In this series of articles we are covering the most common assessment categories in 360 Feedback, and one of them are certainly communication skills.

If you are interested in a previous article in this series, check out 360 Feedback Categories: Leadership.

A recent research showed that 29% of employees consider poor communication skills as the reason that projects fail.

74% of employees have a feeling that they are missing out on important information at work.

These are not small numbers.

In the business world, it is widely known that communication skills are one of the most reliable predictors of success, especially in a big organisation. If you are working together with three people, establishing proper communication is not that hard. However, in a 200-people company, it is a different story.

Like we said, everyone knows that communication skills are important, but how do you develop them? What if you aren’t naturally talkative and outgoing?

Don’t worry, in this article we have compiled some of the most common traits of great communicators. If you embody these traits, you will see a drastic improvement in all interpersonal issues.

Let’s begin.

Top 3 Communication skills

Listening

You will see this trait on almost all lists of communication skills. Listening is about much more than just nodding along and letting the person talk. It is not even about understanding their words necessarily. This is about creating a space for the person to be truly heard. It is about encouraging people to speak freely around you and express their ideas and thoughts, while you truly listen and try your best to understand.

That is the essence of listening.

Nonverbal Communication

Studies have widely shown that words only account for 7% of communication between two people. All the rest lies on nonverbal communication. Your body language, your tone of voice, these are all important factors in how you come across to other people.

So become a student of body language and keep a few of the fundementals in mind. Keep solid eye contact, stand up straight and have great posture, speak clearly and confidently, and give others the space to do that as well.

Respect

This is probably the most important trait of these three. If you have great communication skills, and you carry yourself well and have good body language, but lack respect for the people you are talking to, your communication will be greatly flawed.

You need to treat people with respect, regardless of their position in the company.

There are many ways of assessing the communication skills of your employees and your own. However, in our opinion, the 360 Degree Feedback method is by far the best. There is a whole category of assessment questions concentrated only on the subject of communication skills.

If you are looking for a great and easy-to-implement software for conducting 360 Degree Feedback, check out Best360.