If you work in an international setting, it is not always easy to grasp every message conveyed or to share your thoughts and vision in a different language…
If you are not writing in a language that is yours, you have to get your point across all while being careful about what you say and how you say it.
Quillbot is an AI-based paraphrasing and grammar checking tool that guarantees a greater understanding and an adept communication style, tone and language.
If your writing is feeling flat or inappropriate for your audience, Quillbot helps you craft topic sentences from your own ideas and drafted arguments and keep the message of your sentence.
Furthermore, Quillbot provides the tools to refine your writing, vary your vocabulary by giving you several word options, and articulate your sentences in the style that you need whether your style leans towards formal, fluency, standard, creative or shorten.
This paraphrasing tool can even highlight grammar errors and include citations.
Finally, Quillbot facilitate your language improvement by providing feedback on the structure and sense of your sentences.
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We seldom are perceived the way we see ourselves or the way we want to be perceived.
Contrary to popular belief, our facial expressions are not always readable, our emotions are not that obvious and we don’t communicate as much as we think we do.
Guided Perceptions
There are many heuristics and assumptions that guide our perceptions and create inaccurate interpretations of people.
Assumption #1: The confirmation bias
Some people look at you and see what they expect to see, taking into account the stereotypes of the groups to which you belong, your culture and their past experiences with you.
Assumption #2: The primary effect
Other people forme their perceptions of you using their initial impression of you.
With this assumption, first impressions are lasting impressions.
Assumption #3: Stereotypes
Stereotypes are the beliefs about categories of people to “better understand” them.
Assumption #4: The halo effect
The halo effect is the belief that someone, with one powerful positive trait, has a lot more positive traits.
Assumption #5: The false-consensus effect
The false-consensus effect is the belief that others think and feel the same way that we do.
The Two Phases of Perception
There are two phases of perception that exist in every interactions: Phase 1 or System 1 and Phase 2 or System 2.
Phase 1 or System 1 is the automatic and effortless ability to recognize strong emotions in someone’s facial expression and voice, to identify, categorize and interpret a given behavior, to attach that given behavior to “some aspect of your personality, character or abilities”.
First impressions are made in Phase 1.
Perception often stops at Phase 1 and people, being busy, tend to rely heavily on heuristics and assumptions.
Phase 2 or System 2 is the ability, through complex and effortful mental operations to get a complete and accurate understanding of someone, by taking into account additional factors about yourself.
This effort has to purposefully be motivated by an attention-grabbing circumstance.
Distortion of The Phases of Perception
The level of trust, the possession of power and the size of the ego tend have an impact on these phases of perception.
However, these distortions can be averted by understanding the circumstances and the wanted results of each interaction.
The level of trust
Most of the time, people are not just trying to make assumptions about you but are trying to find out unconsciously if they can trust you, especially in the workplace: are you a friend or a foe?
The decision to trust is made unconsciously in Phase 1 of perception and depends on the way that you project warmth and competence.
To increase trust to the people around you:
Convey warmth indirectly by giving subtle but genuine complements, by providing assistance whenever you can, by showing interest in others feelings and thoughts.
Demonstrate empathy by acknowledging someone else’s perspective.
Manifest your trust in people first by being cooperative, talking about your vulnerabilities and challenges.
Transmit competence by making eye contact while speaking.
Show will power by showing self-control.
Avoid overconfidence by showing modesty and restraint.
Adopt a power pose in order to take up most of the space, to signal your competence.
Emphasize your potential for greatness and for success.
The possession of power
Having more or less power changes the impressions that we form about one another.
Powerful people tend to be overwhelmed with responsibilities and have no time to spare, to be focused on their goals, rely heavily on stereotypes to categorize people, stay stuck in Phase 1 of perception.
Furthermore, the sad truth is that powerful people don’t pay much attention to less powerful people.
To get noticed by powerful people and to increase your influence:
Be instrumental to their success.
Find out how you can align your. objectives with those of the powerful.
Ease their burden.
Anticipate their needs and challenges.
Avoid complementing them because they don’t care.
The size of the ego
Perception is distorted by the size of the ego in such ways that you must come out on top, feeling good about yourself.
Your ego has the purpose of protecting and enhancing your self-esteem.
To control the way people perceive you through their ego, you will need to:
Help people enhance their self-esteem.
Evaluate the threat that you and your abilities pose to your colleagues.
Be humble about your accomplishments, past and current difficulties. Avoid tooting your own horn, playing dumb or acting like someone else.
Affirm other people by praising them and their achievements.
Avoid stereotyping other people.
The eager reward seekers and the vigilant risk mitigators
The safety and security of our personal situations also poses a threat to our perceptions of people, of our colleagues and of our career.
On one hand, the eager reward seeker looks for opportunities everywhere, are effective, risk takers, rule breakers, adventurers, optimistic, motivated, innovative and often creative.
Unfortunately, eager reward seekers are prone to fail and to underestimate problems.
On the other, the vigilant risk mitigators see danger everywhere they go, are vigilant, risk averse, reliable, thorough and deliberate, prone to analytical thinking and self-doubt.
To get the best of both types of people, simply adapt your language to each of them by making one see a potential for gain and the other a cautionary plan.
The clingy, anxious and the aloof, avoidant
The need for closeness shapes our relationship with others.
The clingy and anxious people tend to have low self-esteem, need validation, constantly seek closeness and are worried that the people that they have built a relationship with will leave them, see injuries and slights where there aren’t, fear rejection.
To accommodate them, practise empathy, don’t take it personally, clarify your speech, stay reliable to this person.
The aloof and avoidant people don’t foster close relationships but instead maintain emotional distance.
To accommodate them, don’t take their behaviour personally, restraint your own warmth, give them time to open up.
Correcting bad impressions and fighting misunderstandings
Finally, to correct bad impressions and start over on the right track, you can exhibit attention-getting evidence of the contrary evidence of you so they can notice and cannot deny reality.
You can also force people to revisit their opinion of you by making them feel that their judgement is unfair or unequal.
Finally, you can make people depend on you and need you to reach their goals.
Review
No One Understands You and What To Do About It by Heidi Grant Halvorson is a great self-development book that explores the prominent reasons why we are often misunderstood and gives useful advice on how to clean up our reputation, to clarify a difficult situation.
Every single conclusion that Halvorson draws is scientifically researched and illustrated with probing examples.
This book is intended for people who have made past mistakes with people and want to correct them.
It was absolutely hard to read because Halvorson revealed hard truths, reminded me of the stereotypes that pursue me on a daily basis and that keep interfering with my goals, forces me to question myself and my behavior.
In addition, this book made me more self-conscious about my presentation to the world and my decisions, more aware that first impressions are critical, that most people don’t think the same way I do, react the same I do, or perceive me the same way I do.
Furthermore, No One Understands You and What To Do About It was also cathartic and purging, helped me become a better judge of others, understand that the way people treated me in the past was not my full responsibility.
In No One Understands You and What To Do About It, Heidi Grant Halvorson explains how perceptions are born, describes a set of stereotypes and assumptions that affect how people perceive you, the different ways for correcting bad impressions and for overcoming misunderstandings.
Favorite quote(s)
Studies show that while very strong, basic emotions—surprise, fear, disgust, and anger—are fairly easy to read, the more subtle emotions we experience on a daily basis are not. You are never really starting from scratch with another person, even when you are meeting him or her for the first time. The perceiver’s brain is rapidly filling in details about you—many before you have even spoken a word. Knowing this gives you a sense of what you’ve got going for you and what you might be up against. And the more you can know in advance about your perceiver’s likes, dislikes, strengths, and weaknesses, the better equipped you will be to anticipate what’s being projected onto you.
The benefits of projecting trustworthiness (and the costs of failing to do so) are Enormous, particularly in the workplace. Studies show, for instance, that the willingness to share knowledge with colleagues—a sticking point in most large organizations—is strongly predicted by feelings of trust among employees.
Words are powerful and can have a long-lasting effect on people…
Leaders are responsible for employee engagement, for setting goals, giving feedback and reinforce positive feedbacks.
Therefore, leaders have to be careful of the words that come out their mouth.
On one hand, they can say annoying things from time to time.
On the other hand, it’s not always easy to find the right thing to say.
Wondering what are the most annoying things that leaders usually say?
1. “It’s my way or the high way!”
Leaders who want everything they way tend to hire talented individuals to do the job but don’t trust them to do so or don’t give them the opportunity to exercise their expertise. By doing so, their team gradually lose confidence and morale.
2. “You’re wrong” or “Why didn’t you do this instead?”
There is more than one solution to a problem and there is more than one way than doing things.
3. “It’s none of your business” or “Stay in your lane”
Leaders who pull rank or hold back information try to retain power as much as they can and wish to establish a certain distance between themselves and their team.
4. “Let me finish…” or Interrupt people while the are talking…
It is important for leaders to actively listen before they speak and to value their team’s knowledge.
5. “I don’t pay you to think!”
By saying that, leaders reduce their team members to mere tools or objects.
6. “I’m not going to do your job for you”
Team members usually come to leaders for advice and reassurance but don’t require those same leaders to do their job for them.
7. “Don’t waste my time”
Time is indeed a precious commodity but by saying that leaders impeded their team from suggesting innovative ideas.
8. “I don’t have time right now”
Leaders are definitely busy bodies but they make time for what is important.
9. “That’s not important…”
This statement has a tendency of devaluing team members.
10. “I don’t care” or “That’s not my problem”
Helping team members find solutions to problems is part of the job description of leaders.
11. “You are not as good as you think” or “You are lucky to even be here”
If a leader needs to remind a team member how great his or her job is then it is not that great to begin with.
12. “We have always done it that way”
Through that statement, leaders emphasize that there is no room for improvement or innovation.
Last words of advice!
When you have said a few annoying things, you can always recover by:
Being aware of your words.
Observing the impact of your words
Admitting your mistakes.
Calmly explaining yourself.
Letting go and moving on.
Hope that I’ve helped you get it together on your way to leadership!
Don’t forget to like, share and leave a comment below.
Most people don’t share their ideas or go after what they truly want because they are afraid of rejection and don’t know how to use the right words at the right time…
Below are 23 magical phrases that will get you to start conversations, share ideas, influence people, assist people in taking decisions and achieve personal success.
1. “I’m Not Sure If It’s for You, But”
This phrase is an opening statement, used to introduce a person, an idea, product or service, to remove pressure and to spike interest without going through rejection.
2. “How Open-Minded Are You?”
In general, people love to think of themselves as open-minded. Everybody wants to be open-minded.
Before making any statement, asking people whether or not they are open-minded allows you to introduce new ideas, gain their support, and having them agree with you.
3. “What Do You Know?”
When sharing ideas, some people feel the need to be right or demonstrate that they know best. By finding out what the other person knows before sharing your knowledge, this statement helps you overcome preconceptions, avoid debates and arguments when trying to share new concepts.
4. “How Would You Feel If?”
“How Would You Feel If?” allows you to understand what motivates people and what emotions trigger their decision making process.
The truth is that emotions and motivation tactics are used in all “areas of negotiation, influence and persuasion”.
Indeed, motivation is a reason to step into action and emotions are reason enough to make a decision.
Used effectively, motivation and emotions can be used to make people step into action.
5. “Just Imagine”
“Just Imagine” is employed to use people’s creative mind, to prop people into action by setting a powerful preface and to bring a decision into reality.
People tend to imagine the outcome of a decision in their mind before actually implementing that decision in reality.
That is why sharing a story before asking someone to make a decision is helpful and creates a picture in the mind of the other person.
6. “When Would Be a Good Time?”
This phrase prevents people from telling you that they don’t have the time to listen to you and subconsciously sets the idea that their will be a good time for you to make your point.
7. “I’m Guessing You Haven’t Got Around To”
“I’m Guessing You Haven’t Got Around To” is used when you want to indirectly ask someone whether or not they have gotten the time to do what you asked.
“I’m Guessing You Haven’t Got Around To” allows the other person to feel proud if they have accomplished what you have asked for or it allows them to save face and it gives them the opportunity to step up to the plate.
8. Simple swaps
Asking open-ended questions instead of closed ended questions is more effective for conversation-making.
9. “You Have Three Options”
Presenting people with three options reduces their choices and subsequently helps them through the decision-making process.
10. “There are two types of people in this world”
“There are two types of people in this world” is a sentence that assists people in making up their minds by making wonder what kind of people they actually are, by reducing their choices and allowing them to choose.
11. “I Bet You’re a Bit Like Me”
“I Bet You’re a Bit Like Me” is an opening statement that gets people to quickly agree with you.
12. “If… Then”
“If you don’t do this, then this will happen!” are conditional statements that we have heard since childhood, that most people still believe in and that will guarantee an outcome.
13. “Don’t Worry”
This phrase helps in keeping a highly stressful situation under control and improve someone else’s level of anxiety.
14. “Most People”
Putting “Most People” in front of any sentence, when making a case, makes people feel confident about their decisions.
15. “The Good News”
“The Good News” puts a positive spin on a negative situation and shifts people’s perspective.
16. “What Happens Next”
This statement explains the next stages of the interaction and leads the conversation towards a conclusion.
17. “What Makes You Say That?”
“What Makes You Say That?” maintains control over the conversation, allows the other person to openly express their objections and make a decision.
18. “Before You Make Your Mind Up”
The phrase “Before You Make Your Mind Up” is useful to make someone change their minds, switch their refusal to a potential agreement.
19. “If I Can, Will You?”
Some people find excuses or reasons why they cannot go along with the suggested idea.
Asking “If I can do this for you, will you do this for me?” opens the door for more agreement.
20. “Enough”
Finding out what someone else considers to be enough can encourage them to agree with you or your concept.
21. “Just One More Thing”
The words “Just One More Thing” allow the continuation of the conversation and the introduction of an alternative idea.
22. “A Favor”
People secretly wish that someone would do them a favor and make their lives easier.
Therefore, when someone ask them for a favor, people oftentimes commit to the task at hand or tend to agree with the idea.
23. “Just Out of Curiosity”
“Just Out of Curiosity” provides clarity on the other person’s thought process.
Review
In Exactly What To Say: The Magic Words For Influence andImpact, after years of studies, Phil M. Jones shares the chosen words that are able to create results, help influence and direct conversation. These 23 magical phrases could be used personally and professionally, in all areas of leadership, negotiation, and sales.
This book is recommended for people who:
Regularly speak for a living, who want to change the way they speak and are serious about their personal success.
Want to know what to say, how to say it and to whom in every situation.
Always wish to be prepared for almost every conversation.
Exactly What To Say: The Magic Words For Influence and Impact by Phil M. Jones is a demonstration of the power or words and the reason why they have to be used carefully.
Let me know below what you think about this book!
Favorite quote(s)
The subconscious brain is a powerful tool in decision-making because it is preprogrammed through our conditioning to make decisions without overanalyzing them.
Success in life and business is rarely achieved without the support of others. If you can do things that allow other people to help you achieve your goals, then the chances of you reaching them significantly increase.
Smart Thinking is effective reasoning that requires the filtering of information.
Needless to say, Smart Thinking helps you become successful at work and in your everyday life.
What is Smart Thinking?
Smart Thinking combines the way:
You reason and comprehend the complex world that you live in.
You access information, process information, analyze and express your ideas and critical thoughts.
You clearly communicate, present, classify and structure these ideas.
You illustrate these ideas.
You adapt your ideas to your audience and persuade them.
You understand someone else’s idea.
You discern useful information, sort out and understand general information.
You assess, make decisions, solve issues and predict the future based on your experiences, assumptions and biases.
What is required in Smart Thinking?
Smart Thinking requires information and the proper use of claims
A claim is a written or spoken statement, true or false, that expresses the view of the world.
Therefore, claims are descriptive, reserve positive and negative value judgement.
To properly reason, claims are linked together and must be carefully structured.
How to reason effectively?
Reasoning effectively means avoiding errors, internally evaluating arguments and thoughts before expressing them.
In effective reasoning, clear, well-formed, well-founded and truthful claims are welcomed and are easily accepted by an audience.
To reason effectively, you must start with claims that are more acceptable and end with those that are less acceptable to an audience.
“Reasoning is not about answers […], but about the process of making answers more acceptable by giving appropriate reasons for them.”
Furthermore, using expertise, accurate examples or authoritative sources is a way to solidify a claim and make it more acceptable.
Another way to reason effectively would be to remain in control of your claim, aware of the context of the claim and believe that your claim is true before sharing it with an audience.
The different types of reasoning
There are five types of reasoning.
1. Causal reasoning
Causal reasoning employs common sense and allows reasoning from cause to effect.
2. Reasoning from generalization
Reasoning from generalization explains how a general event impacting general population leads to another event.
3. Reasoning from specific cases
Reasoning from specific cases takes specific events and provides a conclusion.
4. Reasoning from analogy
Reasoning from analogy uses an analogy to a given case to draw conclusions about that case.
5. Reasoning from terms
Reasoning from terms used the meaning of words from a given context.
Review
Smart Thinking: Skills For Critical Understanding And Writing by Matthew Allen is a roadmap to critical thinking and analytical skills which are heavily required leadership.
Taken from practical experiences and Australian History, Matthew Allen explores the philosophical concept behind language, the importance of words, critical thinking and the reasoning process.
Matthew Allen teaches us ways to make our reasoning strong and effective. He shares the analytical structure of reasoning and consolidates every single one of his theories with exercises and comprehension tests in every chapter.
In addition, his book and examples are socially conscious when it comes to the treatment of Aborigines in Australian History.
Furthermore, Smart Thinking: Skills For Critical Understanding And Writing by Matthew Allen is not the type of book that I’m used to reviewing. However, I recommend it for leaders seeking to build remarkable leadership and critical thinking skills.
After reading this book, you will want to consider issues in depth and within context, be smarter about the messages you convey, avoid making assumptions and make well-founded claims.
Let me know below what you think about this book!
Favorite quote(s)
Reasoning is something we already do: all of us have be learnt, in one way or another, to think and to reason, to make connections and see relationships between various events and attitudes in our world. So, being a smart thinker is not about becoming a different sort of person, but about improving skills that you already have.
It is our responsibility to understand what is happening in society and to act where necessary to conserve or change, to get involved, to make things better, and to fight injustice. We can only pick our way through the complex tangle of opinions, assertions, ideas, and assumptions that make up the dominant social world in which we live.
We should never assume that there can be only one right view; we should not, in turn, presume that all views are right.
What makes assumptions dangerous is not their content […] but, rather, that they are not consciously considered and tested to see if they are correct.
What any one individual knows about world is extremely limited. People tend to be experts in certain small areas and ignorant in many others; their detailed knowledge is often applicable only in limited situations.
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