Communication vs Miscommunication

October 2016

I teach several seminars on communication.  In these seminars we discuss verbal and non-verbal communication, tone of voice, and word choice, among other things.  We are all communicating on a daily basis from the time we rise to the time we return to bed.  Successfully communicating our wants, needs, and desires is hugely important in this world.  But, often through no fault of our own, sometimes miscommunications happen

Let me ask you some questions.  What fruit did Adam and Eve eat in Genesis?  If you were raised in the United States, your first thought is probably an apple. I’m not sure why the apple received this unflattering accolade in the US.  In other parts of the world different fruits are suggested, including the apricot and pomegranate.  In truth, the Bible doesn’t tell us what the fruit is.  If it did, it would say in Genesis 3:6, but the Word just says fruit, no specific type.

Here’s another one.  What animal swallowed Jonah?  If you’re thinking a whale, keep thinking or go consult Jonah 1:17 and Jonah 2:1.  We all know a fish is a fish and a whale is a mammal and the Bible clearly uses the word fish.  In verse 17 it does acknowledge the size of the fish with the adjective great (NIV), but logically, the animal that swallowed Jonah was not a whale.

How many kings visited Jesus at the manger?  This is a doubly tricky question.  First, the kings never visited Jesus at the manger at all.  The magi visited Jesus when He was a few years old and by that time the family was back in their own home.  They didn’t live in the barn for that length of time.  Second, were you thinking of the number three?  Nope.  Or yep.  Scripture never says how many kings were in attendance but that three gifts were brought, gold, frankincense, and myrrh.  Maybe the number of gifts is why we think three kings, or maybe because of the song, We Three Kings.  Why, then, are Nativity Scenes sold with three kings?  I honestly don’t know but it’s a common misconception.

Can you name an animal the Bible never mentions?  There are many animals in the Bible.  We know there are sheep because Jesus is the good shepherd.  There are donkeys even though Mary is never said to have ridden one on her way to Bethlehem (I considered asking that as a question but opted to just share the information).  One answer is the cat.  Cats are no where mentioned in the Bible.  This doesn’t mean they don’t exist since we know they do.

Communication is difficult with only two people.  When more people are added there is more potential for miscommunication and challenges.  Even when people try to be painfully clear in their communication, errors still occur.

In my business book, Yes, He Actually Said That, I tell the story of trying so hard to communicate the time and place for a meeting.  We agreed on a Starbucks and I was told it was across from the Y.  So the morning of the meeting, I went to the strip mall across from the Y and there was no Starbucks to be found.  I drove back and forth getting more and more upset because I can’t stand being late and the time for the meeting was quickly approaching.  Then I saw a gentleman walking toward the grocery store in the strip mall holding a Starbucks cup and I practically ran him over in my eagerness to ask where the Starbucks was.  It turns out that I hadn’t realize the Y, with all its land, was located on a corner, and the Starbucks was across the street perpendicular to its front door, not across the street in front of the building. Oh.  I was able to race over and was in time to see the person I was meeting walk into the Starbucks.

The point of the story is that I tried really hard to make sure I knew where we were meeting.  Knowing how many Starbucks there are in this world, and how close they can be to each other, I truly made what I thought was every effort to locate the correct destination.  Yet I still missed.

There are miscommunications in life.  They happen.  The real question, then, is how important is a miscommunication?  In my case, the worst that may have happened is that I had to postpone or miss the appointment because I couldn’t find where I was going.  But what if it’s a Scriptural question and the person is missing heaven because of a misunderstanding?

Here’s an easier question for you because there’s no right or wrong answer, just your opinion.  Is it important to include the chapter and verse when you quote Scripture?  Growing up never memorizing Scripture, I never thought so.  But as I became more bold in my Christian evangelizing and just praising the Lord out loud, I was asked more often where in the Bible something is said.  I realized that for a few reasons, I need to know at least the book I’m quoting if not the chapter and verse.  First, it gives the speaker credibility.  If I were to say the Bible says you must be born again to go to heaven, somebody else could say the same is true for other religions, but you have to believe in their god.

If, however, I quote John 3:5-7, “Jesus answered, “I tell you the truth, no one can enter the kingdom of God unless he is born of water and the Spirit. Flesh gives birth to flesh, but the Spirit gives birth to spirit. You should not be surprised at My saying, You must be born again.””  Not only do I have some credibility, but the person now needs to have their discussion with the Lord, not with me.  I’m showing them in black and white where the Bible says this is true.  So the challenge is off of you and onto the Lord, where it belongs.  Not one of us can see a person saved, that’s the job of the Holy Spirit.

Miscommunications happen all the time.  I’m sure daily.  The goal is to ensure any miscommunications are minor in comparison to sharing the truth of the gospel.  So, how do we do this?  Practice.

One question I often ask in several of my seminars is, “Who is the single greatest golfer in the world?”  Whether or not you like him, people have to admit that Tiger is, or at least has been, the best in the world.  The world.  It’s hard to be the best at anything even in a small group and rarely can somebody claim to be the best in the world.

Now, what do you think Tiger does on a regular basis, and certainly before he begins a tournament?  He practices.  That’s right.  He doesn’t take a month off then head onto the greens.  He goes to practice like it’s a job. It is his job!

Well, if we take the great commission (Matthew 28:19) seriously, our job is to go and make disciples of all nations.  If we want to even be good at this, maybe not the best in the world but good at sharing our faith, shouldn’t we practice?  If we share our faith with others who already believe, then iron will sharpen iron.  If we start sharing out faith with unbelievers they may ask questions we are not prepared to answer, and then miscommunications may occur.  So as iron sharpens iron, let’s practice with other Christians and ask them to challenge us.  As we practice we will have time to visit the Bible to see where our beliefs originated.  It’s great if you can tell someone that the only way to the Father is through the Son!  But if you can then let them know they can learn this for themselves in John 14:6, you’ve taught them to fish.

Let me explain that.  There’s a saying, “Give a man a fish, feed him for a day. Teach a man to fish, feed him for a lifetime.” Well, if you can point people in the right direction in the Bible, then they can learn in their own time and their own way.  So you might want to communicate Biblical truths clearly by quoting them.  This should also greatly reduce any miscommunications as you quote word for word.  You can keep your Bible handy so you don’t misquote the Word.

The point is, no communication is going to be perfect when man is involved.  We can do our best to improve our communication, especially when communicating the most important truth any person will ever know—that Jesus died on the cross for them and the only way to get to heaven is to accept the gift of His sacrifice.  At the same time, just because communication can be difficult is not a reason to not try.  Keep talking, keep communicating, keep sharing.  The Lord remains in control.

Product Life Cycle – a Refresher

September 27, 2016

Every company and every product or service a company produces has a product life cycle, PLC.  There are four stages of every life cycle and the goal is to keep your product alive and flourishing as long as possible, just like with your own life cycle.

In a person’s life cycle they are first born, thus Introduction on the PLC.  Then there is growth, also called Growth on the PLC.  Maturity should come after about twenty years in a person’s life, but the Maturity phase is hoped to begin sooner on the PLC.  And finally, there is death in a person’s life, but we can opt to call it Decline for the PLC.  Let’s discuss each thoroughly.

Introduction

The Introductory phase of a product comes after what should be a well thought-out launch.  If launch is well done, the introduction of the product is easier.  This is the point where the product is new and advertisements are mostly informational—what the product is, how it differs from competition, where it can be found, and possibly some suggestion of price.  The goal is to make the target market aware of its existence at this point.

For some products, especially for a company that has multiple similar products out, such as Proctor and Gamble, this is easily done. They take a large amount of advertising monies and produce commercials and run the ads when they know their target market is listening.

For a brand new product, especially one by a new company, this may take some trial and error even after good research to learn the best way of promoting the product.  The point is that in the Introductory phase, basic information needs to be provided.  That should be the goal of every marketing and PR piece.

Growth

During the Growth phase, competition enters the market.  The product was so successful during Introduction that others have copied the product and are now selling a similar product under their own name.  It may be very similar, it may be better, it may be worse.  The point now, instead of having regular competition for dollars, you now have direct competition.  If the competition has deeper pockets than you and can outspend you on advertising and discounted pricing, you may be in trouble.  The good news is that the first product to the shelf normally has a natural niche that takes years to beat.

For instance, Miller beer created its own niche when they created Miller Lite and began a series of ads touting, “Taste great, Less filling.”  Since they created the product, while there was competition in the beer market, there was not yet any one-on-one competition, until Anheuser Busch realized they were missing a large piece of the pie.

So Anheuser created Bud Lite and set out, with a 20 year plan, to take over the Lite beer market (they were successful and as I write Bud Lite is the number one Lite beer in the US).  Bud Lite entered the market as Miller Lite was entering their Growth stage.  So now there were multiple products side by side on the shelf.

During this phase, advertisements need to change from informational—Hey, we exist and can be found at these place—to motivational.  The ads needs to differentiate and sell what makes them the best of the choices.  Some choose to do this head-to-head, some choose to take an indirect approach.

For instance, whenever you see Coke and Pepsi in the same commercial, it will be a Pepsi commercial.  They have chosen to go head-to-head with the number one soda seller in the consumer market.  Coke doesn’t recognize Pepsi’s existence in their advertising.  They just keep telling you that Coke Is It! after telling the nation that Coke is the Real Thing.  Different approaches to advertising.

Maturity

Coke and Pepsi, in truth, are now in the Maturity phase of the PLC.  This is where sales start to level off as market saturation has been attained.  Advertising changes from how and why we’re better than competitors to encouraging brand loyalty.  This is why Coke started Reward Points—to show appreciation to loyal fans.

This is also where new products are introduced in what is called Product Line Extension.  Once Coke got to the point of saturation, they created a diet line, using the same factories and machinery.  While the diet drink was in the Introductory phase on the PLC, the company was in the Growth phase, and it can be argued that the original products were between growth and maturity.

In the last fifty years we’ve seen both Anheuser Busch and Coca-Cola add a large collection of new products to their lines.  As the company matures they need to bring in new products to keep the company growing.

In maturity we are also finding new ways to advertise and new clients.  Coke got into the water market with Dasani because they realized that with the health awareness in the country, fewer people were drinking sodas, or drinking less soda, so they needed to find a product that would appeal to new clients who don’t drink soda.

Decline

Alas, we’ve seen it many times before, some products just die a natural death.  Often, technology is the cause of the death toll.  Do you remember what a slide rule is?  It’s not the oldest calculator, that would be the abacus, but it was a handy-dandy portable way of multiplying larger numbers.  It wasn’t replaced by a better slide rule, but by the calculator.  Now computers replace existing computers as technology improves.

Horses didn’t get put out to pasture because bigger, faster horses were introduced to pull wagons and carriages.  They were replaced with the horseless buggy, cars.

Sometimes there may be a single company that survives when an industry is in decline.  While there were once multiple buggy whip producers in the US, today there is a single company left that produces buggy whips.   The products are considered cash cows because no more money is invested in research and development and very little is put into advertising.

So what should be done when a company realizes their product is in decline?  Depending on why they’re losing market share, they may choose to sell out to another company.  If I was selling my product but another larger, bigger came by and took over the industry, I would sell out to my competition and enjoy my retirements

Another option is to harvest what’s left of the market.  With this plan a company will slowly discount their prices and the reduce the number of locations where it can be purchased, to get the maximum amount of revenue and profit left in the market.  We’ve all had products we love leave the market, and when we see them discounted, we buy them in bulk, realizing they’ll soon be no longer available.  We can read the writing on the wall.

The last option to be discussed here is to just pull the plug.  A company may choose to stop producing and shipping products, sell the machinery and viable pieces of the company, and just cease to exist.

Now, this is just a review of the four phases of a traditional PLC. There are multiple Product Life Cycles to be discussed, but not in a refresher. This was just for fun.

Understanding Your Competition

September 20, 2016

While you know your product and service stands apart from others, it’s important to know your competition.  Please, don’t pretend that you don’t have competition.  If you don’t think you have competition, you don’t understand.

Who has competition?            EVERYONE.  Even if you don’t have direct competition—maybe you are the only bank in your town—you have indirect competition.  Anything that keeps people from buying your product or service is your competition.  Not only is Pepsi against Coke, but against water;  Pepsi and coke are also in competition against snack foods if in a vending machine and the person buying has limited change.   If NIKE sells quality, then competition is any quality product, not just sports equipment.  In terms of entertainment dollars, for any couple opera might be a competitor of football, if the couple can afford tickets to only one event.

Before you can move any further with understanding your competition, you first have to understand what you sell.  Like the example of Nike above selling quality, what is the product you sell—efficiency, convenience, or just the product itself?

My favorite example of a company that completely understands this concept is minor league baseball.  If you ask some of the minor league managers what they sell, they’ll tell you entertainment.  They don’t sell sports or baseball.  Further, if you ask them their number one competitor, the answer is not another sports team, but television.  They know the biggest challenge they face is getting their customers off their couches and out of their houses to drive to the ball field and spend money to watch a game live.  They take this very seriously, and don’t just provide a sports game in a nice venue, but entertainment for the entire family—races for children between innings, dancers, announcers with games and prizes.  The entire event is designed to keep you entertained the entire time, so that you’ll enjoy yourself enough to tell others and return again.

So, what do you sell?  Once you really understand this, you can find your competition, but don’t limit competition to similar items.

How do you learn who your competition is?  Some formal approaches would be to check out the Internet, the library for public information, and journals and newspapers.  Some informal approaches would be to drive around and see where people are spending their time and money. Ask the people who do buy from you where they were buying before, and what made them change.  Don’t immediately hire someone to perform research for you, because some of that information can be gleaned with observation and common sense.

If the gas station with the lowest price is always jammed, and the high priced but nicer/cleaner gas station is empty, you can discern that people are buying price without investing in a survey.  If the opposite is true, then it may take some work to learn if people like the expensive station because of its cleanliness, location, or choice of items inside (where gas stations make half their money).   Yes, these could all have an effect on the less expensive station as well, so common sense is still needed.

Once you know for sure what it is you’re selling, and why people are buying from you versus their other choices, then you can begin to really understand who your competition is.  From there you can keep an eye on your real competition so you can take an offensive or defensive position when necessary.  You’ll be better off with this information than just believing what you think is right.

Lindy is a Speaker, Consultant, and Business Author, currently living in Atlanta, GA, and available to answer your questions anywhere in the world.  She is The Business Coach to companies with 50 – 100 employees, Entrepreneurs, and Start-ups.  Focusing on Communication, Leadership, and Corporate Culture, you will be more successful with Lindy as your in-house Consultant.

 

Thought Leadership and Sphere of Influence

September 13, 2016

Thought Leadership has been a buzz word for the past few years.  Like other Speakers and Coaches, I have shared Seminars and Sessions on the topic.  But while it is important to exercise thought leadership, you first need to know who you are influencing, why, and what you are saying.

In your home, your center of influence goes out to very specific people, and you know their age, genders, personalities, and more.  You can learn not only what to say, but how to say it (and possible rewards and penalties) to make your messages stick.  You have great opportunities to model behavior that you know will be seen.

At work, your center of influence is much larger – your employees, colleagues, clients, vendors . . . .  You also influence people you see without looking at them:  other drivers, store clerks – you get the idea.

How are you sharing your thoughts?  Too often, subconsciously, unconsciously, and non-verbally.  Non-verbal communication is huge.  Your face-at-rest, posture, and more speak VOLUMES.  Know what message you are sending without speaking a word.

Next, why are you trying to influence others through Thought Leadership?  Are you looking for different behavior?  Are you trying to cement ideas that you find valuable?  Thought leadership is a good way to communicate your messages, but then SO IS TALKING!

Most importantly, know your message.  What you are saying?  Is there a good, better, and best way to communicate?  Thought Leadership is all well and good, but like the six most important pieces of business that have to work together (message me for more), thought leadership has to work with everything else.

Know what your message is, know why you’re sending this information, know to whom you are communicating and their style when possible.  Verbalize your messages, consistently support your messages by your own behavior, and use your Thought Leadership to help others around you.

For instance, if you value timeliness in your employees, make it a written company policy that punctual attendance is mandatory.  Next, verbalize the importance of starting on time.  Daily, show up early.  This is when your actions truly speak louder than words.  Make all your behavior support your message – when others show early, compliment and reward them.  When someone is consistently late, deal with it.  Non-action is non-verbal communication too.

Thought Leadership has a huge Sphere of Influence, so it’s important to know with whom you’re sharing your thoughts, intentionally or not, as well as what thoughts you are actually sending, not just what you believe yourself to be sharing.

 

Lindy is a Speaker, In-house Consultant, and Business Author, currently living in Atlanta, GA.  She is The Business Coach to companies and departments with 50 – 100 employees, focusing on Communication, Leadership, and Corporate Culture. You will be more successful with Lindy as your Consultant.

Build Your Team

September 6, 2016

We all like to believe we are good managers – supportive, encouraging, understanding.  Below are seven simple steps to implement immediately to ensure you really are a good boss.

1. Watch the way you speak.  Talk about your team, using the word.  As VP of Marketing, I called us the Marketing Team, not the Marketing Department.  Use the words like colleagues and make it clear your employees work with you, not for you.  Always show your respect when talking to and about your team.
2. Be genuinely interested in your team.  Who is married?  Who has children?  Invest your time and attention in other people.  You’ll be a better person and they’ll like you more.  It’s hard to not like someone who likes you.
3. Find compliments and use them.  Don’t be insincere, but it can be as simple or complex as you like.  Try to offer the compliments in front of others, especially if  team members aren’t getting along.  Take the two who aren’t seeing eye to eye, and pull one up and ask him to agree with you that the other did a great job closing the last account.
4. Get everyone involved in the good.  Don’t congratulate with just a note, get everyone to cheer when you are complimenting one of your team members.
5. Don’t leave anyone out. Ever.
6. Always play nicely—never an unkind word.  Do unto others as you would have them do unto you . You don’t want to be gossiped about, therefore don’t gossip ever.  Even one misspoken word can bite you for a long time.  Every action has consequences.
7. No questionable behavior.  As the lead, you’re held to a different standard.  Make sure your house is clean inside and out.  No naughty words or inappropriate jokes, especially around clients.

Yes, there is more to say, but this is a short list to ensure you are in the right direction.  If you can check every one of these, call me for next steps.

Lindy Earl is a Business Consultant, Speaker, Trainer, and Author.  Working from Atlanta, GA, she is available as an in-house consultant to ensure your company is working at maximum capacity.  Contact Lindy today to learn how to be more successful immediately.