Thousands of years ago, man has gained the knowledge to communicate, to speak and listen, draw, to write, and many more. Although, we had this knowledge and possibly the mastery of it through time, a lot of things remain unchanged. Even if we had a lot of chance to evolve and improve ourselves, we cannot still deny the fact that our communication skills are not perfect.
There are a lot of reasons why communication becomes miscommunication. The message may not be perceived by the receiver the same as how the sender intended, but fortunately, effective communicators can ask for feedback to check if their message was properly understood.
Understanding barriers to effective communication is a handy skill and a must-have for a good communicator. A message is also supposed to be simple, easily-understood and unbiased. The use of jargons should be avoided because not all people are familiar with technical or topic-specific words, making it a big obstacle to achieving understanding.
The lack of attention of listeners is one great challenge for a communicator. We must find ways to get pique their interest and maintain their eyes on us to properly convey desired messages.
The differences in viewpoint is another barrier, we must first acknowledge that each and every person has different perspectives and take on things and we must not trample in what they believe in. We must encourage free-thinking and persuade politely if needed.
Physical impairments are another thing, sign languages, braille, and other things, help in this kind of cases. Not being able to see non-verbal cues or signs is also a problem, making sings and cues noticeable and easy to see is one of the solutions for this.
Accents, prejudicing and false assumptions, and cultural differences are still barriers to effective communication and overcoming those is easy if we can understand the different barrier’s nature and prepare possible solutions for each and every one of them.
We must remember that in order to solve a problem we must first understand it and layout plans even before encountering them.
An effective communicator can eliminate differences in perception by explaining things thoroughly without hiding anything from the other individual. The use of simple language is also encouraged to ensure that the message intended will be the same as the message perceived.
As much as possible we must reduce the noise or even eliminate it so that the full attention of the audience is directed to the speaker.
Active listening is a lot better than passive. This emphasizes the difference between listening and hearing. The ‘walk the talk’ technique proves to be effective in promoting active listening.
Emotions should be kept inside while communicating, never let your emotions cloud your thoughts. This is one of the biggest reasons why communicating becomes hard for emotional people.
Avoid information overload, keep the message simple, not complex. Feedbacks are also very much encouraged to know if there is a problem or if the message is properly transmitted.
In our eon, modern technology has become a vital part of communication. The proper choice of communication medium is also encouraged. Flexibility and the ability to adjust or adapt to the paradigm shift is also a skill needed by an effective communicator.
We have faced these barriers for thousands of years yet we are not able to fully eradicate them but now with the help of the development of communication, we now stand a chance. We can now convey messages and meanings properly, and hopefully, someday, we will not be there and be back again.