WESTERN GOVERNORS UNIVERSITY
Developing Your Communication Skills
Communication Skills
Communication skills are essential in today's workplace. They enable individuals to express their thoughts, ideas, and concerns effectively to others. These skills involve more than just speaking—they encompass active listening, nonverbal cues, and written correspondence.
Effective communication is vital at every level in the workplace and in one’s personal life.
This page covers the different types of communication skills, how to acquire them, and how to apply them in your everyday life.
What Are Communication Skills?
Communication skills are the abilities that you utilize when speaking, listening, reading, and writing. Active listening techniques are a vital component of communication.
Listening, speaking, watching, and empathizing are all communication skills. It's also helpful to understand the variations between communicating in person, over the phone, and through digital channels like email and social media.
Why Are Communication Skills Important?
Effective communication skills are crucial in personal, academic, and professional contexts for numerous reasons. They help to accomplish the following:
- Fostering positive relationships. Good communication skills enable you to communicate clearly and respectfully.
- Enhancing productivity. Clear and concise communication ensures that tasks and goals are understood by everyone involved, leading to improved efficiency and productivity. Communication skills also help you to give and receive constructive feedback, which can help you to improve your performance and productivity.
- Preventing misunderstandings and conflicts. Miscommunication can lead to misunderstandings and conflicts, damaging relationships and hindering progress. However, strong communication skills help you avoid or resolve such issues.
- Promoting career advancement. Employers highly value excellent communication skills as they contribute to effective teamwork, leadership, and the ability to influence and persuade others.
- Facilitating personal growth. Communication skills aid in self-expression, assertiveness, and the ability to convey thoughts and emotions effectively.
What Are the Benefits of Having Communication Skills?
There are numerous benefits of having communication skills. Here are some important ones:
- Increased job opportunities. Employers are always looking for employees with strong communication skills. They value people who communicate well with customers, clients, colleagues, and managers.
- Improved relationships. By developing strong communication skills, you can foster better relationships with your family, friends, and colleagues. Effective communication allows you to truly understand their needs, feelings, and perspectives, leading to deeper connections, increased empathy, and more successful collaborations.
- Increased productivity. Improved communication skills lead to higher productivity. You can set clear goals, expectations, and feedback for yourself and others. You can also work more effectively with your team members and other stakeholders.
- Enhanced creativity. Strong communication skills can help you to be more creative and innovative. They can help you to brainstorm new ideas, explore different perspectives, and challenge assumptions.
- Improved self-confidence. Strong communication skills can help you to feel more confident and self-assured. They can also help you to express yourself authentically and assertively.
Examples of Communication Skills
Some examples of communication skills include:
- Verbal communication: Verbal communication is any time you use spoken words. It plays a crucial role in personal and professional interactions by enabling practical expression and understanding between individuals.
- Nonverbal communication: This encompasses how you convey messages without using words. It includes your body language, facial expressions, and gestures, which can communicate emotions, attitudes, and intentions more powerfully than words alone.
- Written communication: Written communication involves the exchange of ideas and information using written language, such as letters, reports, emails, texts, or instant messaging. It requires careful planning, organization, and editing to effectively convey a message and ensure clarity, coherence, and appropriate tone.
- Active listening: Actively listening involves giving your full attention to the speaker, maintaining eye contact, and seeking to understand their message. It requires empathy, patience, and the ability to suspend judgment, creating a safe and open environment for effective communication.
- Assertiveness: This is the ability to express thoughts, feelings, and needs clearly and confidently while respecting others. It involves effective communication, setting and maintaining boundaries, and advocating for oneself respectfully.
- Brainstorming: This collaborative communication skill encourages the generation of creative ideas and solutions within a group. It involves open-mindedness, active participation, and the suspension of judgment.
- Conflict resolution: This involves addressing and resolving disagreements positively and constructively.
- Feedback: Providing and receiving constructive feedback is crucial for personal and professional growth. Giving feedback involves offering specific and actionable suggestions for improvement.
- Presentation skills: Presentation skills refer to the ability to deliver information or ideas to an audience concisely and engagingly. It involves structuring the content, using visual aids effectively, and engaging the audience to ensure understanding.
- Public speaking: This communication skill involves delivering speeches or presentations to a large audience. It requires effective verbal communication, engaging body language, and connecting with the audience, to delivera message confidently and persuasively.
- Writing skills: Writing skills encompass the ability to express thoughts, ideas, and information clearly and concisely through written communication. Effective writing involves using proper grammar and punctuation, organizing information logically, and conveying a clear and coherent message to the readers.
How Can I Use Communication Skills?
In the workplace, communication skills are essential in various scenarios. Here are some examples of how communication skills can be used at work:
Writing Emails
Strong written communication skills are crucial for composing professional emails. These skills ensure that messages are understood and facilitates smooth interactions with colleagues, clients, and stakeholders.
Delivering Presentations
Presentation skills come into play when sharing information or ideas with colleagues, clients, or superiors. This helps convey information effectively and can influence decisions and outcomes.
Leading Collaborative Projects
Communication skills are vital for project leaders. These skills foster collaboration, promote teamwork, and ensure everyone is aligned toward project success.
How Can I Learn Communication Skills?
There are many ways you can learn and hone your communication skills, but one of the best ways can be through a degree program. WGU provides training for communication skills through most of our degree programs.
You’ll learn specific ways to focus on communication depending on which type of program you are pursuing, for example:
School of Technology
In IT degree programs you will learn to:
- Identify the correct medium and audience to deliver a message.
- Ensure communications are delivered regularly and in the most practical manner to reach the appropriate audience
- Translate technical jargon for multiple audiences to understand.
School of Education
In education degree programs you will learn to:
- Minimize the likelihood of a misunderstood message.
- Identify the correct medium to deliver a message.
- Implement appropriate grammar for communication.
School of Business
In business degree programs, you will learn to:
- Report facts in verbal and written form.
- Leverage appropriate communication techniques to persuade and guide outcomes.
- Ensure communications are delivered regularly and in the most practical manner to reach the appropriate audience.
Leavitt School of Health
In healthcare degree programs you will learn to:
- Describe the various information and communication technology tools used in the care of patients, communities, and populations.
- Demonstrate appropriate methods of communication for a given situation.
- Demonstrate written or oral communication between and among patients, families, and an interprofessional team to advocate for and contribute to high-quality, safe patient care.
Frequently Asked Questions
You can improve your communication skills by focusing on areas such as active listening, asking for feedback, improving your presentation skills, and even emotional intelligence.
Several barriers can hinder effective communication. Here’s what you can look out for: poor listening skills, language barriers, clarity, distractions like noise, and even lack of feedback.
To overcome barriers to effective communication, you can actively improve listening skills, use clear and concise language, address language barriers through translation or interpretation services, minimize distractions, and seek and provide feedback for better understanding and clarification.
Yes. Communication skills are vital in a remote work setting. Some crucial skills you should improve are collaboration and building relationships. You should also ensure your communication method is clear and concise.
Yes. Just like anyone else, introverts can acquire communication skills and improve their communication.
Introverts should, however, recognize their strengths, find a communication style that suits their personality, and learn from different personal experiences.
