CommunicationDrive

Communication is about how we interact with others - how we get our thoughts and ideas across

What is communication? We all know what it is but are we any good at it and how much does it impact on our lives?They say communication makes the world go around - well it does. Wars have been started and stopped because of good and bad communication. Many people suffer mental health issues and don’t know how to communicate their feelings to others to get help. Many people struggle to find the right words, or the right moment in which to start communication with people. We should make sure we communicate with people who may need help.

Click on a heading below and see a summary, and if you're interested you can GO and read more about it.

Click on a heading below and see a summary, and if you're interested you can GO and read more about it.

Here are some initial thoughts about communication. GO!

Here are some facts and stats  about communication. GO!

There are some basics about communicating that can make your communications more effective and are worth revisiting.  GO!

It’s not only traditional communicating these days – especially for younger people a lot is done on social media. See more and  GO!

Communicating with another person or people should be easy. We’ve been doing it for thousands of years.  But it isn’t.  The key to remember – it should be two way. GO!

When you’re talking to someone, are you hearing what they say (vaguely) or really listening to them? GO!

Why do we often fail to be understood? Even when we think we have expressed ourselves really clearly. It’s a question of style! GO!

There are systems which take communication to the next level – we don’t intend to cover this in detail here, but if you’re interested in having a quick look, … GO!

If you’re a visitor to our site you can join and download information, assess your own health and create your own action plans, and even contribute to our site.  GO!

We have a video and a testimonial then some ideas on next steps you can take. GO!

We have some additional information and stuff on this subject. GO!

Some Initial Thoughts

Important in relationships

In work relationships and family relationships personality and communications come high on the list of what cause breakdowns. It’s her/his/their personality - she/he/they are so hot-headed they only half-listen to what you have to say and then they respond with the first thing that comes into her/his/their head, full of emotion and lacking in clarity.

We also consider group communications

Communication is not just about having a conversation - it's much more than that. In CommunicationDrive we focus on personal communication in the main but provide a section on speaking in groups.

This is a HUGE subject which we’ve broken down into sections which you can visit 

Facts About Communication

teenagers
30 %

in a survey in 2012 30% preferred face to face communication -in 2020 it had dropped to 30% with text and social media taking over

of teenagers
40 %

40% teenagers had smatrtphones in 2012 – it’s 92% in 2020

teenagers
75 %

75% teenagers used facebook in 2012 – it’s less than 15% in 2020

employers
1 %

in England reporting difficulty in finding employees with an appropriate level of oral communication skills.

Communicating Effectively

Humans have been communicating since caveman days. Some would say communication hasn’t got much better since then! Back then there was a basic structure but without having complex lives. Today the basic structure is still there but humans have much more complex brains and lives.

It seems to be a given that humans can communicate but that is just not the case. We also do not have specific training at school or university regarding communication, it’s merely a by-product in that we need to communicate our subject matter. There is no formal training. In recent times organisations are sending their potential managers on courses for communication, and communication is often on a competency-based interview.

So why are some so good and some so bad? Well, it’s all down to personality, character, social background and upbringing. There may be genuine mental health issues causing a person to have difficulty expressing themselves but generally it’s the personality etc.

We may have come from a household that is reserved or loud and boisterous. Either group could under- or over-communicate. With training and guidance, you can learn not only to communicate effectively but also learn better ways to get your message across that you previously hadn’t thought of. These include the ability to talk and give out a clear message and the ability to understand the recipient of the message and do they understand it.

There are also prejudices people may hold that will stop them from receiving and understanding your message, even though it’s right and good. These include racism, ageism, sexism, they may just hate you, they don’t trust you, they are from a different class.

social media universe

Social Media

For years social media was quite a "nice" concept - starting with school reunions and ending up as Facebook keeping families and friends in contact while geographically separate..

Nothing much happened - headlines such as "Even President Obama Thinks That Facebook Isn't Cool Anymore" - Techcrunch 2014 meant that no-one took social media that seriously.

Then Donald Trump used Twitter to publicise his Presidency, TikTok caused international stress between USA and China and the Cambridge Analytica data scandal rocked the world.

Now social media is in everyone's mind. Running these platforms is suddenly quite fraught, as Governments try to apply pressure to manage content better. Elon Musk's purchase of Twitter has highlighted changes. In the UK social media was blamed for the suicide of 14 year old Molly Russell for enabling "horrific" content to be accessed by children. The children's commissioner for England accused social media companies of losing control of their content.

Most platforms are US- or China-based - the only exception is Telegram (Dubai-based created after Russian founders left the country). Meta own Facebook, WhatsApp, Messenger and Instagram and their only real competition is YouTube (owned by Alphabet) and the Chinese ecosystem with biggest players Tencent and ByteDance

For the full article see Visual Capitalist on the Social Media Universe

Communicating in dialogue and conversation

Communication is the backbone of our society without it things would collapse in chaos. However, often there are real issues in communications. Simply, these can be two-fold: what you're communicating and how you do it, and the way this is received.It's worth looking at each of these aspects ina bit more detail.

Active Listening

Active listening is as important as talking

Big talkers are often not good listeners. Sometimes it’s due to personality and character, other times it’s because someone is not a competent communicator. Good listening skills are as important as talking. Making sure that the conversation flows is so important, having a balanced chat and allowing each person to express themselves is a skill in itself. We take talking and communicating for granted therefore we don’t think of preparing in advance, as you would for a meeting. But it is worth learning to stop yourself and learn some simple techniques.

Here are a few tips:
• Listen because you’re interested. When you listen with the intention to understand, you listen with an open mind.
• Try not to interrupt especially in the middle of the other person’s point.
• Give yourself time to process what you’ve heard. You cannot listen and be prepping your reply at the same time, so wait.
• Repeat back and clarify what someone is saying.
• Try to focus on the conversation and limit distractions, put your phone to one side
• Maintain good eye contact.
• Use your body language to show you are listening. Lean in to the conversation.
• Get curious, by asking more questions
. • Put yourself in the other person’s shoes.
• Try not to over trump someone else’s story. Once is ok, twice is acceptable, but never constantly trying to out tell a story bigger, better, stronger.

Communication Styles

Why are we misunderstood?

We often fail at communication because we don’t put the effort in to having a conversation. Humans talk without thinking sometimes, it’s basic instinct.

Personality, Character, Attitude, Style, Approach, Culture, Race, can all impact and have an effect on communication style. People might be brilliant communicators in terms or oral presentation but if the recipient of the message doesn’t like your style or approach they won’t listen.‘Chalk and Cheese’ as the saying goes; the lively , dynamic, vibrant fast talking clear communicator will be ineffective in a group of accountants, who will switch off. The same stereo types would apply to a room full of sales people been addressed by an Actuary wishing to talk stats. These are simple examples but it’s not just about what we say, it’s how we say it and the approach we take.

Take our communication style questionnaire and see how you get on.

Communication - Advanced

Do consultancies and high level sales organisations offer special training in communications?

Of course they do. When the value of a sale is in the millions, it is worthwhile giving the people responsible for completing these sales every possible advantage. That includes in-depth training in every aspect of communicating and selling.

This includes all the basic information you've seen so far in terms of communications, and also the ability to understand the different personalities involved in the process. Not only to understand them ,but to know the best way not only to communicate with them but the best way to influence them. A well known phrase in this world is:

Communicating without a desired outcome is like travelling without a destination.

Knowing the outcome is important and keeps focus on what to say, what to look for after it's been said and what to change as conversations develop. In this world, continued resistance to the message being put out is a comment on the presenter, not the person responding. It is seen as showing a lack of flexibility.

Neurolinguistic Programming or NLP

Technically Neurolinguistic Programming is a model of communication that focuses on identifying and using patterns in the thought processes that influence people's verbal and non-verbal behaviour as a means of improving the quality and effectiveness of their communication.

There is a huge body of work in this area. Simply, NLP tries to detect and modify people's unconscious 'map of the world'. Yes, that's right, it said 'modify'. Isn't that a bit like hypnosis or brainwashing - not really, as it's just better communication through use of language and sensory systems (hearing, visual, etc), but it is aimed at changing someone’s thoughts and behaviours to help achieve desired outcomes for them.

Possibly the best way to consider it is to think of it as understanding people (much) better. In one way It is easier to communicate with those people that are like us. The ability to influence those who are not like us is the difference that makes the difference.

We don't propose to cover this in any detail here but there will be an expert who help if you're interested.

For visitors

Why don't you join us?

You can register to join us as a member, when you’ll be able to download our stuff and comment, or as a YouDriver when you’ll also be able to check your health and set up your own action plans to make some improvements.  If you’ve already registered, sign in below. Or let us know what you think.

How to improve your communication skills

Improve your communications skills

Linda Raynor explains 4 steps to improve your communications skills

"I used to think communication was the key until I realized comprehension is. You can communicate all you want with someone but if they don’t understand you, it's silent chaos."
Unknown

Next Steps

It doesn’t matter what stage  you’re at – it’s important to be the best you can be.  At the end of the day it’s about taking personal responsibility – You Drive!

It’s really your choice. You can find out more information about the subject, or see other institutions that can help by going to Support. There you will find organisations, training, coaching, self-help courses and other items to support your personal change. We have also started developing a panel of experts to provide info, advice, help and support. 

Get Support

There are times when you need some help to meet your aims –  a helping hand. That might be  an organisation that can provide you with some help,  some specialised information, a particular book or tool to help, or just getting some background reading material.

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More information

4 Essential Keys to Effective Communication in Love, Life, Work–Anywhere!

Including the “12-Day Communication Challenge!”

What if a few simple skills could radically improve your life, marriage, and ALL your relationships?


Go to Amazon

The Art Of Marriage Communication

Communication Habits That Will Kill Your Relationship And How To Do It Better

Are you frustrated with your relationships falling apart when life and other commitments get in your way?

Do you feel like no matter how hard you try, Love is just hard for you?


Go to Amazon

The Essential Guide to Neuro-Linguistic Programming

NLP (Neuro-Linguistic Programming) has already helped millions of people overcome fears, increase confidence, enrich relationships, and achieve greater success


Go to Amazon

PositivePsychology have an article on improving comunication in relationships

Success at School help develop communications skills for work 

Improve high school children’s communications skills

Relate offer communications tips for relationships

Entrepreneur offer 14 ways to improve your skills

Tony Robbins explains how to communicate in a relationship

This is a MindTools video on Locus on Control

Stuff you might want to do regarding communication

Now you’ve read about communication and all it entails, you might want to make a bit of a statement.  Have a look at some stuff below we think has some humour value!  We may make pennies on commission, but that’s not the point really.  Click on the image to see more details.

Communications Officer tee-shirt

Behaviour is Communication tee-shirt

Communication mug

Problem solving mug

How to Talk to Anyone

All areas of health are interlinked

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Find your initial focus

You might think that physical, financial and mental health are quite separate, and for some people they are. However, often a problem in one area has a knock-on effect on others. Losing your job can lead to anxiety and depression, which can turn you to drink and impact your health.

You might have a severe issue in one area but that can lead to problems in other areas, and the people treating you for the first problem won’t be equipped to deal with these linked issues.

For example, doctors and nurses can treat you for a physical problem but can’t advise you about your job or finances.  Nor for the anxiety that comes with it, apart from prescribing some drugs, which might or might not be the best solution.

We encourage you to take a holistic view – we look at all areas and offer support across the whole spectrum.

health areas interlinked

Even this view of health is simplistic, as you’ll discover later if you go down that route.  You might want to consider overall health, or wellness or wellbeing, which include additional types of health, such as occupational health (how you are in your job).   Then there’s happiness and quality of life – how do these fit?

If you’re interested in that, click the link here to see more information.

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The Essential Guide to Neuro-Linguistic Programming

NLP (Neuro-Linguistic Programming) has already helped millions of people overcome fears, increase confidence, enrich relationships, and achieve greater success


Go to Amazon

The Art Of Marriage Communication

Communication Habits That Will Kill Your Relationship And How To Do It Better

Are you frustrated with your relationships falling apart when life and other commitments get in your way?

Do you feel like no matter how hard you try, Love is just hard for you?


Go to Amazon

4 Essential Keys to Effective Communication in Love, Life, Work–Anywhere!

Including the “12-Day Communication Challenge!”

What if a few simple skills could radically improve your life, marriage, and ALL your relationships?


Go to Amazon

Health Areas in Domains

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Domains

We break down the overall concept of health or wellness into ‘bite-sized chunks’ that we can actually do something about.  The first level we call health domains. 

We like the Life of Wellness site and we have chosen the following domains.

1. Emotional Wellness: Awareness and acceptance of feelings
2. Spiritual Wellness: A search for meaning and purpose
3. Intellectual Wellness: Recognition of your creativity, knowledge and skills
4. Physical Wellness: Need for physical activity and balanced nutrition
5. Environmental Wellness: Positive awareness and impact on your environment
6. Financial Wellness: Debt reduction, cash flow balance or financial future planning
7. Occupational Wellness: Personal achievement and enrichment from your career
8. Social Wellness: Contribution to your community

Health Areas

Within each domain, we have included a number of health areas. These are specific issues that you can tackle.  Within each health area, e.g. Depression, we have built additional information and exercises which you can do to help in the area. You can create your own Action Plan to address this area, and see

Emotional: Anxiety, Compassion Fatigue, Depression, Gambling, Laughter, Narcissistic, Personality Disorder, Sleep, Stress

Environmental: Environmental Issues, Greenness

Financial: Debt, Family Finance, Financial Planning, Financial Wellness

Intellectual: IQ, Personality, Procrastination

Occupational: Jobs for Different Personality Types, Retirement Income, Work Life Balance

Physical: Alcohol, Disabilities, Dizziness, Drugs, Fitness, Food Preferences, General Health, Healthy Ageing, Illness, Nutrition, Sleep Apnea, Smoking

Social: Communication Skills, Communication Styles, Domestic Abuse, Emotional Abuse, Love Partnerships, Mental Abuse, Parenting Styles, Sexual Addiction

Spiritual: Are You Sensitive, Mystical Guidance, Spirituality

Each health area has supporting information and its own questionnaire.

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Understand Health

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Physical, financial and mental health

One definition of health is:

Health is a state of complete physical, mental and social well-being and not merely the absence of disease or infirmity. 

The NHS define health as: ‘We use a broad definition of health that encompasses both physical and mental health, as well as wellbeing. This means we are not only interested in whether or not people are ill or have a health condition, but also in how healthy and well they are.’

We believe we also have to consider financial health, as this can easily impact physical and mental health. Click the button to see an example of how these are connected.

 It gets more complicated…

What is Health? How about Wellness, Wellbeing or Happiness?

The Active Wellbeing Society (TAWS) define Health as a state of the overall mental and physical state of a person; the absence of disease. They define Wellbeing or wellness as a way of life that aims to enhance well-being and refers to a more holistic whole-of-life experience which also includes emotional and spiritual aspects of life.  We expand on this definition of health to include financial health and mental health, to make it synonymous with wellbeing or wellness.  

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Health domains

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We break down the overall concept of health or wellness into ‘bite-sized chunks’ that we can actually do something about.  The first level we call health domains.

We like the Life of Wellness site and we have chosen the following domains.

1. Emotional Wellness: Awareness and acceptance of feelings
2. Spiritual Wellness: A search for meaning and purpose
3. Intellectual Wellness: Recognition of your creativity, knowledge and skills
4. Physical Wellness: Need for physical activity and balanced nutrition
5. Environmental Wellness: Positive awareness and impact on your environment
6. Financial Wellness: Debt reduction, cash flow balance or financial future planning
7. Occupational Wellness: Personal achievement and enrichment from your career
8. Social Wellness: Contribution to your community

wellness wheel

Health Areas

Within each domain, we have included a number of health areas. These are specific issues that you can tackle.  Within each health area, e.g. Depression, once you have subscribed we have built additional information and exercises which you can do to help in the area.

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See which domains you should address

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Having established that we use 8 domains, you need to understand which you should concentrate on.

The 8 are:

  • Emotional
  • Environmental
  • Financial
  • Intellectual
  • Occupational
  • Physical
  • Social
  • Spiritual

 

You can take a questionnaire, which scores you in each domain.  You can decide which domains you are strong in, and which you need to improve.

Another analysis shows which domains you should look at, but also which domains you want to look at.

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Locus of Control

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  • We want to help people in all aspects of their health  – physical, financial and mental. We also provide detailed explanations of how overall health (or well-being) is measured.
  • We believe these things are often linked, so we try and address health holistically. We are building templates, questionnaires and exercises to help you identify what’s important to you.
  • We think people should try and take responsibility for  of their own health as much as they can.  See below for what that means.

People look at things differently.  Some people believe things happen to them, while others believe they can influence what happens to them. Technically this is called the ‘locus of control’.  People can have an Internal or external Locus of Control

So how do you see things?

Psychology Today have a 15 minute test which gives you a summary of your position you can buy the detailed results if you want to.

My Personality Test have a 10 minute test which gives you a summary.

People tend to take more responsibility (locus gets more internal) as they get older.  However, external isn’t always bad – for example if you are physically unable to do some things you can accept it and focus on the things you can do.  This American video explains the concept and gives examples of how this can affect relationships.

locus of control

Internal

  • More likely to take responsibility for actions
  • Tend to be less influenced by others

External

  • Blame outside forces for what happens
  • Don’t believe they can change their situation themselves

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Add your attitude to change - see how you view changes in your life

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Do you need to change?

No matter how healthy you are at the moment, the chances are that there are some areas you could improve. It may be that you have a real problem in one or more areas, and you would like to make some improvements.

At YouDrive we accept that there are many different degrees of ‘not wellness’ in a large number of different health areas, ranging from physical illness such as covid-19 through mental illness such as anxiety through to financial problems like debt.  We try and help where the problem ranges from ‘slight’ to quite bad’ – after this expert help and intervention may be needed.

However, especially in these times, we have to try and make these changes ourselves, possibly with some help from others, whether remotely or face to face.

The thing is, to make an improvement we have to change some things.

This involves changing our behaviour in some respects, and that’s not always easy.

Henry Ford, the creator of the assembly line, is quoted as saying “if you always do what you’ve always done, you’ll always get what you’ve always got”.  

henry ford

Another way of looking at this: “The definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting a different result.” – attributed to Albert Einstein.

Consequently we need to make some changes.  The problem is that we have already developed a lot of habits, some of which we need to break and replace by better ones.  Some of our bad habits have become entrenched, and the bad results they create in turn engender further bad habits to develop – in effect the bad habits can feed on themselves.

We need to understand how we can make changes and stick to them, and that’s what this part of your health profile is about.

It will involve some learning, through reading, some videos and some additional information and also seeing how you react to change currently.

It will also ask you to consider whether you feel you are in charge of your future, or whether you feel it’s all fate.

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Assess your overall health using a health questionnaire

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At YouDrive we try and help people improve their health. We use ‘health’ but we understand there are other terms such as wellbeing or even happiness that reflect how we are doing in our lives – if you’re interested in the different definitions and ideas see our page on the subject.

We want to help whether you have a particular problem – physical, financial or mental – or if you just want to improve some specific part of your life or just make some improvements overall.

You’d be surprised, but there has been a serious amount of scientific work done in this area over the last twenty years.

So first we allow you to assess your current health (or wellbeing, or happiness).  We do this by questionnaire.  Which one is determined by the type of person you are:

  1. You understand yourself well and want a quick overview of your health and wellness, and will drill down in any areas needing work
  2. You want to do a more detailed assessment and then focus on areas you’re already aware of
  3. You want to look at the whole situation in more detail across all the health domains.

By the way, we take your privacy seriously – we collect information that you choose to provide but we de-identify it as much as possible and will never share it with anyone without your explicit consent.

You can then drill down into some specific areas and there are more questionnaires to see your situation in these particular areas.  We provide you with specific information and refer you to other potential aspects of help. Our next step is to build a personalised action plan – for now we will make a suggestion for you to develop your own plan and then after a time you can see whether this has had a positive impact by retaking the test.

In future we will be engaging with medical and behavioural specialists to devise action plans for individual people with specific situations.

We have an overall questionnaire which you can complete which will assess your current state.

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Values, Attitudes and Beliefs

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We all have our beliefs, attitudes and values – these have developed throughout our life based on who we are and what we have done. Let’s look at what these are.

The University of Reading explain: “People’s values, beliefs and attitudes are formed and bonded over time through the influences of family, friends, society and life experiences. So, by the time you’re an adult, you can hold very definite views on just about everything with a sense of “no one is going to change my mind”.

The combination of your personal values, beliefs and attitudes are your moral principles that guide you in life and affect your behaviour. However, your views can wildly differ to others and in an institution such as a school, these beliefs may be counter to the values of the school, child development or indeed the law.” 

Let’s look more closely at the differences between beliefs, attitudes and values.

Beliefs

These come from real experiences – we think our beliefs are based on reality, but in fact our beliefs colour our experiences; also, an original experience e.g. when we were a child is not the same as what’s happening now. Beliefs can be moral, religious or cultural and reflect who we are. They can be rational (‘it gets colder in winter’) or irrational (‘I am never going to make something of myself’).

Attitudes

This is an immediate belief or disposition about something specific. It is a recurring group of beliefs and behaviours aimed at specific groups, people, ideas or objects. They will normally be positive or negative and we will always behave that way to the target group. Examples of attitudes include confidence (I can or can’t do something), grateful (I an entitled to / grateful for XXX) and cheerful (I am generally happy / miserable).

Values

These are things (principles or qualities) that we hold in high regard or consider to be worthwhile or right / wrong. They are formed by a belief related to the worth of something – an idea or behaviour. Some values are common (e.g. family comes first, the value of friendship) or cultural (which the whole community have – see video at Study.com here)

The theory

Links to Wikipedia

Expectancy Value Theory suggests you balance your beliefs about something with the value you attach to it. The Theory of Reasoned Action suggests that beliefs and evaluation about behavioural outcomes determine attitudes, and intentions lead directly to behaviour.

Beliefs

Expressions of confidence – can change over time

Attitudes

Learned predispositions to something – are subject to change

Values

Ideals that guide our behaviour – Generally long lasting and often need life changing experience to change

Iceberg demonstrating implicit and explicit bias – from Owlcation

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A Butterfly Life: 4 Keys to More Happiness, Better Health and Letting Your True Self Shine

Times of change can be a challenge, no doubt! Whether it’s a relationship breakup, job loss, or being diagnosed with a serious health issue. Or you may WANT things to be different, but it feels a little scary or overwhelming. The butterfly reminds us change can be beautiful, even necessary, in order to realize our full potential and live our best life.