Excerpt from the ASME Professional Practice Curriculum – Communications Skills Module

Although everyone listens, speaks and writes every day, few people realize how important these communication skills are. Engineers in particular tend to emphasize technical and mathematical skills more than communication skills, not realizing that they cannot be fully effective in their jobs if they are poor listeners, speakers and writers.

Most of us have been speaking and listening since we were very small, but that does not mean we do it well. Engineers need strong speaking, listening and writing skills to succeed at their jobs. As managers, for example, they will need not only to listen to what their staff tells them, but to come across to their staff as someone who is listening. Similarly, managers must conduct meetings, write memos, directives and reports, and they must talk to their staff such that they are well understood.

Alaina M. Pizzo, Systems Design Engineer, Philips Medical Systems reveals different models to be an effective communicator that can help you acheive your career goals faster and avoid common pitfalls.

 watch video  (36:53 min)   listen to audio  (36:40 min)      

    Alaina's presentation slides (PDF file)
 

Listening
Listening requires careful attention. Sometimes people don't pay careful attention when someone is speaking to them, thinking instead about how to press their point when the other person stops speaking. Here are some of the ways managers and engineers can benefit from listening well:

• Listening leads to better work and cooperation from others. When people feel their manager is really interested in them and their problems, their thoughts, and their opinions, they respect not only the manager but the organization that the manager represents. This can also be true of those who interact with engineers.

• Listening helps managers and engineers make better decisions. Through listening, managers and engineers can draw upon the experience of the people who work with them, and get information they would not otherwise have.

• Listening can help individuals do a better job. By asking questions and listening to people they work with or for, managers get suggestions as to how they can do a better job of managing.

Speaking
In their capacity as managers and team leaders, engineers must speak to employees, must deliver presentations and must conduct meetings. All of these - from a short, simple conversation to a long technical presentation - require good speaking skills.

Before you think about the words you choose, look at your nonverbal behavior. Good eye contact, for example, conveys interest, warmth, and credibility. Giving your listener enough "space" - by not standing too close - keeps the person at ease and allows him or her to concentrate on what you are saying. Here are some other tips to improve your speaking skills:

• Don't state opinions as facts. First, you might not be right, and second you will alienate your listeners. You might even cause an argument. Identify your opinions as such with phrases such as "it seems to me" or "I believe."

• Use words that convey your message. When talking, be sure the words you choose are clear and straightforward. Fancy phrases and long or strange words might be impressive, but they do not necessarily lead to clear communication.

• Repeat if necessary, but stop talking once you've made your point. Many speakers repeat themselves unnecessarily, long after their listeners have caught on. While illustrating your point with an example clarifies an idea, needless repetition causes your listeners' minds to wander.

Emailing
Many people write their e-mail messages the same way they write in virtual chat rooms. While it is important to write the way you speak, you must also remember that you speak differently in different situations. You wouldn't speak in a professional setting the way you would at a baseball game, for example.

The same is true for your e-mail correspondences, especially because e-mail does not come with the non-verbal expressions that supplement what you "say." Most of the time we make judgments about a person's motives and intentions based on their tone of voice, gestures, and their proximity to us. When those are absent, as they are in e-mail, it becomes more difficult to figure out what the writer means. Thus is much easier to offend or hurt someone in e-mail, so it is important to be as clear and concise as possible.

Conducting Effective Meetings
Every meeting has an objective, and the meeting leader's job is to reach that objective. This can sometimes be a difficult task, requiring the leader to wear many different hats. The leader must stimulate and direct the discussion, for example, and might also have to referee disputes, interpret what people are saying, and plan a course of action. When a meeting ends, all participants should find it easy to agree that the objectives have been reached.

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Alaina M. Pizzo, Systems Design Engineer, Philips Medical Systems reveals different models to be an effective communicator that can help you acheive your career goals faster and avoid common pitfalls.
 watch video  (36:53 min)    listen to audio  (36:40 min)