How effective communication can benefit your study

Communication is how we express and share our thoughts and opinions with others. Doing this well allows us to understand each other without confusion when we are conversing. It’s also a valuable interpersonal skill you can apply to grow professionally and academically. Developing your communication will help you foster good working relationships, and also spill over to help you in many aspects of your life like work, study, and friendships. 

How to develop effective communication

In clearly demonstrating your thoughts and ideas, and understanding the needs of others, your communication will flourish. From written communication to casual conversation and formal discussions, effectively communicating across all these areas will improve any interaction:

• Spelling and grammar.
• Clear communication.
• Body language and active listening.
• Building social connections.

Anything that gets you interacting with people is great for developing your communication skills and improving your active listening. Both are essential for fostering effective communication as a student and in the workplace. Here are six helpful ways to help you improve your communication.

Use grammar and spelling tools

One of the most valuable tools when communicating is great grammar. Making sure your written language is clear and easy to understand goes a long way when communicating across digital platforms. 

Having a tool to back you up as you’re writing will save you time proofing and help you communicate better overall. Whether it’s important study notes, work materials, or assessment tasks, ensuring proper spelling and grammar will elevate your writing and improve your written professionalism.

This is where grammar tools come in. They are great for giving you tips on spelling, grammar and help improve the flow in your writing. They will point out if a sentence feels too long or if you’ve used the same word too often, while providing some great alternatives.

Tip: Our favourite grammar tools are LanguageTool and Grammarly. They’re easy to use, and they’re both free chrome extensions! These tools will automatically check your grammar and spelling for any errors and highlight them as you write. 

Here are some quick tips to help you with the set-up:

• Create a free account using your email.
• The default language is ‘American English’, so you will need to update your preference to ‘Australian English’.
• Use this how-to guide for Grammarly.
• Use this how-to guide for LanguageTool.

They work in any editable format on your browser, such as Google Docs. If you need them for any apps you use, you can download the tool’s app as well as the browser extension.

Remain clear and direct

Being able to communicate clearly and directly is great for avoiding confusion and constant follow-ups. Here are three aspects of communication you should consider that will improve your overall communication.

Clarity of message

Ensuring that you provide relevant and useful information when sharing your ideas and opinions is a valuable skill. Consider these questions as during planning to help clarify your massage: 

• Are you providing all the information this person will need to do their job? 
• What could their follow-up questions be?
• Can you answer these questions preemptively? 
• If you could only describe the situation in three sentences, what would the most important information to convey be?

 Building these skills can be tricky with no direction, here is a helpful exercise you can try to help improve the clarity in your communication.

Tip: Pick and read a random article or Wikipedia page online, then break it down and find the three most essential takeaways. Write these down and use these notes to explain the article to someone who hasn’t read it before.

This can help you determine if you really covered the most critical aspects and whether your explanation made sense to fresh eyes. Repeating this process with new people and new articles will help you develop your clear communication skills.

Keep it concise

Keeping your communication concise means you get your message across efficiently using the fewest words necessary without sacrificing clarity or detail. In staying concise, you help to enhance overall comprehension, saves time when communicating, while also holding the attention of others. 

Whether it’s written or spoken language, it involves eliminating unnecessary words and repetition, focusing on key points, and using a simple, uncluttered communication style. 

• Active voice: The active voice focuses on the doer of the action, making sentences clearer and easier to understand than passive voice, as it clearly identifies who is performing the action. If you’re unsure of your writing, you can use this passive word checker to help you get accustomed to using the active voice style of writing. 
• Word choice: Prioritise using simple language and steer clear of overcomplicated phrases and long sentences. Avoid the use of acronyms and jargon, as it comes across as less confident. Instead of using phrases like ‘in order to’, say ‘to’, or instead of ‘due to the fact…’, simply say ‘because’.
• Avoid filler words: Eliminate unnecessary phrases and filler words to ensure you remain on topic and focused. If you’re communicating verbally, try to avoid filler words like ‘um’, ‘uhh’, and ‘like’.  

Speed of communication

Keeping communication open and allowing a reliable flow of information means you remain approachable and maintain smooth social interactions. 

Each workplace has their own expectations for how long it should take you to respond to a message. This varies based on if the message is from within your team, from a manager, or from a client. You should take note of the expectations in your work place, but a good rule of thumb is:

• Direct messages and mentions: For urgent messages, respond as soon as possible, ideally within a couple of hours. Otherwise, reply within one business day. If you can’t respond to a message properly in that time, let them know when they can expect a full response from you.
• Emails: Non-urgent emails can wait for a few days. However, urgent emails should get a response sooner, within 24 hours at the latest.
• Meeting invites: Depending on how urgent the meeting is, a meeting invite should be accepted/declined within the same day.

Maintain approachable body language

Your body language does a lot of the talking in social situations, so being aware of how you come across can help improve your overall communication. Keeping your body language open and approachable will encourage honest conversation. 

It’s important to always be conscious of your attitude and non-verbal communication. Here are some things you should consider so you can remain professional and welcoming during conversations and meetings.

• Good posture — Keeping open and inviting body language is a great way to welcome progressive conversation. Ensuring you sit with good posture while leaning towards the person speaking opens you up to more pleasant interactions. 
• Eye contact — Whether you’re talking one-on-one or in groups, making and maintaining eye contact with participants shows that you’re engaged in conversation, and you’re listening. This can make people feel more comfortable talking with you and lead to more constructive conversations. 
• Movement and hand gestures — Get expressive while you talk. By walking up and down throughout a presentation or using hand gestures to enunciate your speech, you can become more engaging and easier to follow. Just be careful not to go overboard, as too much movement can become distracting. 
• Facial expressions — Remember to stay positive, smile, and show that you’re engaged. Facial expressions are valuable nonverbal cues that impact communication through expressing understanding and reiterating your message. 

Networking 

Attending a variety of social and networking events provides you with excellent opportunities to interact with a diverse group of people and develop your social and communication skills. Networking skills are also valuable in the workplace as you can connect with investors, companies, and other professionals to benefit your career progression and your business. 

Here are some great ways to engage with people you normally wouldn’t and learn different communication styles to fit each situation. 

• Sign up to a local sporting club or community group. 
• Volunteer at a fundraising event.
• Attend a formal industry networking event. 
• Reach out to your coworkers and people from different departments.
• If you work in a hybrid environment, set up a catch up meeting with a remote coworker and get used to talking through virtual meetings.

Becoming versatile with your communication skills can help you connect with people across various life experiences with empathy and compassion. Opening yourself to new interactions, even within your own workplace, can help you build your communication and find ways to best communicate for any situations. 

Seek mentorship 

Having fantastic role models and people to support your growth is a great resource to add to your learning journey. There are many sources within your current network who you can turn to for good advice. If you have an important presentation or meeting, ask someone to proofread it or act as a test audience for you. 

Chat with people who you consider to be excellent communicators, and don’t be afraid to ask for their advice or mentorship. People love helping people and sharing their knowledge with you. 

• A manager at work. Managers can be a great source for mentorship as they already have a vested interest in your success. They also have experience with how you currently communication and may provide you with some ideas for improvement.

• A professional career advisor. Exploring feedback from professional career advisors or someone with a communication style you look up to can give you a new, insightful perspective on effective communication.
• A trusted friend within a professional industry. They don’t have to be the same industry as you. Seeking advice from a variety of avenues can open yourself to more growth opportunities in your communication.

Stay open to feedback

Whether you’re giving or receiving feedback, it’s important to remain positive even if the feedback is negative. To become an effective communicator, you need people to know that they can discuss difficult issues with you and even critique your ideas freely in a constructive environment. That’s why you should be appreciative of any constructive feedback and remember to take it seriously. 

You want people to know that you value their opinions. Try to take on what people say with grace and understanding. By reflecting and applying valuable feedback and focusing on what you can do to improve, you show that you’re willing to learn and grow.