Your employees and the people around you listen to not only what you say but also how you say it, in order to get clues about your level of trustworthiness. They listen for missing bits of information, assumptions, leaps in logic, voice tone and wobble, breath depth and voice tightness. Yes, there are different levels of skill in interpreting the clues, but every person constantly tracks how other people are communicating to work out what actions they will personally take as a result of how you have communicated with them.The Ring of Truth
Now comes the more complex part. Have you ever heard of words having "the ring of truth"? It is as if the words vibrate on a deeper level - you can feel them as coming from a space of truth. Words from the Head/Heart
Words tend to come from two different places. We have words that are spoken from our head or logic, and words spoken from our heart.
Words that come from our head tend to be logical, factual... and to be blunt cold, unengaging, and dry. You can tell when a business report, web copy or marketing material has been written from the headspace. It is as if all emotion has been sucked out of it (and all the life force in the process). If you listen to words spoken from the head, they tend to be spoken more quickly, in a higher voice pitch and often come out in convoluted stories.
Words that come from our heart tend to be harder won. If you listen to the voice tone of the person speaking them, the tone is deeper in pitch, the pace slower and the sentence construction may not be as "neat". Speaking from the heart, you can feel the emotion behind the words and you tend to connect more with the speaker.
Where trust comes from
But how does this head/heart stuff relate to trustworthiness? If all the words come from just one end of the spectrum - all logic or all emotion, then people have less trust in what is being said. To build trust, you need a balance of both head and heart. You need to speak from both the logical and the emotional space.
If you just communicate from one of the "h's" (heart or head), you are limiting the perception of your trustworthiness. If you want to build trust - you need to communicate from a balance of both. In your business, you want to be trusted, so you need to find a way to communicate from both your head and your heart.
Communicating from the Heart
The challenge is that it is easy to communicate from our head only. Communicating from your heart is harder. People find it easy to escape into a world of logic, as it feels safe and free from messy emotional stuff. But real change and connection comes from communicating emotions.
So what do you do to communicate from your heart? Well, as one of my favourite quotes from the movie Finding Forrester says. "Write your first draft with your heart. You re-write with your head".
First bring to mind the person or ideal client you want to communicate with. Imagine them in detail - what they think and feel about life. Let your first draft be messy, flowing, and saying whatever needs to be said. Once you have allowed your heart and emotions space, only then do you edit your words with your head.
Appropriate Disclosure
Make decisions about how much you are willing to disclose. Only then, edit for flow, facts and format and check for internal consistency.
You can use this process for business reports, emails, performance reviews, marketing material... in fact anything where you need to communicate with another person. The bottom line is communicate from both your head and your heart and you will increase trust in you and your business.
By Ingrid Cliff
