Do you know the seven ways to lose your audience?
The causes of lost connection pervade our personal conversations as well as our public presentations. They are bad habits that we fall into.
No 1 #TEA
Speaking ill of somebody who is not present: Gossiping, it’s never pretty nor is it a characteristic of good leadership.
While gossip itself is reprehensible, it becomes a speaker’s nemesis because of the response it evokes within us, the audience.
We ignore & avoid what gossipmongers say, knowing that 5 minutes from now they are just as apt to be spreading gossip about us!
Instant tune-out.
No 2 JUDGMENTAL
Who wants to stand in front of someone, only to be judged, belittled, or berated?
If we know that someone is going to go all Judge Judy on us, what do we do? Most of us try to avoid the experience, but if we just must stand there and take it, we really don’t listen.
It’s virtually impossible to listen. We get all wrapped up in our heads while our emotions come to the boiling point. The last thing we are going to do is actively listen with an open mind.
No 3 NAYSAYERS
We are all human and can fall into this. Particularly, if we are surrounded by family or teammates who are spew negativity.
It’s hard to listen.
We all have met this guy. He’s given a task within his skillset and his first words are “Yes BUT… ” He’s always ready to tell you why it’s a bad idea, or why it can’t be done.
It's hard to listen or have faith when somebody's consistently negative.
The only reason That Star Treks’ Mr. Scott got away with always telling Captain Kirk how impossible it was going to be was because Mr. Scott had a reputation for making the impossible possible.
This interruption takes another shape in the form of complaining.
In the US complaining is a national sport. It’s the basis of so many topics of conversation.
We complain about the weather, sports, about politics...
Television News is the same litany of complaints… over and over and over.
Complainers aren’t spreading sunshine and lightness in the world.
Eventually we tune this them out every time we encounter them.
No 4 FLAKING OUT
We've all seen this guy.
I call him the blame-thrower.
He blames anyone or anything other than himself. He takes no responsibility. The buck always rests with someone else.
We find it uniformly next to impossible to listen to somebody who is being like that.
Hopefully, we recognize that blame-throwers are incapable of being good partners or teammates.
No 5 O.T.T. – Over The Top
This is all about how we use our language.
We can all give examples of expressions and phrases which have become so overworked that they are now valueless.
Use an overworked expression and we fail to impress, but the damage resides in abusing our language to the point where we demean it.
Here is the ultimate example.
If we see something that really is awesome,
what do I call it?
This kind of embroidery and exaggeration has become the death knell for some words.
No 6 FABRICATION
And then, of course, O.T.T. can become lying,
We don't want to listen to people we know are lying to us.
No 7 DOGMATISM
Dogmatism is the confusion of facts with opinions. When those two things get conflated, you're listening into the wind.
You know, somebody is bombarding you with their opinions as if they were true.
It's difficult to listen to that.
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