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“Creating Successful Leaders”

Tag Archives: Improving Relationships

May 16, 2012 Margaret’s Guide to De-Stressing Communication

By Margaret Smith, UXL:
SPEAKER | CAREER COACH | CERTIFIED INSIGHTS DISCOVERY PRACTITIONER

When I give a presentation on Communication, I always devote a slice of time to the topic of Stress as it relates to communication. If you take a moment to consider the situations that can cause stress in your life, you may realize that some of them involve your interaction with others. If you commit to developing a strategy or plan for overcoming the situations that cause stress, you can change your life for the better.

Now, this may not be what you want to hear, but managing stress doesn’t actually have anything to do with straightening out the behavior of others. Instead, it’s all about management of your own emotional state. We can base our stress-reduction action plan on two unwavering facts:

Fact #1: You only have control over yourself—your actions and your emotions.

Fact #2: People will continue to be, well, PEOPLE. Their actions are completely beyond your control, and often reflect a perspective, rationale, and behavioral preference different from your own.

With the reality that you can only control yourself in mind, consider the following pointers for improving your daily communication:

>> Recognize the situations that stimulate your energy. When are you most comfortable? When do you perform at your best? Seek out these situations and find ways to alter or eliminate the situations that bring you down.

>> Be consistent in what you do to control stress. Once you’ve identified a cause of stress and created an action plan, be persistent in your new habit. If you decided to reorient your role during the weekly meeting, build a short reminder of your new habit into that morning’s routine.

>> Be authentic in your emotional expression. Nothing can wreak havoc on your emotional state worse than a misleading façade. Until you’re honest with yourself and others about what’s tough for you, you won’t escape the stress and dread of the situation.

>> Combat the “If only she/he would…” reaction. Remember facts 1 and 2? Instead of blaming others for your stress or feelings of frustration, realize that the best way to avoid feeling this way in the future is to ask yourself, what can I do to avoid feeling this way in the future? Whether it’s altering your own expectations, resolving not to feel so deeply about an issue, or finding a way to circumvent the scenario that created the communication issue in the first place.

>> Oftentimes stress in communications simply comes down to a differing of communication styles. Instead of jumping to conclusions of ill will or incompatibility, make the effort to observe how others listen and speak, and match your own style of communication with the person to keep them engaged, interested, and trusting.

Dedicate yourself to developing a plan. Learn from each new experience and looks for areas for improvement. If you’re interested in learning more tools for de-stressing your life and improving communication, feel free to send an email or phone call in my direction!

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April 26, 2012 How to Modify Your Behavior Effectively

By Margaret Smith, UXL:
SPEAKER | CAREER COACH | CERTIFIED INSIGHTS DISCOVERY PRACTITIONER

The other day I read something about behavior modification that surprised me with its resonance:

Most of us tend to overestimate how much short-term change we’re capable of, but underestimate our long-term potential.

How true is that? Most of us have been guilty of making a huge resolution that we expected to complete in an unrealistically short period of time. And what happens when we don’t see results in the first few weeks? We get discouraged, of course! Conversely, if we look back on all that we’ve changed or done in a year, and we’re blown away at our courage, perseverance, and hard work.

Because I’m a life and career coach, a lot of what I do tackles the challenge of modifying behavior to change a life or professional career for the better. Since I’ve become a certified Insights Discovery Practitioner, guiding behavioral modification has moved even further to the forefront of all that I do. When you’ve experienced the Insights Model, and received your profile, you learn that you have energy preferences and strengths, and these natural callings or habits result in your preferred way of interacting with others.

The other important thing that you learn through Insights Discovery (or coaching) is that you have the ability to identify the communication style and work preferences of everyone around you. And this is an important half of the puzzle—without this, your self-knowledge would be useless—like a jar of jam with no bread, a bike without tires! You improve your self-awareness so that you can modify your behavior to improve your interactions with others and reach your full potential.

Instead of continuing on the same worn path, consider some of the pointers I’ve outlined for using your self-awareness and knowledge of communication styles to improve your career and your life.

Margaret’s Tips for Modifying Your Behavior to Elevate Interactions

> Identify an area for improvement and all of your behavioral habits involved. Take note of the other individuals involved in this interaction and their observed behavioral habits and preferences.

> Clarify what achieving “success” will mean for you in this scenario. What needs to improve, how much, and what will be the measurement of this? Acknowledge that success may not be immediate.

> Recognize that there are always beliefs lurking behind our impressions and interactions. Have the courage to challenge these beliefs by trying a new approach and/or a new interpretation.

> Practice changing your behavior until it happens without having to think about it. Otherwise, you’re likely to lose your better habits and improved interactions.

> When baffled, consult with someone you trust openly, and without argument or response. Sometimes the observations of someone else is not easy to accept, but an outside perspective will help you to graduate beyond the beliefs that are obstructing your path to positive change.

Interested in learning more about how knowledge of yourself and others can be elevated through Insights Discovery, or how Margaret Smith can help you to realize positive change for individuals, teams, organizations, or classrooms? Contact UXL Today.

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March 28, 2012 How to Use Intrinsic Validation to Improve Interactions

By Margaret Smith, UXL:
SPEAKER | CAREER COACH | CERTIFIED INSIGHTS DISCOVERY PRACTITIONER

“Be an opener of doors…”

-Ralph Waldo Emerson

Have you ever met a speaker, Psychologist, and Leadership Coach by the name of Louise Griffith? I had the pleasure of hearing her speak as a keynote at the womEn’s conference this month. Some of her messages about communication really stuck with me because of their clear, simple, and truthful nature. Because I’m still thinking about these messages nearly a month later I’ve decided to pass them on to my readers.

When interacting with others, whether on a very personal or professional level, there are certain ways that we can make them feel respected and accepted. You may not always realize it, but the way you respond to others when they express themselves can very easily make them feel unimportant or shut them down—and you may not even know what it was that you did wrong.

One of Louise’s larger ideas concerned something she called “Intrinsic Validation”. Behind this term is the belief that “the most powerful validation you can give another is to care enough to step into their world and listen without giving advice, feedback, or criticism.”

I don’t know about you, but I find that it is often far too easy to fall out of practicing this skill. Luckily, Louise shared some easy to use and remember tools (in the form of phrases and questions) that help you to continue the practice of intrinsic validation.

Louise outlines four components to improving interactions with and validation of others:

Look for the Good:
Stop yourself when you begin to judge and focus on the good in others instead.

See it, then Say It:
When you see another person’s positive effort or good, make sure to share your appreciation or admiration with them.

Listen for the Doors:
The “doors” are the verbal cues as to what someone is thinking. This is where you create a bridge instead of a wall)

Step into Their World:
We’ve all heard the phrase “step into their shoes” because it works.

Most important were the phrases that we can use as tools to immediately improve interactions:

           Tell me more about that.

           Help me understand what you are experiencing.

           Are you OK?

           What I like about your idea is ________ .

I challenge you to pick one of the phrases above and use it in the coming days. I’m confident that you’ll be astonished at how quickly your interactions with others will deepen and improve.

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