The Art of Communication

The Art of Communication

Christine Blondel

 

Your family relationships are important to you. So are your business relations. But combining family, ownership and business interests can prove explosive. Some families,  fearing blow-ups, fall into the trap of banning the expression of any divergent opinion. Even asking questions can be seen as a sign of mistrust and a potential for conflict.

What these families don't realise is that conflicts arise, and are worsened by, a lack of proper communication.  Having a voice is a need that most of us have. Furthermore, engaging family members in some key decisions not only improves the quality of decision, but also enhances the satisfaction and motivation of all concerned – even when the decision taken is not necessarily favourable to them. This is the essence of Fair Process. Learning to better communicate is a key ingredient for family business success.

 

Communication: listen first

Communication is the sending and receiving of messages. However, often we focus more on the sending part: “we need to communicate more” is misconstrued as meaning  “we need to give more information”. But to foster effective inter-personal communication, attentive listening is paramount. As Epictetus  wisely said: “We have two ears and one mouth so that we may listen twice as much as we speak”. More recently, Steven R. Covey, in his Seven Habits of Highly Effective People teaches “seek first to understand, then to be understood”. He warns against evaluating, probing, counselling or interpreting the other's point of view. Indeed, when we do this, we're not trying to really understand the other person’s position, even less their feelings. Hence, we're likely to leave issues unresolved because we've missed the point.

 

Communication: speak respectfully

Listening is greatly facilitated when the message is transmitted in a proper manner. But how can we express our opinion, perhaps a dissenting one, without being disrespectful? One of the tools is non-violent communication. This method, developed by Dr. Marshall Rosenberg in the 1960s, is based on mutual respect. It teaches how to avoid judgements and generalisations, while still identifying and expressing our own feelings and needs.  Requests, when put in such a context, are  better understood and accepted by others – even when there is no obligation to fulfil them.

 

Communication improves negotiation

Great negotiators understand that the purpose of good negotiation is not to divide up the pie to their advantage, but rather to increase the size of the pie so that both parties can benefit. This is best achieved by understanding each party's needs. A well known example, taught in business schools, is negotiation over a stock of goods. The size of the stock will simply not allow the different parties needs to be met, unless… they communicate well enough to discover that in fact they each need different component parts of the goods!

 

Facilitating communication in groups

Individual communication skills are the building blocks for productive communication. Certain tools foster group communication and are useful in management and board meetings, as well as at family meetings:

  • a code of conduct, ideally prepared by the group itself, and listing the behaviour necessary  for a productive meeting (listening, respect, sincerity, being non judgemental,  are often listed and one shouldn't hesitate to add confidentiality and no phones or emails);
  • the gathering of all participants’ opinions,  by going round the table or by collecting and posting their written comments;
  • the holding of a single conversation at a time.

An outside facilitator can provide useful skills to facilitate difficult conversations. An Agenda sent ahead of time, as well as Minutes circulated afterwards are an integral part of quality group communication.

Hopefully, such tools will enable you to hold fruitful discussions!

 

Christine.blondel@insead.edu

https://www.insead.edu/centres/family-enterprise

www.familygovernance.net

This article was initially written for, and published on KPMG blog (2014)