The Mystery That Is Communication

Over the years I have found out that when the word “mystery” is mentioned to people the first thing that pops into their mind is the spiritual unsolved mysteries or the weird death of a person or even a stripped pink cat could be a mystery and no one knows if the paint just spilled on the cat. Mysteries to some people are unexplainable phenomena that just surpasses their understanding. However I have found out that one mystery that people don’t seem to notice is the Communication Mystery.

I’m not talking about communicating with the dead or trying to use Jedi mind tricks on people or things to get your message across. I’m not talking about seeing dead people or hearing things that go bump in the night. I’m speaking on the unknown mysteries that entrepreneurs fail to see or understand in communication.

There was a man who came up to me and said “ I’d like to start my own business”. Now that’s news I love to hear so I figured I would help this man and listen to what he had to say. Upon further discussion I found out that this man wanted to start his own strip club…yes a strip club. Now imagine this: what if I said to him…”No no no this will not do. It is wrong, immoral…” and I start to outline all the cons of having a strip club in Nigeria. He would have walked out on me and never come back. Now I could feel good about it but I lost a client who could have more potential.

Now the real story…I sat with this man and said to him “I do understand the reason you want this and the success you feel you might have; however judging from the market and the kind of Country we live in I feel there’s more you can do.” We sat down together and the ideas this man had were incredible. Our communication was successful, we understood each other, flowed on the same pattern and created a new vision for him.

Communication is effective when all the parties involved understand each other and the message is received and accepted. It becomes a mystery when there is no flow of communication. The mystery is some people feel that communication in business does not amount to much however the truth is it determines whether your business is going to be an astounding success or a colossal failure. Communication keeps businesses alive and feeds them with success mints every time its successful.

What are the keys to effective and successful communication, how do you know when its been successful and more importantly how do you remain in the truth of effective communication? Its simple! Listen to the client carefully and try not to interrupt when he/she speaks. Take notes where necessary so you are effective and can capture all your clients requests and the best part- follow-up follow up and…follow up. Its necessary its important and the benefits…OUTSTANDING RESULTS AND REFERRALS FOR YOUR COMPANY.

Zainab Akpan is the Head of Client Operations at Starfish Consulting. Starfish Consulting is a Business Consulting firm with the sole purpose of turning businesses around making them more effective and the staff more efficient. Contact us now on 070-2559-8448 or send an email to zainabakpan@gmail.com