Change, innovation, managing risk, developing strategy and continuous improvement are just some of the situations where you need to be able to articulate, present and debate ideas. In many ways, your ability to contribute and add value is determined by your level of skill in communicating, persuading, and influencing others. Being able to articulate, present and debate ideas mean you have a voice.
These skills enable you to be heard and to be an active participant in making decisions. Without these skills, you may find yourself in a situation where others are making decisions that impact you and you have no influence on what happens.
Some key factors that can impact how well you articulate, present and debate ideas include learning and communication styles, timing, the location or environment, cultural awareness, and building rapport and trust.
By the end of this topic, you will understand:
- How to determine the purpose for the communication and the specific audience for communication according to task requirements
- How to consider and evaluate the advantages and disadvantages of various methods of communication
- How to research organisational or legislative frameworks applicable to the communication.
A framework for communication outlines the purpose, context, scope, stakeholders, communication methods and frequency. A framework helps to improve communication so that is easier to understand, is relevant to the purpose, gives all stakeholders an opportunity to be heard and makes the process as time efficient as possible.
The World Health Organisation's (WHO) objectives for their Framework are:
- awareness and understanding
- active relationship
- organisational capability.
WHO describes its framework for communication as having these characteristics:
- Is a written document
- Has its own objectives
- Identifies commitments for delivering communication across all stakeholders
- Guides the organisation’s interactions with specific stakeholders
- Embeds best practice approaches as business as usual
- Develops internal capabilities to deliver communication commitments
Both the WHO and South Australia EPA Frameworks provide umbrella-level guidance and requirements for all communication activities across their organisation. They are applied to all communication strategies and individual communication activities, or campaigns as follows.
World Health Organisation (WHO):
- Describes the role played by communications in supporting the delivery of the organisation’s strategic objectives.
South Australia EPA:
- Establishes how we will articulate who we are and what we do
- Aligns our communications activities with best practice standards
- Supports a positive corporate culture and capability across the organisation.
The Business School at the University of Navarra in Pamplona, Spain, applies the concepts of a Framework for Communication to individual communication and marketing activities, through these principles, which it calls the 6Ms. Each principle is expressed as a question:
- Mission
- What are the principal objectives to be achieved by the activity? What is the campaign’s mission?
- Market
- Who is our desired target market, or the different segments within that market, that the message should be addressed to?
- Message
- What do we need to say to this target audience, including what are the benefits to them related to this product, service or information?
- Media
- Which media channel(s) are likely to be the most successful to deliver the message to the target audience?
- Money
- What are the costs for the different media options being considered? How could those costs be reduced, if circumstances changed during the run of the activity and budgets have to be cut? This is planning for risk mitigation around cost.
- Measure
- What is the likely return on investment for each of the different media options being considered?
Resource
South Australia EPA Communications and Engagement Framework 2013– 2015:
In any communication, the purpose is not what you want to do. It is what you want your audience to understand and agree to do as a result of the presentation or communication.
Purpose: (the outcome of the communication)
- What you want your audience to agree to or understand.
Audience:
- The person or people you want to communicate with. In order to achieve your outcome, it is critical to know and understand your audience. You will want to know aspects about them such as who they are (name and role), their background, their personality style, what is important to them and what impact the topic or decision will have on them.
Methods to find out about your audience
Depending on how many people are involved, it is a great idea to talk to the stakeholders. Have a coffee with them or give them a call.
These can be useful ways to gather data of a large group.
Primary, secondary and hidden audiences can be identified. These are people you may not have intended to communicate with who may receive your message from someone else who thinks it might interest them.
You cannot communicate effectively—that is, achieve your purpose—without a strategy or plan for how and what to do. You cannot develop the strategy if you don’t know your audience and purpose. Knowing your audience means finding out their characteristics, wants, needs, values and preferences.
You will also need to find out how large your audience is likely to be. This can affect the choice of media options. In addition, consider other aspects of your audience such as:
- How homogenous or similar your audience may be in their thinking or values? In other words, they may all be similar in their thinking and what is important to them, or there could be very different views within the audience.
- How different is the audience’s view from mine? You will need to think about how you will address any such differences.
- How much do they know about your topic and the context for it? You may think everyone understands the context, but people may not remember it at that moment.
- Are they specialists or non-specialists in relation to your topic or item? Non-specialists need more basic information, especially in an introduction, and more interpretation and conclusions. Specialists want more detail. A well-crafted communication item about something scientific or technical should make sense, in broad terms, to anyone who has some understanding of the topic. Digital communication encourages the ‘layering’ of information, from overview level down to deep detail, for your audience to explore.
Watch
The following are two of the most-watched and inspiring TED Talks of the last 20 years.
Watch these videos from Daniel Pink and Amy Cuddy to give you an idea of what a highly articulate and persuasive presentation can look like:
‘The Puzzle of Motivation’
Your Body Language may Shape who you are!’
Watch
The following YouTube video is another example of excellent communication, in the form of a speech by Toastmasters World Champion of Public Speaking, Aaron Beverly:
‘An Unbelievable Story’
The following graphic is a tool for analysing your audience:
- Audience - Who will recieve your message?
- Understand - Their knowledge about your message?
- Demographics - Their age, gender, education level, role?
- Interest - Their level of interest in your message? (What's in it for them?)
- Environment - What is their setting/reality? What are they immersed in? Cultural difference? Likely attitudes?
- Need - What do they need to know?
- Customise - How can you adjust the message as needed?
- Expectations - What are their expectations about the subject or being communicated with?
Read
To learn more about audience and purpose, read the following article from Scitable: Audience and Purpose | Learn Science at Scitable (nature.com)
When creating any communication, you need to consider the requirements of the organisation, including its audience, purpose and how the communication should be carried out.
Organisational requirements include:
- Policies (e.g., privacy, use of branding or logos, use of social media, etc.)
- Procedures (e.g., privacy, publishing requirements, copyright, etc.)
- Framework for Communication
- Communication or Marketing Strategy
- Mission Statement.
Selecting the most appropriate communication methods is a very important part of achieving your purpose and outcome. This starts with the work from the previous section where you determined the purpose and the audience. Now that you are clear on all of those aspects, you can refer to them as you evaluate the possible methods of communication.
How you go about communication will change significantly for different purposes and audiences. When your purpose is to get the Senior Management team to approve your project, your communication method will be different compared to gaining community support for better disability services in your local government area.
Some of the communication methods we use in organisations every day include phone, email, text, live chat, video conferencing (such as Zoom), audio conferencing, webinars, social media (Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, etc.), newsletters (print or digital), websites and intranets.
Read
Read the following articles by Jonathan Sharp of RealBusiness and Neil Kokemuller of azcentral to learn more about various communication channels and using digital communications in the workplace:
- Digital communication tools pros and cons - Real Business
- Advantage & Disadvantage of the Different Types of Communication Channels (azcentral.com)
Also, get input from others about the best communication methods; ideally, people who have different views or experiences from yourself. Think about the presentation you are planning and the audience analysis you carried out earlier. Decide if other communication tasks or items are needed to support the presentation. Decide which delivery method(s) may be effective for the presentation, and for the other supporting communication tasks, for your audience. Think about the likely effectiveness of the method(s), possible costs involved, possible timeframes, and the availability of any required technology and required skills in using it.
Make sure you check your organisation’s policies and procedures for communication with your specific audience. You will also need to check for specific legislative requirements, frameworks and guidelines. Check in with HR or your specific communications department about the organisation’s communication policies. Some specific areas to consider here are privacy, confidentiality and disclosure.
Your organisation will also have some policies and guidelines on ethics such as equity, fairness, impartiality and respect for the rights of others. Some of the legislative frameworks you will need to consider include anti-discrimination, local, state and territory work health and safety (WHS) legislation and the Privacy Act 1988. It is your responsibility to make sure you know how to access and research all the relevant policies that apply to your topic and audience. If you are not sure what those are or how to access them, ask for help from your manager
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