Have you ever spent time explaining something to someone? You know, you talk them through it in detail, explain what you’d like to happen, ask them if they understand. Then they go away and do something. Unfortunately that something has very little resemblance to the something you expected! Happens quite often doesn’t it.
The thing is how often do you then feel annoyed? The time and effort you put into explaining it, you even asked them if they understood, what’s wrong with them?!
Truth is, there’s nothing wrong with them. You’ve probably just explained it in a different language. If you want to get more people to understand, then you need to become multi lingual. Don’t panic, this doesn’t mean going back to school or spending a fortune on translation dictionaries, this is about knowing what people need to hear and how they need to hear it if you want them to perform.
If you want to improve your ability to explain, if you want people to be able to put your instructions into action then try these:
- Do they have the skills to do what you’re asking of them? Have they done it before or something similar? Ask them!
- Do they feel confident that they can do this thing? How motivated are they to do it? Ask them!
- Do they like to know details, facts, information? Ask them!
- Do they like structure, order, a plan? Ask them!
- Do they like solutions, big pictures, freedom to try? Ask them!
- Do they like benefits, purpose, reasons? Ask them!
- If in any doubt, ask them!
- If they don’t know how to do it, then tell then how to do it. People don’t know what they don’t know.
- If they have some experience but it didn’t go well, then remind them they’re just learning and it’s ok to ask questions, tell them how to do it and congratulate them when they do.
- If they’ve done it before but their performances fluctuate, remind them how good they are and how it makes you feel when they succeed.
Remember that when you are explaining anything to anyone, 50% of your conversation should be establishing how they learn and what they need to perform. When you have this, then you can explain what you want.
Give it a go, you’ll get better results!
