Monday 27th April 2020
We deal with it every day. As a team, we like to think we’re ok at it – we spend our days helping others understand it and improve their skills in it.
But the rules have changed over the last few weeks. Things are different.
I’ve been reflecting these last few weeks on non-verbal skills and the impact of our enforced engagement in virtual conversation has highlighted just how much I relied on them!
Team meetings on Zoom.
My team have been superb at adjusting – I know there are those of us who, previous to Lockdown Life hadn’t even dipped our proverbial toe into the waters of the ocean that is virtual conversing. Now I was asking them to scuba-dive in it!
Were we old school? Probably. Some may even say archaic (thank you to my pre-teen nieces for dating me so eloquently).
Shy? Introverted? Overly self conscious about seeing our physical selves displayed before us? Maybe.
My team are able to empathise at an extremely high level; being instinctively good at ‘just knowing’ what someone needs and what can be done. It’s the non-verbal communication that helps us process feelings, intentions and expectations.
The team have gone beyond their duty to not just adapt to this new form of communication, but to engage completely. For others.
So my first observation, then is about how difficult it is to use our previous forms of non-verbal communication to engage.
When I speak with my team in ‘real-life’, they can see the subtleties; minute changes in my face or body language that lets them know the intention behind my conversation.
Not in virtual life so much.
I have come to realise I use sarcasm. Ok, to be fair I was fully aware of this prior to regular use of virtual conferencing platforms; but I have become acutely aware of how vital my non-verbal communication was in acting as an interpreter to my audience; providing the truth behind the ‘lie’ of the spoken word. I have noticed that my non-verbal communication may be more likely to be misinterpreted in this virtual world – which could be a big problem.
It levels the playing field somewhat. We are now experiencing in a virtual world what many have been experiencing previously – the fear of being misunderstood due to misconception or another’s perception of the message that is being conveyed.
Working with logical. literal thinkers, I have spent many a conversation explaining and teaching about sarcasm. I’m constantly stressing the importance of use of sarcasm alongside the literal interpretation, to increase acceptance and understanding – however online conversation has meant I have to take that up a notch. I now have to use these strategies as a matter of course.
Now, even those that may think they’re good in ‘real life’ at picking up the subtleties of social discourse, are having to upskill – active and effective listening and observation skills are being honed daily. If we want to continue to be understood by others and our messages perceived as we had intended, we have to increase the explanation and not rely on the non-verbal as much as we did before.
Not only that, but I can’t tell who is talking to who at our Zoom meetings?! My non-verbal communication techniques skills have become ineffective.
My superpower stripped.
Those subtle head movements and use of eye contact indicating whose ears are intended as the target of the impending verbal message, no longer work. It’s like someone has unplugged our non-verbal element and I have to cue in to my other, lesser used components in order to function effectively. We have to now excessively use verbal communication to indicate the name of the person we want to attend to our message if it that message has been personalised for a specific listener.
That sounds familiar – use of name before information is another common strategy used to engage those neurodivergents who need clear information that the speaker is talking to them and that they are required to attend to it.
Levelling the playing field.
Non-verbal communication in training.
It doesn’t look like it used to.
I joined a webinar this week – a great speaker, discussing how to ensure your teams are engaged, the importance of understanding the needs of individuals and knowing the ‘why’ of our business.
Great talk; starting with a ‘Tiktok’ – style song and an instruction for three nominated individuals to follow his lead in doing the ‘worm’ (a breakdance style dance move for those who are a little less archaic than I) across their respective home office floors.
This talk would have been so much more effective if the host had remembered to turn on the video function of the 3o+ attendees. The result being we could all see our speaker, but his view consisted of a screen of muted names, photos and company logos. This guy, who quite clearly was a great public speaker, had found himself in front of a public with no ability to provide him with any form of feedback of his efforts.
Essentially he was talking to a brick wall.
No non-verbal information providing him with essential feedback on how his training hooks and messages were being perceived.
No way of knowing if his audience was sitting enthralled by that carefully chosen anecdote he had anticipated would be engaging or whether they had started to check their email, in which case he should swiftly move on to the next point.
No way of knowing (other than the occasional ‘ping’ as attendees left platform) if people were liking what he was saying.
He could only guess at whether any premature departure was due to the desperate need of assistance of a 5 yr old dependent or, in fact they found his talk boring and unnecessary.
His attendees did not even have to conform to the unwritten social rules of exiting training rooms; when we leave a virtual platform we can leave without apology apparently.
We don’t have the compulsion (and in this case we hadn’t even the means) to do the wide mouthed, thumbs up, insistent head shaking ‘it’s me – not you’ message of – ‘sorry – I’m going to have to rush – but loving the talk, thanks so much’ as we sidle apologetically out of the door.
No, all this guy got was the shared ‘ping’ that felt a little like the harshly oversimplified and under communicated ‘no likey, no lighty’ of the worryingly popular TV series or the dramatic buzzer of another where your self esteem and confidence are precariously placed on a platform and exposed to audience behaviour akin to that which determined the fate of the brave, Roman gladiator.
So, in conclusion, I may have to admit finally that I am an addict of non-verbal communication; my over-reliance on its use and its effects have been exposed to me, and no doubt those around me over the last few weeks.
Only time will tell if this is true I guess and no doubt I will keep you all informed (I have no access to your non-verbal communication as you scroll through my musings, so I shall continue in a blissful state of ignorance, my self esteem intact.)
Keep well and communicate (in whatever form you choose), to feel better.
