a couple of paragraphs to change history.

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Guiding Principles

NeverHide behind emails & your lap-top. Face to face is the best way to deliver most messages as you can immediately gauge reception and understanding. Misinterpreted email stories abound for good reason.

Be Aggressive; being assertive has its place, aggression never does. Understand the difference and work on assertiveness.

Respond ‘on tilt’; a poker term for betting carelessly after losing a big hand. If your emotions are high you should be very circumspect about responding quickly. Try composing the note but not sending it. Leave it for an hour or a day; you’ll probably edit it when you revisit. If not, at least you’ve made a considered decision.

Commit criticism to paper or an email that you wouldn’t be able to justify if it were seen by the subject of the communication. True for clients, competitors & colleagues.

Rely on materials; Steve Jobs hated PowerPoint, and not just because it was a Microsoft product. He argued that if someone needed to rely on Keynote, Ppt or a set of notes then they didn’t know their subject well enough to convince him of anything.

The more elaborate our means of communication, the less we communicate. Joseph Priestly

True interactivity is not about clicking on icons or downloading files, it’s about encouraging communication. Edwin Schlossberg

KEY POINT :

First drafts are never the best drafts.

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Consider

People remember the start and the end of any communication far more than they remember the middle, unless you use some smart tricks & techniques. It’s why the old adage; ‘tell them what you’re going to tell them, tell them and tell them what you’ve told them’ remains valid.

Mild shock is memorable and one way of getting a key point in the middle of a communication to be remembered. This can be done by the juxtaposition of what goes before it and just after it. Think of the structure of many jokes; they lead people in one direction where you think you know what’s coming and by changing tack they grab and hold your testicles (or attention). Mild shock can increase the chances of your message standing out.

Eats, shoots & leaves; the title of a popular Lynne Truss book on grammar, specifically punctuation. You don’t need to be perfect. You do need to know that a misplaced comma, or colon: can completely change, the meaning of; a sentence, not just, the, flow. Get the basics right though if you want to be taken seriously.

Animal Magic; you can also consider what ‘Animal’ they are (ask us for the Animal test if you don’t know what it is). For example, ‘Lions’ respond to hard-hitting headlines, urgency and brevity. ‘Owls’ will need the full facts, detailed data and time to digest.

Humour can strengthen relationships and rapport and make your audience look forward to interacting with you. However, humour is highly subjective; one person’s rib-tickler is another person’s HR tribunal. If in doubt, leave it out. If you do know your audience well enough to use humour then the safest form of humour is self-deprecating humour, where you’re the butt of the joke.

International; communicating effectively with non-UK stakeholders can be a minefield and there are peculiarities specific to most countries & continents. The short-hand version is to simply increase professionalism and clarity. Always apply the Check & Clarifying steps from the Circle of Comms. Misunderstandings are common so be wary of idioms and colloquialisms, remove obtuse words, and be extra careful with humour. Some cultures find humour in meetings to be inappropriate and rude, in others it can be essential.

I’ve learned that people will forget what you said, people will forget what you did, but people will never forget how you made them feel. Maya Angelou

KEY POINT :

Preparing yourself is the best thing that you can do to enhance your chances of success in an important conversation.

Grammar Basics. They’re, There or Their? You’re or Your? Its or It’s. If you’re not sure about any of these, ask for help and learn.

Mark Heathcote enjoyed one mixed-nationality meeting recently. A colleague over from Hamburg, called Frank, didn’t quite understand it though. For some reason, everyone kept starting their sentences with, “to be frank..” At the end of the meeting our German visitor said. “I get what needs doing, but I don’t know why you all have to pretend to be me to do it.”

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Practical Tools & Tips

Being prepared and having a plan is important, think about Communication as you would any other work-stream of an Assignment or Project and apply the same rigour.

Who are your stakeholders? Formally identify them and record them. You need to understand Their Agenda to maximise your success.

Score or rate the level of importance and the level of relationship for each stakeholder, a basic RAG will help to keep it simple.

Over 70% of a Project Manager’s role should be Communication. Peter Taylor

Reporting; what does each stakeholder want to know, not just need to know? Some will only need high-level metrics but may also like a regular informal verbal update. Don’t assume, ask.

Focus attention on important stakeholders with poorer relationships. It’s human nature to avoid difficult conversations & stakeholders. It’s easy to spend your time with friendly faces. Resist this temptation. The real value lies in bringing resistant and especially senior stakeholders on-board.

Diarise time in the CRM system or MSOffice for reviewing and updating your Comms Plan. Set Flags & Reminders aligned to the frequency for each key stakeholder, stick to them. You can attach your Comms Plan or Stakeholder Map to the Outlook Appointment or CRM Contact Record to make sure it’s always to hand, even on your mobile.

If you’re being chased for updates or news, you’re not managing that stakeholder well enough. It’s particularly poor to set up a standing report and then miss a week/day or two. People are creatures of habit, if they’re used to seeing a report on a Monday PM, its absence will be noted, negatively. If they’re not going to get it, tell them in advance.

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Be careful about supplying data just because you have it. If you’re sending a raft of data to stakeholders, make sure you provide an executive summary and analysis. Add value and save their time by minimising their reading.

Maintain a Risk Register relating to stakeholders and communication. Perception is reality and ensuring positive perception can be important to delivering success in your role. A low opinion of a project hinders its success. Perception is a risk, treat it seriously.

Always have a clear summary at the outset and a succinct recap at the end. Either of these should work as a stand-alone Executive Summary, detailing the key points. Don’t expect everyone to read every page of anything.

Writing Style & Grammar

Orwell’s Rules

Each generation bemoans the standards of grammar and writing of the next. Whilst we’re not advocating using TXTSPK, the reality is that there’s no such thing as ‘perfect’ grammar. However, you do need a grasp of the basics. Partly to ensure your message isn’t misinterpreted and partly to present a professional ‘high-end’ image.

In a 1946 essay George Orwell outlined Six Rules for good writing; with very little updating they’re as true today as they have ever been.

Orwell’s Rules Never use a metaphor, simile, or other figure of speech which you are used to seeing in print.

Avoid clichés. Try to put your point across in an interesting, not stereotyped way.

Never use a long word where a short one will do.

Easy to misunderstand and reflects worse on the writer than the reader.

If it’s possible to cut a word out, always cut it out.

Your first draft will never be the best you can do. Re-read and edit, ruthlessly.

Never use the passive where you can use the active.

Excellent advice for a Consultant. Communicate as you operate; Actively.

Never use a foreign phrase, a scientific word, or a jargon word if you can think of an everyday English equivalent.

Applies to technology as well, assume you’re writing to a non-technical audience.

Break any of these rules sooner than say anything outright barbarous.

Rules are only guidelines. Communication is personal and having your own ‘style’ is positive.

KEY POINT :

Short words, sentences & paragraphs aid understanding as well as the perception of the writer.

In a series of five studies, Daniel Oppenheimer demonstrated that using long, complex or unusual words unnecessarily makes people view the writer as less intelligent than someone using short & simple words. He named his paper with pleasing irony:

“Consequences of erudite vernacular utilised irrespective of necessity; problems with using long-words needlessly.”

Always use ‘Xceed is’ or ‘Xceed has’

and never ‘Xceed are’ or ‘Xceed have’.

Xceed is a single entity.

KEY POINT :

Recap & summarise. Add analysis and value.

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Seven Simple Steps

Put the reader firstPicture a real person and write directly to him or her. Consider ‘Who will read this?” and write for them, not for yourself.

Organise your thoughts

Most communications need a start, middle and end. Jot down your key points, establish the best order & ‘flow’. Remember to repeat or highlight the key point(s) at the start and end.

Use short paragraphs

Newspapers use columns and short paragraphs because they know that it makes reading easier for their audience. Most brains absorb information best when it’s in small chunks. It’s why aphorisms, mottos and quotes are memorable and repeated. Dense pages of text can be daunting and many people will delay reading them.

Use short sentences

For the same reason that you keep paragraphs short. One idea per sentence; any more and you risk confusing or losing your audience.

Use simple words

As Oppenheimer showed, writing ‘adumbrate’ rather than ‘shorten’ not only confuses your audience, it reflects poorly on the writer. You can be a great writer without using complicated words.

Be specific

Get to the point, say what you mean. If you want someone to take an action or respond, make that very clear. If you can’t avoid a lengthy message then number your key points and recap them at the end. The name you chose for the document or email will also have a lot of influence on how it’s treated.

Relax & be yourself

Don’t try and copy someone else and don’t worry about your writing. As long as you’re using decent grammar and observing common usage conventions then you should write as naturally as possible. Think of writing as a conversation and write in the same way you’d talk to that audience. Do use spell-check if in doubt though.

KEY POINT :

Be yourself; treat writing as a conversation. Tailor your style and content as you would when speaking to different types of stakeholder.

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Packaging & Non-Verbal Communication

Cognitive Ease A lot of Behavioural Economic research has shown that the easier something is to understand, the more trustworthy and believable it becomes. This is to do with System 1 and System 2 in the brain. System 1 is lazy and doesn’t analyse too deeply. As soon as someone has to engage their System 2, they become more sceptical, analytical and cynical.

This goes beyond your choice of words and use of grammar. For example, when two completely false facts are presented side by side, people will believe the one that is easiest to read. They will challenge the one that is in a faint font or hard to decipher.

Billy Bragg was born in 1956 Billy Bragg was born in 1958

Using language, terms and references that are familiar to the audience aids not only their understanding, but also their belief & trust in the message.

Clear fonts, clear spacing, good quality paper, simple & familiar language, all aid Cognitive Ease and improve credibility.

Repetition, framing and priming are all worth understanding to hone your communication skills. Daniel Kahneman’s Thinking, Fast & Slow is the best source for these topics.

KEY POINT :

The easier to understand and the more familiar it is, the more believable the message becomes.

Did You Know?

Post-It If you have to leave hard-copy papers on someone’s desk, stick a Post-It on the front. Even without any writing, the Post-It increases the chances of your paper(s) being read by as much as 3 times.

Yeah, But no But. Studies show that using the word ‘But’ negates everything that goes before it. Eliminate ‘but’ if you want them to hear what you said before. This is partly due to the fact that Bad has been shown to be at least TWICE as powerful as Good.

If I…will you? If you need to get someone to take an action, and are having to negotiate, you should Always start: ‘If I…will you?’ and Never ‘Will you…if I?’ Research shows that people’s brains instantly start to construct objections when you start ‘Will you..’ and they won’t hear the rest. Start ‘If I...’ if you want to get results. Try using ‘And’ instead of ‘But’.

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Packaging How you present your message is critical to how it is received. There are four main types of packaging: Body Language, Intonation, Choice of Words and Ambience.

Body Language:

Research shows females are far better than men at reading body language cues. Facial expressions, positions and movements of our body, from folded arms and yawning to eye-contact all make a big difference to how the content of your message is received. Studies have shown that up to 93% of communication is non-verbal. Whilst the idea that people can read micro-expressions to know when someone is lying is unproven, all normal brains can easily recognise Anger, Boredom and Stress.

Whilst the ‘science’ of NLP (Neural Linguistic Programming) is largely unproven, the concept of Mirroring someone’s movement & body-language does work. Just don’t go overboard. We’ve seen interesting results when one person has a nervous tick and the other starts mirroring it.

Intonation:

Intonation can account for 1/3rd of communication and is broken into 3 parts: Speed, Volume and Emphasis.

Speed: Fast speech can be interpreted as urgency & excitement but also as irritation, uncertainty, panic and stress. Slower speech is less prone to negative interpretation. Mirroring of speed can be appropriate and is often unconscious. Speaking steadily helps you to get messages across in the way you intend and helps the other person to listen and understand.

Volume: Too quiet and you will force the other person to engage their critical brain (System 2) to understand you. They will be less likely to believe or trust the message. Too loud and the other person will become defensive or even embarrassed. Mirroring of volume is natural.

Emphasis: The word(s) which you emphasise can completely change the meaning of a sentence. One of the reasons emails are so open to misinterpretation.

Albert Mehrabian’s regularly quoted 1971 research suggests:

Words (the literal meaning) account for 7% of the overall message

Tone of voice accounts for 38% of the overall message

Body Language accounts for 55% of the overall message

Scientists have recently discovered ‘Mirror Neurones’ in the brain. They light up when Mirroring occurs. Other scientists have pointed out that regular jelly (as in trifle) gives off the same readings as a live human brain. It’s an emerging field. Incognito, Secret Lives of the Brain provides a balanced and interesting overview of the latest findings.

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Choice of words:

Words can be used to communicate but can also be used as weapons. Some strong words evoke chemical responses in the brain, leading to emotional feelings both for you and the recipient. This results in a less productive conversation. Changing the words you use can have a strong positive impact on your audience as well as on yourself.

Above all, use familiar language and words that will be recognisable and easily understood by your audience. By taking time to think about and change the words we use, we can alter the way people react to us and alter the feelings we take from situations.

Ambience:

The demeanour, stance or mood which you or your audience are in. It’s invaluable to read the mood of the person before you communicate with them, timing can be everything. Likewise, it’s important to consider the ambience you present to others when they engage with you.

When the emphasis is… It could mean…

I think you have a very good voice…

No-one else likes it though.


I could be wrong though.


You’re better than the others.


This is your best feature.

Eg. Should vs Could:

Should… Could

You should have won that… You could have won that…

Pressure, states failure, negativity

Room to be better next time, optimistic

I should lose weight… I could lose weight…

Pressure, obligation, judgement

Hope and opportunity

You should say sorry… You could say sorry…

Resistance and guilt Reflection and choice

KEY POINT :

Take the time to think about, and change, the words you use. You can alter the way people feel and react by simply changing the words you use.

KEY POINT :

Working on your body-language, intonation, use of words & ambience will significantly improve the effectiveness of your communication with others.

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Assertive vs Aggressive

Be Assertive not Aggressive Assertive:

Calm and without emotion. Careful choice of words. Use of ‘I’ not ‘Me’ or ‘We’.

The 3 steps to assertiveness. All 3 need to be used to be effective:

1. Say to the person what you don’t want, using the word ‘I’.

2. Say to them how it is making you feel.

3. Say to them what you do want, using the word ‘I’.

It can help to ask beforehand to be heard uninterrupted and that you will only state the facts as you see them.

Afterwards, it helps to thank them for listening. The use of ‘I’ rather than ‘Me’ is key.

Aggressive:

Full of emotion. Evokes emotion in the other person.

Aggressive communication must be used very cautiously, if at all. When using aggressive communication it is almost impossible to avoid confrontation and conflict. This will not only undermine the effectiveness of your communication, it will likely lead to escalation in the short-term and lingering negativity in the long-term.

ListeningListening well is the single most important aspect of good communication. The old adage of having ‘two ears and one mouth’ and using them in that order is a cliché precisely because it is so true.

Many people spend the time someone else is speaking working out what they want to say next. They regularly fail to get the message but always succeed in frustrating the speaker. Great Consultants demonstrate ‘Active Listening’ which includes recapping and playing-back to confirm understanding.

The most important thing in communication is to hear what isn’t being said. Peter Drucker

Wisdom is the reward you get for a lifetime of listening when you would rather have talked. Mark Twain

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Listening properly is essential to building good relationships and knowing what your client or colleague is really looking for.

Remember, a lot of what is being communicated won’t be in the words themselves, you have to learn to ‘read between the lines’ which is impossible if you’re not actively listening.

If someone isn’t doing this when you’re speaking, then do it for them. Otherwise it’s very easy to exit an interaction assuming they’ve understood and will act on the discussion. Even if you haven’t agreed an explicit action stakeholders will always be frustrated if they think you haven’t heard what they had to say.

Listening, not imitation, may be the sincerest form of flattery. Dr Joyce Brothers

The Secret of success is to understand the point of view of others. Henry Ford

KEY POINT :

You can’t ‘read between the lines’ if you’re not Actively Listening in the first place.

Suggestion: Use MoSCoW in your communication. If you mean MUST, use MUST, if you mean SHOULD, use it not COULD. You can also help yourself and your audience by being SMART with any Actions or requests that you are delegating. Ambiguity of instructions is one of the largest causes of time wasting and frustration.

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Recap of Key PointsSimple is best. Know your audience. Short is sweet. Be prepared. Be Positive and Polite. Too much is better than too little. If in doubt, seek Peer Review.

KEY POINT 1:

Communication is a skill. Like all skills, it requires practice to maintain & improve.

KEY POINT 3:

Cut the fat. Keep it simple. Say what you mean.

KEY POINT 5:

Preparing yourself is the best thing that you can do to enhance your chances of success in an important conversation.

KEY POINT 8:

Be yourself; treat writing as a conversation. Tailor your style and content as you would when speaking to different types of stakeholder.

KEY POINT 10:

Take the time to think about, and change, the words you use. We can alter the way people feel and react by simply changing the words we use.

KEY POINT 2:

Just because you’ve sent a message, doesn’t mean it’s been received or understood. It’s your job to Check, Clarify & Chase

KEY POINT 4:

First drafts are never the best drafts.

KEY POINT 6:

Short words, sentences & paragraphs aid understanding as well as the perception of the writer.

KEY POINT 9:

The easier to understand and the more familiar it is, the more believable the message becomes.

KEY POINT 11:

Working on your body-language, intonation, use of words & ambience will significantly improve the effectiveness of your communication with others.

KEY POINT 12:

You can’t ‘read between the lines’ if you’re not Actively Listening in the first place.

KEY POINT 7:

Recap & summarise. Add analysis and value.

ACTION: If you’ve got this far, it’s worth going a little further. Pick 3 actions or suggestions from this document to try. Embed them into your work until they become second nature. Ask if you need any help. Then pick another 3.

If you master everything in this document you will be in the top right hand corner of The Matrix.

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References & Further ReadingThese sources & references are not all exclusively dedicated to Communication, but all touch upon the subject, several from unusual perspectives. Others, like Theories of Human Communication are seminal texts.

Kahneman, Daniel: Thinking, Fast & Slow

Harford, Tim: Adapt, why success always starts with failure

Earls, Mark: Herd: How to change behaviour by harnessing

our true nature

Peters, Steve: The Chimp Paradox

Ariely, Dan: The (honest) truth about dishonesty

Eagleman, David: Incognito, Secret lives of the brain

Wiseman, Richard: Quirkology, the curious science of

everyday lives

Wiseman, Richard: 59 Seconds. Think a little, change a lot.

Taylor, Peter: Lazy Project Manager

Lakhani, Dave: Persuasion, the art of getting what you want

Vitali, Joe: Hypnotic Writing: How to seduce and persuade

your customers with only your words.

Myers, Jeff: Secrets of Great Communicators Student Text:

Simple, Powerful Strategies for Reaching the Heart of Your

Audience.

Thaler & Sunstein: Nudge: Improving decisions about

health, wealth and happiness

Gladwell, Malcolm: The Tipping Point

Cialdini ,Robert: Influence, The Power of Persuasion

Fisher & Ury: Getting to Yes

Littlejohn & Foss: Theories of Human Communication

Jackson & O’Hanlon: Pragmatics of Human Communication

Truss, Lynn: Eats, Shoots & Leaves

If you buy any of these books, Xceed will reimburse the cost if you donate the book to the Xceed Library once you have finished.

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The blue squares are painted on the cloister walls; no Photoshop has been used in producing these images.

The man behind this art installation is Felice Varini, a Swiss artist known for his geometric anamorphic illusions. Anamorphic illusions are images which only make sense if you stand in exactly the right place.

The Xceed Way is a broad & on-going initiative to capture Xceed’s collective experience & expertise and transfer that knowledge across the business.

It is our goal to help all Xceed Consultants stand in the best place to see a clear picture and the road ahead.

xceed way - communication (1)

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