How do I learn to communicate effectively?

1. Start with writing.

1a. Fewer words are more powerful than many. Attempt to reduce your word count as much as possible.

1b. Expand your vocabulary.

1c. Make your statements active, not passive (reduce or eliminate 'be' verbs).

1d. Plan your thoughts well and orderly.

1e. As much as possible write in a narrative style.

1f. Speak from facts. Clearly state when your opinions are your opinions. Leave nothing to chance. Nobody will assume your expertise and generally nobody cares.

1g. In all things execute with precise.

2. Speak like slow, clear, deliberation like your mastery of writing.

2a. Speaking is plumbing. The words that escape your mouth are sewage. You don't them back and you don't want to. Keep a solid rhythm so the plumbing does not back up.

2b. Speak from empathy.

2c. 90% of communication is non-verbal comprising tone, facial expression, and body language. Embrace this.

2d. Make all communications flow from logic, but remember all communications are emotional all the time.

Identify elements of good/bad communication patterns: https://consilienceproject.org/endgames-of-bad-communication...

Non-violent communication is a very structured approach to guiding people through perceived difficult behaviour: https://www.clearerthinking.org/post/2019/03/06/Want-to-impr...

Gain a little understanding about the give and take of communication: https://experimentalhistory.substack.com/p/good-conversation...

If possible, try to spend more time with people who espouse these desired characteristics and less time with those who don't.

Finally, conversation should be...fun...if possible. If you hack your way to being 100% in control of things all the time, then how much fun is that going to be for others?

You can see here what I think is the wrong way

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=33090580

The right way, in my opinion, is to hang around with real people who you genuinely respect and admire. Do this for even a few weeks and you begin to absorb not only their mannerisms, tone, prosody and pace, but some of their more subtle speech devices.

If communicative kindness can be captured in any theoretical way it is probably by Jurgen Habermas's idea of communicative rationality [1].

The centrepiece is sincerity

> don't say anything that sounds demeaning or hurtful to the listener.

You cannot fully control that and shouldn't optimise for it. Especially is you choose to speak truthfully rather than tactically. People will infer what is not implied, and some will do so deliberately as an argumentative device to feign 'offence'.

The trick is to be in touch with genuine compassion and attend to the wounds you cause when speaking well.

> It also includes listening attentively to what the other person is saying.

That is the hardest skill of all in my experience. You can "listen" on many levels. If there's a trick to that it's not splitting and allowing your mind to start preparing a counter/response before the other person has finished. Eye contact and physical proximity really help.

Interesting fact: the word "conspiracy" comes from personal intimacy. To co-n-spire is to breath the same air as others - ie conspirators would have to be in the same room in close proximity (presumably whispering)

[1] https://healthresearchfunding.org/habermas-theory-communicat...

Lots of excellent advice...here is something I like to do.

1) Listen w/out interrupting...look for that natural pause. Also take note that if there is no natural pause, that in itself is a clue to: 1) how the person comprehends information 2) treats other ppl as they may not respect other points of view otherwise they would stop with a pause.

2) Ask if you can repeat what you heard...this forces you to become an active listener as you try to retain salient points of the conversation; lets the other person know that you are listening, which has an interesting psychological effect; and finally validates both what you heard and what they said.

Some tips that might be useful

Lot's of great advice here, especially around listening. It's hard to do, as it is hard to even recognize what it really means, especially when you are not doing it well.

A big learning for me was how important humility is in communicating well.

For me, How to Win Friends and Influence People made me realize that. The title may be a bit offputting, but I found the book to be the catalyst that led to a lot of positive self-change. It shone a light on things that I have not been great at. The book did it in a way that did not make me defensive, and allowed the message to hit where it was needed. In a way, that is a demonstration of what communicating effectively is.

I put off reading the book for far too long, as I heard many summaries of it. The summaries don't do it justice.

Unpopular opinion, apparently: the only communication style that avoids ever stepping on someone's toes is also going to create an environment ripe for passive aggression, mean girlsing, and playing the victim.

Such an environment has a horrible failure mode: when you're actually direct and just say what you mean, for example, because otherwise disaster will happen, everyone will immediately start theorizing what you could possibly have meant by being so direct. It's both ridiculous and dysfunctional, and creates paranoid spirals of backstabbing and ass-covering that burn entire companies down.

People who feel easily demeaned or hurt are generally insecure. They can't take a joke because they take themselves too seriously. They will also try to suck up to others because they hope that will curry favor and avoid negative consequences when they mess up.

It's basically a recipe for avoiding responsibility, and the last thing you should want in an environment where excellence is required to do a good job.

Having spent time in such a company, and eventually getting booted out when somebody _else_ lost their temper at me, here's the craziest part: the people in charge thought I had no filter and always spoke directly... in actuality I was constantly biting my tongue, keeping tabs on what was going on under their noses, and giving them plenty of hints and time to course correct before I spoke my mind... and even then I chose every word carefully, always staying within the bounds of decency.

They didn't even realize that what they saw as unacceptably direct, was actually another person's idea of overly constricting and two-faced, and they didn't realize what it would be like to navigate from the outside. Getting them mad was actually the only thing that _did_ work to trigger any sort of positive change. Anything else would just get rationalized away.

My advice: find people who can take a joke, who are eager to learn, and who don't define themselves purely through how others see them, and you won't need to worry about stepping on their toes. I'll even cop the heat and say your chances of finding that among a majority of female coworkers are extremely slim.

When you do find yourself worried that your communication partner needs to be handled with kid gloves, and that you can't just say what you're thinking... that's not an environment you want to be in, not among adults.

Know the difference between open and closed questions.

Open questions are used to gain knowledge, and are phrased so that an answer can be anything. They can start with words like: Who, what, when, where, and why. However be extremely careful using "why" because it forces someone to justify a position.

Closed questions are used to drive a decision. They are phrased so that only specific answers are acceptable. They can start with words like: Can, will, should, do, don't. They frequently force the respondent into a commitment.

My personal pet peeve is closed negative questions like "Don't you like it?". That forces a respondent to defend against a negative assumption you've placed on them! Better to ask, "What do you think of it?"

This might be helpful: "Communication techniques for mutual understanding". https://9600.dev/blog/posts/communication-techniques-for-mut...

(disclosure: author of the note. I've been managing large software engineering teams for a long time and I think the investment in improving communication skills pays off incredible dividends for the both the individual and their team mates)

I’m on the spectrum and it sounds like you might be too. Often people find me blunt or abrasive. I used to worry about it and tried to meter myself for years but the only thing it got me was stress and I wasn’t being my authentic self. My best advice, be your authentic self. If that is abrasive to some, we’ll then so be it. I’d rather be abrasive than fake and waste time. If someone takes something astute as hurtful or demeaning then maybe you’re trying to run with the wrong crowd.

Depending on what medium you want to communicate, there are a number of options.

1) the hardest to change is talking. You tend to run at the limit of your capacity, taking shortcuts to speed up. This leaves little time for planning or introspection. However that's not to say its impossible. My first step would be to "develop" empathy.

What I mean by empathy is understanding how people feel, not feeling how they feel. there is no need to project their feelings onto you. To do this you need to be around other people. You need to listen in to their conversations and work out what each side is feeling, and figure out what their reaction would be to the words are being said.

Long in person meetings are good practice, You are allowed to stare vacantly, and listen intently.

2) For written communication, you are running at your own speed. Look at the blurb that comes with high end advertising, try and pull apart the facts from the spin. Those words have been chosen to illicit a specific emotion.

As a practice, try writing a complaint, instruction, or direction that fits into one paragraph. write the same thing three time, but targeting different emotions you want to get across, something simple, like joy, respectful annoyance, disappointment. put them asside for a week, come back and see how they make you feel.

Iterate and improve.

> that sounds demeaning or hurtful to the listener.

I'm guilty of all that at times. What works for me:

- Priorities. I pick my fights. Not everything needs to be a conversation. Sometimes I prefer email over conversations, because editing. You can't take back a half thought-through sentence in a conversation.

- Tone. Sticking to facts sometimes comes across as lack of empathy, but I find it's the best compromise of all available options. Minimising mean squared error etc.

> It also includes listening attentively to what the other person is saying.

I think this requires some serious self-hacking and patience. I worked in cultures where you don't interrupt others, which occasionally leads to people going on pointless rants. I think active listening where you steer the conversation might help generate genuine interest.

> How to learn all that?

Practice in your head, in front of a mirror, with friends and at work. Pick your fights: prepare a conversation, limit the scope (topic and time) and limit the training session to that one conversation.

I'd recommend Circling. It's a practice where people talk together about what they can notice about the present moment for a set time. It has had a huge impact for me on my ability to understand and feel my own emotions and others' emotions, and how to communicate more skillfully, both professionally and privately. The practice gives you lots of experiences of skilled facilitators' use of language, as well as direct feedback on how your communication is received.

There's Circling Anywhere based in Texas or Circling Europe based in Amsterdam. Both offer online stuff as well as in person stuff. There are also lots of local facilitators all over the world.

I teach a nonfiction "writing at work" workshop that's all about effective communication. The format is simple:

We work together on your writing as you’re writing. You send me your work in progress, I'll respond promptly with feedback and advice. I'll ask questions, flag awkward sentences, and help find the right language to get your point across. My focus is less on grammar and syntax, more on structure and framing, and even more on the content of the argument itself.

We'll exchange a bunch of email back-and-forths until you have a well-written message. It's free, email is in my profile if you're interested.

Honestly, listen more. Who is an effective speaker in your work or community? What kinds of phrases do they use to make people feel comfortable and heard? Echo and mimic what seems to work and see how it feels.

When we have stressful events at work I pay attention to what our manager says and note what's effective. You can even write down useful phrases and try to incorporate them into your vocabulary. Pay attention to how people respond...if it's effective, keep it, if it's awkward, keep trying.

I recommend starting with the book "I'm OK, you're OK". It teaches you transactional analysis, which is a useful toolset to both understand oneself and others.

Step one is to be aware of your capacity to hurt; it seems like you have this covered. I find that over time my awareness has grown, which has caused me to care more (and be more careful) about the feelings of who I am communicating with.

I used to think something like, "If I can just get them to see that I didn't mean to hurt/mean it that way, they clearly won't be hurt!" This is not at all true for many (most?), and like many matters of emotion that's ok. I was not originally aware of the phrase "intent is not impact" but this idea is what I'm trying to describe above.

It is very important to approach this from a place of humility and non-defensiveness. Be eager to apologize for the hurt you caused. I'm sure you're a great person who doesn't wish to hurt people; apologizing doesn't mean that you're sorry you tried to hurt them but that you're sorry that you did. Think of it as the equivalent of apologizing for accidentally elbowing someone in the head. It's not like you meant to, but their head still hurts where you elbowed it.

Actually caring helps a lot; it helps remind you to think before you speak or write, and to pay attention to reactions. If you care, you tend to get better over time.

Do comedy on Twitter.

This is half in jest, but I did find that when I did some amateur comedy on Twitter I focused more on making my tweets concise. Comedy is an economy of words and Twitter applies an upper bound. It was kinda fun, really.

I wonder if a similar approach is helpful? Learn to say what you need to say in few words, which might help avoid unintentional tone. …just be careful not to sound blunt.

"The Elements of Style", by William Strunk Jr. and E.B. White

You can call it the User's Manual for the English language.

Good communication requires empathy. Frame the entire conversation around understanding where the other person is coming from and what they know, and then add whatever knowledge you're trying to share. Without empathy for the audience, you're likely to explain too much, explain too little, or come off harsh or cold or whatever. Most communication strategies are designed to encourage empathy indirectly. You can generally skip them by focusing on empathy directly. The one strategy I think works well and doesn't come naturally from empathy is framing any opinions you have explicitly as your own: "I think X is the best" instead of "X is the best".

Toastmasters are still around, and they are great for public speaking practice.

Try to have a good understanding of the listeners knowledge on the subject.

If you're talking tech/dev and they're a dev as well, then use lingo.

If they aren't, then make sure to say you don't know how much they know and they should interject if it's too basic. Then adjust the level until the listener gets your language and doesn't need to constantly get clarification.

But honestly, I think you'll just need to accept that, sometimes, you will sound demeaning, and constantly adjust yourself to find the optimum for each person.

I know your situation.

Read "Non Violent Communication" it will help utilize logic to change how you talk to a more empathetic way.

And don't just read it - keep t he book by your side always.

You may find this ebook useful - https://www.sivv.io/guides/Effective-Communication. It outlines the key takeaways from dozens of books and studies on communication, covering things like crafting an effective message, active listening, non-verbal communication and dealing with difficult questions.

I have captured my personal experience of struggling with this topic during my career into a book called "Communication for Engineers". The book builds a foundation and then explores the myriad of ways we communicate as engineers. Lots of overviews and tips to try out. You may like it: https://chrislaffra.com/c4e

> convey what I want to say

comes with practice

> so that I don't say anything that sounds demeaning or hurtful to the listener.

Learn to put yourself in their position. Imagine someone's saying it to you, how would you feel hearing it? Takes practice. I still have to do it.

> It also includes listening attentively to what the other person is saying.

Practice, and believing they have something valuable to say. If you really can't concentrate, that may be a medical thing.

Good luck!

Communication is an attitude of openness towards the other, which implies availability to share, that is, to give and receive. It is an art that must be practiced continuously to develop it in all its fullness and thus be able to obtain an optimal benefit. We as human beings need to practice to the fullest and improve the quality of our communication every day through active listening and empathy.

Google: "communication insights from movies." Key takeaways: "If you are a good communicator, you have empathy.

How can we develop empathy? It’s just the mental exercise of putting yourself in someone else’s shoes and trying to see the world through their eyes.

The key, therefore, to meaningful communication is to use empathy to listen to others as if you were in their position trying to be understood."

https://youtu.be/T3FC7qIAGZk?t=12630

Unravel it, quite. I wonder sir, what that word communication means.

To communicate implies not only verbally but also listening in which there is a sharing, a thinking together, not accepting something that you or I say, but sharing together, thinking together, creating together, all that is involved in that word 'communicate'. And in that word is implied also the art of listening. The art of listening demands a quality of attention in which there is real listening, real sense of having an insight as we go along, each second, not at the end, but at the beginning.

Communication implies there must be at the same level, at the same time, with the same intensity, we are walking together, we are thinking together, we are observing together, sharing together.

Also, in communication there is not only a verbal communication, but there is a non-verbal communication, really which comes into being, or which happens when one has the art of really listening to somebody, in which there is no acceptance, no denial, or comparison, or judgement, just the act of listening.

I'd just get a book or something then practice like anything else. I actually just picked up my first book on communication and it's been really interesting. Much better then stuff I've come across before like random advice from people

I find communication to be more of a symptom than a root cause. You can try and act like you're not demeaning, not hurtful, and a good listener. Thus would just be an act, and sooner or later, the truth will come out.

In terms of listening, it seems basic, but ask questions. Even if you think you've got the jist of what's been said, getting people to expand on their point helps you understand them better and makes them feel listened to.

Coincidentally just saw poised.com on the front page. Not tried it but it promises to coach for speaking and presentation skills using AI. Check out that thread though as a few are questioning privacy policies around this service.

I think first thing is to think clearly. Speak to yourself when driving or whenever and see if it feels nature. If you have to gloss over a lot of things or cannot even talk straightforward then go back to step 1.

Look up for Vinh Giang.

This guy randomly appeared on my Instagram feed, and since then, he has become a must follow for me, because his content about communication is just amazing.

Clear and to the point.

I would highly suggest the book The Fine Art of Small Talk by Debra Fine.

I covers great tips and different scenarios.

So the ancient egyptians have a concept of eloquence.

Here is a paper about it https://www.academia.edu/2241961/_Ancient_Egyptian_Rhetoric_...

Check out “non violent communication”.

Read "Pyramid Principle" book

Read books.

Write stuff.

Speak often.

Listen more than you speak. (two ears, one mouth)

How do you learn to communicate effectively? You don't.

Beyond the cheap rhetorical trick, if one takes the effectiveness of communication to it's extreme they will reach what the French call "langue de bois", wooden language, as can be seen in the annals of parliamentary speeches of yesteryear or in the buzzwords-filled tech articles of today. And by aiming for pure effectiveness you can only achieve a wooden language since only there, in the dried-out forest of semantical nothingness and nonsense, you can reach a general consensus: we all know what "artificial intelligence blockchain-driven cloud-computing" means: close the article and move on.

This implies that the effectiveness of communication should only be one of the means to reach a goal. What could that goal be? Simply put: the goal of any communication should only be that of emerging out of it as a truth-teller. How to be a truth-teller? Use only the public reason.

Two rather heavy concepts above. The first, the truth-teller (parrhesiastes in Greek [1]) is a concept developed by Michel Foucault in the final lectures held at Collège de France [2], especially in 'The Courage of Truth', the Second Hour from February 1, 1984 speaks of "the truth-telling of the technician". And being a truth-teller you would never worry about being demeaning or hurtful because sometimes you would simply have to be so and you will only care about the courage of being a truth-teller, when calling the murderous naked king a murderous naked king.

The second concept is a dichotomy developed by Immanuel Kant between private and public use of reason [3]. For Kant 'private' does not mean that which I do in solitude, but that which belongs to my self-interest. We often hear the phrase "free speech" and all the phraseology surrounding it. But we never ask, free of what should the speech be? Kant answers: free of your own self-interests, perceived as such or surreptitiously attached by others. By using the public reason, one is indeed free, a truth-teller on the way to enlightenment, on the way to "emerge out of the self-imposed nonage".

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Parrhesia

[2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Foucault%27s_lectures_at_the_C...

[3] 1784, Kant, Immanuel, What is Enlightenment? http://www.columbia.edu/acis/ets/CCREAD/etscc/kant.html and in the beautiful language of the Romanticism, German, "Aufklärung ist der Ausgang des Menschen aus seiner selbstverschuldeten Unmündigkeit", https://www.rosalux.de/fileadmin/rls_uploads/pdfs/159_kant.p...