Have you ever wondered how a single person can influence a team, a department, a division an ENTIRE corporation to follow just one vision?
Have you ever wondered how a SINGLE person can get the majority of an entire nation to believe and trust in his/her words? Isn’t that beautiful?
But have ever wondered how we will be able to reach full potential in life?
What if this clicker was magic? and we can see your future, 10, 20, 30, 40 years from now?
The day we retire. What have we accomplished? How far have we gone? Have we truly maximized our potential?
Or what if I tell you that despite the abundance of information overload that we have access to these days, there is one single life hack. That can do just that.
And this, dear TEDsters, is the beauty of effective communication.
And I have bad news here today, all my dear Japanese friends, “yoroshikuonegaishimasu”.
Unfortunately, it’s going to be very difficult to speak like a native speaker. It’s very very difficult. It’s almost impossible.
But the good news is, you can learn how to communicate better than a native speaker.
Who here knows Mark Twain? Anybody know Mark Twain here? Raise your hands. Mark Twain, of course right?
In order to preface the day, Mark Twain before dying, he left us with a beautiful message.
Huge difference right?
But isn’t this beautiful though? The “right word” and the “almost right word” right? This is the key point.
Why? Because effective communication, with effective we have results rite?
and we communication wait hold on. What is “communication”?
Communication is not speaking a language. Communication is not talking.
Communication is the ability to choose the right words for the right person to generate the right feeling.
That’s the beauty of effective communication.
And Mark Twain, understood that. When results and relationship truly matter tiny little words can make a huge difference.
There’s a beautiful study out there, a very popular study that breaks down the numbers like this.
Why? It’s simple.
If you have a good degree, you will have a job, you’re safe. You are safe for the job.
If you keep doing your tasks over and over, you will become more efficient than them.
But in order to lead, in order to manage, in order to inspire, you will need effective communication. That is the key point.
Who here knows Brian Tracy? Raise your hands. Oh, there’s like two people…
For those who don’t know him, Brian Tracy is a true guru in the world of sales and negotiations. Probably one of the renowned currently in the world.
Brian Tracy, along this line said something like this.
Why? Because Brian Tracy knows that in the world of sales and in the world of negotiations, these all fall under one beautiful big umbrella.
And this is the umbrella of effective communication. It’s all under that umbrella, effective communication.
And the reason why I’m here today is to share with you, with you, with you and with you of course, 3 communication hacks.
The first communication hack is “how to deliver a better first impression than a native speaker.”
Communication hack No.2 is “how to communicate ideas during discussions more effectively than a native speaker.”
And communication hack No.3 is “how to make a better decision than a native speaker.”
First impressions, discussions, decisions. Aren’t these crucial skills in the world of business?
Think about it, you will meet these situations over and over and over and over again.
So thats’s why, what I would like to share with you is valuable and you can use it from today.
And the most important point is I would like you dear non-native speaker friends to speak better than me. Alright? Let’s do that.
But before we jump into it, there is one key point. The key point is that communication can be divided into two concepts.
That also pair with each other. There is internal communication, auto suggestions, self-talk. Talking to yourself like you are doing right now.
But there is also external communication. It always starts internally and communicates externally.
So it’s very important to understand the what and the why mindset before the how. So let’s have a look right here.
According to Princeton University studies, on a subconscious level, first impressions can last 0.3 secounds. Isn’t that fast? Wow, you are already judging me. That's amazing.
It can go all the way to 10 secounds, 15 seconds but we know that in average we have 7-8 seconds to build a first good impression.
7-8 seconds to make the other person feel important, to make the other person feel special rite? So, let’s have a look at how we can communicate this.
Let’s start hacking right now shall we?
Imagine yourself right now. You have successful people sitting right next to you. Don’t you think it would be a good idea to make a good first impression?
You never know, you might have a business partner for life in this room.
Guess what? If you introduce yourself to someone, most people will start like “hello”.
But if you communicate like a native speaker, you will most likely to start a conversation like this.
“Hi I’m Alex, nice to meet you” right? That’s how most native speakers would talk like. Hi I’m Alex, nice to meet you.
It’s the standard way but it's definitely not the effective way.
First of all, if I want to make the person feel special should I start with my name? and “nice to meet you”, we are creatures of emotions.
Does “nice to meet you” make you feel important? Does that make you feel special? No, of course not. So how can we change this? Simple but every effective.
“Mr.Nazeer”, what if I learnt the person’s name before actually meeting them? It happened to me tonight. “Oh Alex…” I was like oh my god, I love you already.
So learning about their names, especially in this world, where LinkedIn, Facebook makes it so easy to stalk people. Credibility already started here.
On top of that, what if we change “nice to meet you” to “it’s a pleasure”. Does that generate a different feeling?
On top of that, what if we add a “finally”.
This one word is worth dozens of words because “finally” is telling the other person, that I have been looking forward to meeting you, that I have been looking forward to this moment.
One word generates tons of words.
There we go, it’s as simple as that.
Yes, there is little bit of stalking to do prior, but in the world of effective communication, in the world where results and relationships truly matter, tiny little words can make a huge difference.
Guess what? HACKED. It’s only getting better from now. Communication hack No.2, let’s move on.
Discussion, how to discuss ideas and opinions more effectively than a native speaker.
Picture this, before we actually start hacking, we’re in a room formal setting. Here we have the general managers, here we have the executives, here we have our shareholders.
Some people are thinking “I want to be an executive”.
How would you convey a message, how would you convey your idea, how would you express your opinion?
Well, if you are like most native speakers, you will probably use the following words, “I think”.
Why do these two words make me so upset? Simply because “I think” lacks in assertiveness.
If you are a leader, either you have a strong opinion or you don’t have one. You cannot go half way.
But on top of that, some of you might say culturally, this is not oriented towards me, we like to be more neutral that's fine but on top of that,
what about something like showing that you’ve lacked in preparation, you haven’t done your homework, you haven’t done your research, you have no evidence.
“I think” is actually not thinking. “I think” is guessing in most cases. But worse than that, “I think” leads to communication enemy No.1, Mr.Bias.
What is wrong with Mr.Bias? Mr.Bias is communication enemy No.1, Mr.Bias is conflict maker No.1, Mr.Bias is relationship breaker No.1.
If you think about it, most of the conflict comes from bias. Inability to see it from the other person’s perspective.
So, you guys agree. If you haven’t done your research, you’re not going to get results, if you use “I think”, you might not notice it but you are losing credibility points without even noticing.
So how can we replace this? What if these 2 simple words we replace them with “according to”, “based on”, something “indicates that”, "states that", “shows that”.
It doesn’t matter but what’s so beautiful about these two words is that there is evidence.
You’re taking the time to prepare for the meeting and not only it will generate better results but we will build more credibility and trust. What are some of the examples here?
What about according to customer service, what about based on economic studies, what about experts show that, what about extensive research, what about based on google analytics, what about according to internal audits, what about key metrics, what about market data and what about recent sales figures.
Who would you trust? “I think” or “according to” recent sales figures, which one sounds better?
According to Richard, a professor who did a presentation earlier, which was really good, he was talking about how Japanese people are really good at this. Really good at finding the numbers but lack little bit in terms of opinions, little bit afraid to show their opinions.
Well, if you have the data, you should not be afraid to voice your opinion. You can be strong about it because you’ve done your research.
HACKED.
So moving into communication hack No.3, I’m going to contradict my own saying because yes, ideally we have the evidence, ideally we have the research right?
But there will be times when you have to make decisions without much time. Snap decisions. Especially, in a very fast evolving economy, where technology improves day by day. There will be times when you have to make decisions and it’s difficult to gather the data prior to that.
It’s not ideal, but definitely it will happen right? So what can we do? Before we actually look at the hack, let’s preface this hack with the quote from Tony Robbins. Any Tony Robbins fan?
Alright, so Tony Robbins said something like this. “to effectively communicate we must realise that we are all different in the way we perceive the world and use this understanding as a guide to our communication with others.” Effectively communicate and perceive, these are they 2 key words.
Now, Tony Robbins is a true leadership guru, communication guru and has done a lot in this field and knows very very well in the field of psychology.
So how do we do this? We’re in the same meeting, we got the shareholders, we got the managers, we got the business angels, we got everyone in the same room.
We’ve already expressed an idea, we’re moving onto a new subject and this time we need to make a decision without the research. How can we communicate that?
Let’s have a look, let’s starts hacking right now.
What would a native speaker would say? A native speaker would say something like…
What!? Mr.Bias is back. Oh my god, I thought we got rid of him earlier. He’s back with “I think”, “I think we should”, I, I, I. We don’t want all this stuff right? Let me show you something cool.
So this is the most powerful of all communication hacks. We have Mr.Bias that we need to get rid of, in order to make critical decisions. What can we say?
The most powerful of all 3 words “from a perspective”, “from a standpoint”, “from a point of view”. “Perspective”, “standpoint”, “point of view”.
Now why is the most powerful communication hack out there why? Simply because this gets rid of bias, bias is done. By using these 3 words, internally thinking who am I making this decision for, who does this really matter to, and communicating externally.
You’re not only going to generate better results but you are going to improve relationships once again, you are building credibility without even knowing it.
On top of that, here is the bonus. This is good for decision making, but it also works for persuasion because working in the field of sales from age 16, doing calls and yellow pages and other stuff, a lot of the most successful people would say “put yourself in the client’s shoes”.
What does that mean? That’s perspective. When you are dealing with formal negotiations, multimillion dollar contracts, you are thinking of win-win situations. What is win-win? Win-win is a perspective. So the more you flex your mind internally, the more you communicate externally, the better you will become at seeing it from different perspectives. That’s what can give you a huge lead in front of all stand up speakers, my dear non-native speaker friends.
What is win-win? Win-win is a perspective. So the more you flex your mind internally, the more you communicate externally, the better you will become at seeing it from different perspectives.
That’s what can give you a huge lead in front of all stand up speakers, my dear non-native speaker friends.
So what are some of the examples here? From client’s perspective, from my boss’ standpoint, from a sales point of view, from a team’s perspective, from environmental point of view, from a buyer’s perspective, from a company(s point of view. How many times have I flexed my mind? A true mind shift.
So once again, not just for decisions but for persuasion as well. 3 words, 3 simple words.
A good friend of mine here today, very successful in his field, told me something a couple of weeks ago, he said “Alex, if you want to change people, start by changing yourself and that requires perspective.” If I want to change myself, I have to see it from your perspective, your perspective to better understand and then be powered influence.
One more point that I really want to finish on is, if you notice there is a category here, buyers, users and clients, which falls under the same umbrella.
Jeff Bezos, the Amazon CEO, the guy that changed our habits of buying. When he sets up a meeting with important people, in one room, people with knowledge, skills, expertise. He will do something that’s really important. He will always have the right amount of chairs plus 1.
Why? because despite their experience, despite their knowledge, despite their expertise, all of the decisions need to be made by the client’s perspective.
That’s how powerful it is. These 3 words can change all results, all relationships because in the world of effective communication tiny words can make a huge difference.