E228 | How to Choose the Right Platform for Your Message

What is your first thought or reaction when you get this text message?

“That’s fine.”

The sender could have meant “I agree with everything you just said/ suggested,” or “I have no opinion and will have no problem with the option you’ve chosen,” or “that’s the dumbest thing I’ve ever heard but I’m going with it because I don’t care to contribute to the decision.”  The issue with text messaging as the medium is that without any other incoming information, the receiver simply can not tell what the sender really means.

This is just one aspect of communication that must be considered when choosing the correct medium for your message.

Today’s episode will answer and discuss these popular questions:

• What is meant by “medium” and what are the different types?
  • Presentational, Representational,  and Technological/ Mechanical         
• How do I know which is the right one to use so I don’t give off the wrong impression?
  • Social Presence and Media Richness
• How do I teach my teen (or anyone) to understand and apply this?

Also mentioned in today’s episode was E126: Eight Obstacles to Building Buy In.

If you want to learn more about all things communication, NOW is the perfect time to check out any of our 3 online courses!  We are excited to announce that Bought In, ValuED, and Blindspot are all on sale starting July 1!  Just use the code GROW30 to get 30% off!

 

Today’s episode is brought to you by our loyal partners Dynamic Fitness & Strength + Momentous! 

 

Dynamic is our go-to equipment partner. Fully customizable and manufactured in the heartland of America- if you’re looking to outfit your home gym or weight room visit mydynamicfitness.com to get started. Tell them Brett and the Art of Coaching Team sent you!

Speaking of achieving performance, recovery and health at the highest level, we’d be remiss not to mention our greatest partner in the space- Momentous. Check out their entire line of protein and supplements at livemomentous.com and use code BRETT15 at checkout for 15% off!

Brett Bartholomew  0:11  

If you think back at some point in your career, we all know what it feels like to be looked past glossed over or undervalued at some level, whether it’s a job, he didn’t land, a promotion you didn’t get, or somebody just gave their business to somebody that isn’t really as dedicated to the craft as you are, at times, I don’t know about you guys. But when these things happen to me, it left me wondering why doing the right thing, the right way, always felt like such an uphill battle, especially if we don’t want to have to resort to things like incessant self promotion or being on social media all day. And the fact is that self promotion, putting yourself out there in any way, shape, or form can be a really uncomfortable topic and thing to do for many. But the fact is, we also know that at some level, we want our work to make an impact people be have to be able to find it, they have to be able to hear about it. So what if I told you that you don’t have to feel shame or guilt for doing this. And more importantly, what if I told you that there is a right way to go about doing this, where you don’t have to resort to countless hours on social media, you don’t have to come up with some scheme or some way to get attention that doesn’t feel authentic to you. There are a lot of strategies that you can do these things in an authentic way that gets into the hearts and heads of your dream audience. So like I said, this is something I’ve had to deal with a lot from writing a book, starting a business and gaining clients across 22 different industries. 

 

And so I’m going to be sharing my playbook with you. So on Tuesday, June 28, I am hosting a free virtual training, where I’m going to teach you a few things well five so technically not a few. One, how you can really understand the key to overcoming guilt associated with self promoting and any imposter phenomenon you might be feeling so that you can make the impact you want two I’m going to be outlining five tips for authentically and ethically sharing your value and worth and being able to do so in your voice. Not trying to sound like somebody else not trying to mimic somebody not doing something scripted and dry. Three, what to say to naysayers and friends who question why and how you’re putting yourself out there. Now I know some of you might feel like well, I don’t really need that. I don’t care what people say, Yeah, you do. Because most people really aren’t scared of self promotion. If they’re honest, they’re scared of failure. They’re scared of being blacklisted. They’re scared of what their colleagues are gonna say. So we’re gonna mention these things we’re going to talk about, I’m going to share some stories my life, for I’m going to give you ways to spot fakers and pretenders. So you don’t get caught up falling into the same category. And that’s important, you may feel like you know how to see him and all that. But remember, your audience may not, you want to make sure that you do everything in your power to ensure that you are not coming across like them. And then finally, like I said, we’re gonna go over Strategies for Growing Your visibility and impact without relying on social media. That’s something that’s near and dear to my heart. If I didn’t have a business, the truth is, I’d probably not be on social media. I love the way it allows me to connect with people. But we’re always going to share our most in depth, high quality content here on the podcast, or in our live courses or our digital workshops. Because those are just areas that we can go more in depth doesn’t mean that we don’t care about our social media followers. But it just means that if you follow me on those platforms, it’s usually more who I am as a person and all my weirdness. 

 

So to learn all this, all you have to do is go to artofcoaching.com/impact. Again, that’s artofcoaching.com/impact. And once again, it’s absolutely free. We’re all busy cut the excuses. This is a live training. If I didn’t think it was important, I wouldn’t take time out of my day to do this. I promise you that. So show up at artofcoaching.com/impact. And let’s continue to improve the way we lead, learn and implement at a higher level together. 

 

Support for today’s episode comes from Momentus having spent 15 years in the performance industry. I had seen and heard just about every fitness and nutritional fad come and go year after year, decade after decade, people in companies with just hot products that had a lot of unwarranted claims, no science or even third party testing to verify them. It’s a big reason why I always just kept an essentialist attitude towards any kind of supplement that I took or anything that I put in my body. But Momentus is different. When I came across them in their work through my friend Chris anto. I quickly realized that they separated themselves by taking a research backed approach. They provide time tested products that help everybody from the corporate exec, professional athlete, average college student and even pregnant mother fill nutritional gaps. Well, whether that’s sleeping, performing, recovering anything like that, and I think that’s something that’s important for us, that sort of coaching as well. And what I mean is we are so big on making sure that we cover a lot of topics that are often swept under the rug in leadership on this show, and we want to make our information applicable and usable to a wide range of people. And so we’re going to partner with people to do this Same thing, Momentus is practical. They are research bat, and they have something for everybody in your family. If that’s too much jargon for you, fine, try this. To this day, they remain the only company slash product outside of our other correspondents or athletic greens that I recommend for even my mom and dad to take. Do not take chances with what you put in your body. That’s an artic coaching listener, you can get 25% off your first purchase of Momentus by going to livemomentus.com And using code Brett 25. That’s b r e t t two five. And then you also get 15% off all subsequent orders, guys, that’s unheard of. Again, livemomentus.com Save 25% By using code Brett br e t t 25 When you sign up for a subscription

 

Welcome to the Art of coaching Podcast. I’m Brett Bartholomew. And at a young age poor communication nearly cost me my life. Now, I help others navigate the gray area of social interaction, power dynamics and communication so they can become more adaptable leaders regardless of their profession, age or situation. This podcast is for everybody who is fascinated with solving people problems. So if you’re in the no nonsense type who appreciates frank conversations, advice you can put to use immediately, and learning how others navigate the messy realities of leadership, you’re in the right place. I’m glad that you’re joining us. Let’s dive in.

 

Thanks for sitting down with me for an episode of The Art of coaching Podcast. Today we’re going to dive into something that is really going to be a timeless subject, whether you’re somebody that wants to make sure that your first second, third, fourth impression stays positive, that your message comes across in the right way. And that you are taken as seriously as you want or considered as thoughtful as you’d like to be. And it all comes down to medium meaning. It’s not just the message. It’s not just how we say it, but also the device or the manner in which we share that message. Now brief aside, if you’re new to the show, or it’s been a while, Episode 126 really deep dives into what we call eight obstacles to building buy in, where we share other components of communication, and how we need to be aware of these aspects. Otherwise, we can really screw things up in terms of getting our message across. So if you liked this episode, definitely go back and listen to this. And also a shout out to Priscilla Talman, who reached out and said, Hey, I am a teen. And I work with a lot of people that work with teens. And we’re always worrying about how can we be more effective communicators? But also how can we get our teens to realize that, if they’re sending a message via text, or they’re doing this, that it’s not always going to come across the right way. And many of you listening can appreciate that this just isn’t teens, we all know somebody ourselves included, who have sent a message via texts that really should have been said in person. Or maybe we use email for something that would have been best said in person. We’ve been thinking about it as business owners, there’s a distinct reason I don’t write a blog. We keep one here and there. But why do I choose a podcast instead of a blog or things like that? Well, because certain aspects of communication are just more context rich, there are things that I can deep dive into in the podcast, that based on my tone of voice and just the efficiency of the medium that I can get across in a much clearer or more personal way that you can’t always do so with the written word. So today, it is all going to be about the medium. And how do we know how I should send this message? What’s the best way to share this message so that it doesn’t come across the wrong way? You can also think about it as how do we just educate people on the platform they should use and how that can impact the context and meaning of what they say. So let’s dive into this just a little bit. And then I’ll give you guys plenty of examples. 

 

So in an earlier episode, the one I mentioned, I talked about contextual factors of communication. So a brief aside, of course, what we say how it’s received depends on many things. One of those the individuals we’re speaking to their age, ethnicity, the history of the relationship, the environment, where are you sharing these things physical and perceived, the message itself? The code, meaning that there’s going to be certain times that you say something, but based on the culture you’re in, there’s different shared meanings, even signs and symbolism how that plays a role. Noise Are you in a room where there’s a lot of intrusive sounds distractions, timing All of these pieces, but medium, the means that we choose to convey the message is so, so critical. Now when we think of different mediums out there, and you think about what you prefer, there are email, there’s email, there’s instant messaging, whether it’s WhatsApp, Signal, text, whatever. Of course, there’s social media. There’s virtual platforms such as zoom, Microsoft Teams, Google meet, there’s the phone, there’s face to face, right. So this gives you an example. And you can even think about it. One thing that we’ve shared on our social media before is the image of a Swiss army knife. We want to choose the right tool for the right situation. So let’s talk a little bit about this first, what is medium? What are some examples of how do I know which is the right one, so I don’t give the wrong impression. And let’s get tactical on this. 

 

So there was a great article shared in 1990, the researchers name was Fiske and he defined the medium as the particular means of conveying a message. And he said that there were really three types. Now stay with me, these don’t need to be this complex, but we’ll boil it down. There is presentational mediums. So that is our voice. That is our face, that is our body. So we can even appreciate how different forms of body language play into this. We know sign language, ESL that plays a role in how we convey a message versus just verbally. What is our body saying? Are we saying something one way with our voice, but our body’s saying something different? And we’ll do a whole episode on nonverbals another time. So there’s a presentational types of media, then there’s representational. So this could be books, paintings, architecture, photographs, of course, there are certain artists, especially those that do abstract, that they’re conveying a feeling and emotion or some kind of idea. Through art. People do that all the time. What’s art to one person is not art to somebody else. And so we can appreciate deeply how easy it is to get our communication and our message confused there. I mean, there are people their entire job is to try to postulate what was this artists thinking? What were they feeling? What were they trying to tell us? We know that we’ve heard an image is worth 1000 words, I could tell my mother, hey, we took my son Bronson to the park. And he had a great time. Or I could show her a video of Bronson on the swings, laughing having the time of his life. And you think Well, the same message may have got across but which one really had more impact. And this is why we have this society. Now that is so video and photo centric. So creative from the commercials you see, everything conveys such a stronger, such a much more impactful tone and presence. When we see that image, then of course, there’s technological and mechanical aspects. So the internet, phone, television, radio, you think of a time during parts of the 1900s, where there were no TV, so people had to listen, and they had to use their imagination, because they were listening to the radio, those images weren’t there. Now we have television, we even have virtual reality and augmented reality. And so that was really interesting. When when he broke that down, I thought, wow, yeah, they’re all of these aspects. And we’re gonna make it simpler. 

 

And going into this more, the first of these kinds of mediums that are pivotal to interpersonal communication is in their social presence, the social presence that’s afforded. Now, what that term means, according to Stephens long and McClintock in 2018, is that is the degree to which the medium is experienced as sociable, warmth, sensitive, or personal, creating that impression, that the person communicating is real. That is what social presence is. So when you think about what medium do I want to use? Is it text? Is it email, you have to think well, what’s the message I’m getting across? Who am I trying to send it to? What’s our history together? What’s the background? You see how this starts getting layered? No different than a cake? I want to bake a cake. Do I have access to an oven? What kind of ingredients do I have? What kind of health concerns Why do I need to substitute some things? You think of this the same way? So you want to choose things that let’s say I don’t know somebody super? Well, it’s the first time I’m communicating with them. Or maybe even it’s an issue where we had a disagreement the last time I communicated with them, and I want to convey that I’m sorry, or even if you’re getting ready to submit your resume, but you want to stand out a little bit more. Utilizing mediums that have a higher social presence are always going to be better. They drive more meaningful connection and social presence could be a phone call. It could be me calling and saying hey mister so and so. I understand that you have a lot of applicants and I submitted my resume this morning. But I just wanted to drop you a personal line to say, once again, thank you for the consideration. And if there’s anything else I can do to clarify, or bring more value to you never hesitate to let me know, boom, that could be an issue, or a situation when we have people applied art of coaching, we want them to also send a video because a resume by itself is informative. But there’s not a lot of social presence there. And if they just call us well, there needs to be appropriate barriers. So sometimes we say, hey, just give us a two minute video, let us get to know your personality, anything like that. Now, it certainly doesn’t always have to be voice or vocal or visual. We often send handwritten notes. Think of the difference between a handwritten note. Even though my handwriting is horrible, we believe in sending handwritten notes with wax seals, that has a higher social presence than just sending somebody a thank you email. Now, it doesn’t mean you can’t send a thankful email, we’re just trying to help you guys understand that you need to decide no different than the food on your plate, I’m hungry for blank, there’s many different options of it, should I get it fried blackend, whatever, you have to consider these things more deeply. If I’m meeting somebody for the first time, looking them in the eye, talking face to face, shaking their hand, is always going to have a more impactful presence in that relationship. Of course, there’s times where you can’t do that. But let me continue to go on. I’m just trying to give you some examples. 

 

Another aspect of that is media richness. Now, this is a similar concept. And this just suggests that media differ in the wealth of information that they carry. So that’s another reason things like face to face, or me doing this podcast, instead of writing an email or a blog that has higher media richness, I can share so much more information on this podcast than I could a blog. And it’s so much more digestible. Because again, you can think about what you hear you hear the tone of my voice, I can speak at more words per minute, you can listen to this podcast in a variety of situations in your life, where this was a blog, we lose some of that voice, we lose some of that richness. And plus, you might even just open up the blog and see, you know, 10 paragraphs, which really might only be a 10 minute podcast, and you might decide I’m not reading that that’s too much information. So I love the podcast, because it has an aspect that affords more social presence, you guys get to hear that I’m a real person. And there’s also more media richness, it is the wealth of information they carry. If you’re in a nutrition, think of media richness, almost as nutrient density. So I could eat two different things that essentially have 80 calories, let’s say it’s a handful of chips, or an apple, and I portion them out. So it’s both 80 calories. Well that Apple has more nutrient density packed into it, that is akin to media richness. So once again, if you think I have a message I want to convey, you then have to decide how should I convey it, zoom phone, text, email, social media, face to face? And then you have to think well, what’s the impression that I want to give off? What’s my relationship with this individual? You start going down this cascade chain, and then you think, oh, okay, I’m going to use this. 

 

So I’ll give you yet another example. There are times where we will get tremendously long questions sent to us in a DM and social media with very little context. 

 

One of the reasons we’re able to bring you free content like this is due to the support of our partners like Athletic Greens. Now, frankly, I always hate when podcasts waffle on. And the host clearly reads from a script, despite likely having never even used the products that they’re talking about in the first place. Rest assured that is not the case with us. Athletic Greens is something I now take every day to try to combat the loads of stress I have in my life right now, due to simultaneously running a business, being a dad working on my new book and trying to finish my doctorate. I know I’m a genius to try to do all those things at once. Huge nightmare, but we’re going to continue to push through. So what is it? Well, it’s a powder that provides 75 high quality vitamins, minerals, Whole Foods source superfoods, probiotics and adaptogens. All in all, which support your gut health, nervous system, immune system recovery and focus. When I heard about this originally, I remember most people saying they mix theirs with water, which is what my wife does, but if I’m being honest, I generally mix mine in milk or water with a scoop or to a protein powder. I mean that just helps cover a lot of gaps. Whether I’m traveling or anything like that you never really know if you’re going to get enough protein let alone the vitamins and minerals and everything else that Athletic Greens provides I would also use to have to take multivitamins, fish oil, all these things with me. They cover all of This stuff, it’s not complicated, it does not require you buying 30, other pseudo supplements to go with it, and they have travel packs that I can use on the road. So regardless of where I am in the world, I can ensure I buffer any nutritional gaps. With me, it’s very straightforward. And you guys get a great deal with them, it is unheard of if you just go to athleticgreens.com/coach. Again, athleticgreens.com/coach, they are going to give you a free one year supply of immune supporting vitamin D, and also five free travel packs with your first purchase. All you have to do is go to athleticgreens.com/coach. And anything you buy, you get those other things for free of free here, long supply of vitamin D, and also five free travel packs, check them out now we’re grateful for their sponsorship

 

there are times where we will get tremendously long questions sent to us in a DM in social media with very little context. So not only is somebody choosing and there’s a reason for this, I get it. So don’t get offended. Not only may somebody say, hey, I want to ask Brett or the art of coaching team a question, great. I’m going to choose social media to do this. So they send a message through DM that we may or may not see. And then they may give very little to no context. And this happened the other day somebody asked me a phenomenal question. But it was about you know, essentially they were working with somebody that is having some struggles psychologically, and they’re trying to help them find the best resource to help them. But they didn’t give that much information about that individual. And I also don’t know this individual or that individual, and they wanted a deep, deep answer. And so inevitably, those things are going to lead to pretty general replies not because we don’t want to help but because they’re choosing an aspect, a tool, a medium that has low social presence, doesn’t give me a whole lot of information, right as like, it’s not a very personable way to communicate. And then they’re not giving much written context over a poor media rich circumstance, right? So that’s usually where we say, hey, we’d love to get to know more about you and the situation. Let’s hop on a phone call, or why don’t you look at our mentoring services. And let’s set up a series of meetings. Now you could think, oh, that’s just because you want to make money, guys. Sure we run a business. But no, it’s because that’s almost like telling a doctor without giving them much information at all, or them getting to know you that you just expect them to give you a prescription. And you hope that it works out that well. 

 

Now remember, people don’t get a lot of education on this. So we don’t look at people that do that as less than we don’t think that they’re unprofessional. This is just something most people, aren’t thinking of. It’s almost akin to my early days on social media, when somebody would say I want to hear all of your thoughts on blank. And I’m sitting here thinking, okay, and at this time, you couldn’t access Instagram on my computer, this person essentially wanted a very in depth dissertation like reply, and I’m like, I am not going to sit here on my phone, and type all this out. And that was a huge benefit to me writing the book, or why we do the podcast, and we can send people information, these things have higher media richness. Now let’s pause for a moment and just think of one other big, duh reason why it’s important. The world is moving faster than ever. And we get so much conflicting information left, right and center. It pays to be specific. It pays to be social in a high level it pays to be warm and context rich, you have to think about these things. Think of all the time you have seen a tweet or you got an email that you read in the wrong tone. Or maybe somebody sent in the wrong tone. And it created all these distractions and emotions that cost you your time and your feelings. So that is again, why you have to think about this. talking to somebody face to face will always provide a greater richness of social cues and a fuller experience to the individual than messaging or emailing. Right. So you want to choose the most suitable medium, dependent on those range of factors. 

 

Now, I’m going to give you another example where this face to face and things like that aren’t always the case for best examples. In our company, we have a communication medium hierarchy. So of course we all preferred mediums, but as a business, there are certain things that we just have to utilize regardless of their media richness, or social presence. For example, let’s say we are interacting with an attorney about a subject it, or let’s say, Yeah, let’s just keep it there. When we’re communicating with them, we might have some phone calls for the initial discussion. But if we need to actually present them with evidence, or we need to talk to them about a complaint or whatever E is for evidence, it pays to have a written record of those things. Say you have a dispute with somebody and heaven forbid, it went to court, and they say, Do you have proof that you tried to make this right for the individual? And you’re like, Yeah, I called them on the phone? Well, unless they subpoena your phone records, you don’t have that proof? Sure, they could see that you called them on July 2 2021. But it’s much easier to say, Your Honor, yes, we do. As you can see, from the email that we sent, we said, blah, blah, blah, and then three bullet points. So for anything that is really customer service related, or and it could be as simple as saying, hey, Liz, so and so signed up for our National Apprenticeship, they had some specific questions, here you go, if I call is and tell her that I’m relying on her memory or her note taking ability. So for things like that, it’s much better to send an email for there’s specifics. There’s details, of course of the same as for receipts, legal issues, just giving you some examples here. Now, another example, where we consider the right medium is we are remote team at art of coaching. So I would love to have all of our team meetings in person, I would love to have face to face contact. Unfortunately, we can’t have that. So here’s a pop quiz, what is the next best option to just have a long email chain, going back and forth between everybody using Slack something written like that, or zoom, Microsoft Teams or Google meet? Now think about it, what will have the highest social presence and if you don’t remember, that is all about which the medium is experienced as sociable, warm, sensitive or personal? Do you describe email or slack as warm, sensitive or personal comparatively to something like zoom, where you can see that person, you can see the social cues, their body language and all that? Well, of course, video, it doesn’t matter what we think about zoom, what you’re comparing here is video versus written, when you’re trying to one get a lot of information across in a short period of time, in a staff meeting, aka media richness, two you want to forge some kind of connection with those individuals, right, and then three, you want to make sure to hear the tones and all those social cues. So in that case, even though in person would be best, zoom or something that shows us it could be FaceTime, or anything like that is going to be better. And then if you did have to choose Sure, I mean, I guess slack, but that is not really much of a choice. We also use this because and by this I mean video, we’re very conscious of the fact that as a remote team, we do not always want to have our meetings, over zoom, have to feel so just stuffy or they’re always about work. So we use another app. It’s called Marco Polo, where we use for water cooler interactions. So if I just want to share with Ali, what I’m making for lunch, or she wants to share something going on in her personal life, this is more for staff camaraderie. Again, she could call me and talk to me on the phone. And that’s great. She could show me pictures. But in Marco Polo, all of our staff can see what each other is up to. So we have specific mediums, even for like you look at video for staff, media, or staff meetings, and then also ones simply for casual staff interactions to try to build that rapport. 

 

Now let’s stop here for a moment and think of something else. Let’s say you’re sending somebody a text and you’re like, Hey, Brett, the only option I have here is text. Okay? Well, you could send just a standard text. But most texting solutions, whether you have iPhone, Android, whatever, will allow you to do some kind of audio message or voice note. Now these have inherent pluses and minuses as well. There are some times where I might be traveling or, again, it’s just a more nuanced conversation, it’s not as simple to just text it out. Or it might take a lot of time. Heck, it could just be me not wanting my son to see me typing out some long texts. Or I will use an audio note. And it may sound like this. Hey, Ali, it’s Brett, pardon the audio note intrusion. Just wanted to send you a quick reply. And it’s going to be more efficient here than written. Here’s my three responses to what you said, boom, boom, boom, by the way, great question. Keep it coming. Think about the difference of what you heard with the inflections in my voice, and how quickly she could read that versus the amount of time it would send me to just type that out. Blah, blah, blah. Now, you might say, Brett, that’s all well and good. But what if she can’t remember those three things? Well, guys, you can use voice recorder apps that allow them to replay it or you can just say, you can lead off ahead of time and say, hey Ali, gonna send you a quick voice reply, have a pen and paper down didn’t want you to misconstrue the message. Very simple, very simple. So if you are a teenager listening to this, think about that as well, if you’re just brief, or you use shorthand, and there are certain kinds of, as we know, shorthands easier to use. Let’s say you’re saying talk to you later and you do TTLY. Well, hopefully, you know that if you send that to your boss, one, you shouldn’t be sending that over text two you shouldn’t send it like that over text, you can think about using voice notes. So if you’re indisposed, and you think, Okay, I can’t do face to face, I can’t do video, it’s got to be text or email, at least think about how you can raise the social presence or media richness of that. Alright, so hopefully, I’m clear. 

 

Now, let’s go into some other aspects that can help you as a business. And this doesn’t have to be as a business. This is just more examples. We think of Okay, guys, if there are urgent or time sensitive, high complexity issues, what is the hierarchy? This is for us at art of coaching, number one, face to face or direct phone call to the individual, why higher social presence, higher media richness, if our website has gotten hacked, i Yes, I might type it out to our IT guy in a following email. But I’m going to call Liz or ally or Becca or somebody else and say, Hey, here’s the situation. Here’s what we know, here’s what we need to do. Here are the follow up points. And I can call them because they might have questions. They’re gonna say, Well, how did this happen? Why did this occur? Is there anything we can do? If there’s gonna be a lot of back and forth? Okay, second, and again, this is just for us. Okay, so we already talked about face to face or direct phone call to individual. Second would be video. Remember, higher social presence, higher media richness, then third would be some kind of audio note. Third would be some kind of audio note there. Those are key pieces. Now for daily general team wide communications just so we’re not constantly pecking away at the keyboard was slack or text, we will typically use an audio note we had a group WhatsApp, sometimes we will use just group text and we’ll do audio note. That could also be Marco Polo. Then third could be like Asana, or text or slack or something like that. Where do you talk about team meetings? If it’s a business transaction, just to reiterate, remember, E stands for evidence if it’s something business related, customer service related, we need that logged, we need that log Hey, Adrianna from Croatia, was not happy with blank, she would like these three things to be explained to her. Can we please get back to her in a detailed way? So we do that Adriana gets that answer, boom, great. If it ever becomes a legal issue, we can document that we have that conversation. And it doesn’t even just have to be a legal issue. It’s just so let’s say a team member leaves. And I say I’m going to make up this name. Hey, Polina, we had this interaction with an individual two years ago, if you just search your name and email, you’ll find it archived, awesome. Anything that needs a paper trail, use email, because then if you can’t search an audio note, it’s harder to search a zoom call unless you put it on Vimeo. So you just think of these situations, and really where you want to make the biggest difference. 

 

Now, sometimes there’s something else called Channel, Channel, and medium can get blurred in the literature. And sometimes the terms are even used interchangeably as Owen Hardy talks about, but channel really refers to that which connects the people communicating, and the medium. So for example, let’s say I am giving you sending you guys an email, email is the medium, the channel is the Wi Fi that allowed me to send that email. But it doesn’t just have to be technology. One Channel, let’s say I’m talking to you guys, it’s face to face. So we know face to face, is the medium. But the vocal auditory channel is that which carries speech. Right? There’s this sound waves that carry this speech that allows you to really understand the nuances of these things. Let’s say that we’re talking nonverbal communication. And you said, Okay, Brett, we know that if somebody is doing sign language, or even if it’s a member of the military, and they’re using some form of just signing in symbolism to kind of gesture something, we know that those behaviors how I’m moving my hands, my arms, those gestures, that is the medium and it’s still face to face. Remember in this situation if I’m in front of you, but that is what they call the gestural visual channel, which facilitates nonverbal communication. So we’re seeing the gestures where it were able to see them just as sat like in the other example soundwaves carry them. If Ali is here, and she’s signaling me, hey, we’re running low on time, and she taps on her watch. And maybe we’re on Zoom. Zoom is the medium, but it’s my the gestural visual channel that is sharing that information with me. Confusing. Alright, let’s simplify it a bit more. Imagine you walk by somebody at the airport, and you get a whiff of their cologne or perfume, and it’s immaculate. Or just imagine you go into a bakery, and you smell something that is the chemical olfactory channel. So things that allow us to accommodate smell. And then of course, there is the cutaneous tactile channel, which allows us to make sense of touch or haptics. So all of these channels are typically utilized simultaneously, in the course of face to face communication or video, but they play a role as well as for those of you that are nerds out there. 

 

Okay, let’s summarize here and get it tactical once again, before we sound off. You are an individual that wants to say something to somebody, you have to think, Okay, what is the most? What, medium? Should I use to share this? You have to think well, how do you want to come across? What’s the nature of this situation? What is your relationship with this person? What are the natural constraints? Those things are going to dictate it? There is no one best way? Yes, in an ideal world, in order to decrease the amount of possible misunderstandings, face to face is best to review why it has the highest social presence, which remember, is how warmth sensitive personal individualized, is this impression or the person communicating? Then media richness? How much information can that carry within its message? So face to face? I can see your nonverbals I can hear your verbals, I get a feel free you in many different contexts. Great. If that’s not an option, then you start going down the line. You have to think, what are my login? What’s the background of the individual? where do I come across the best by the way that can happen as well. Like it’s not it’s very easy for me to say, hey, sorry for the brevity in my email. I’m in the middle of several different projects right now. If anything’s unclear, just call me. That’s fine. But you’ve met a communicated and that you’ve said that? 

 

So I want to answer Priscilla’s question directly. If I was giving this information to my son, as he grows up, I’m going to say the same thing I said to you, if he says, Dad, I’m not sure how to send this message, I want to come across the right way. I’m gonna say, well, buddy, generally, you want to think what’s going to be the most warm, what’s going to be the most personal and what’s going to decrease the chance of miscommunications being in front of somebody, because even if you flub your words, somebody’s going to be able to see, okay, they’re trying, they’re sincere. They’re working at it. And they just appreciate the fact that you showed up, well, I’m gonna say, buddy, if that doesn’t work, don’t send them a text, this is a professional contact, let’s send them an email, you don’t have that relationship. Now, once that relationship has been established, if that person says go ahead and text me anytime, again, you want to respect barriers, but then text is okay. But if my son all of a sudden says, Dad, oh, my God, there’s this issue. And there’s a problem at work. And it’s huge. And I don’t want to let them know I don’t want to be blamed for what should I do? Should I email them or call them I’m gonna say, Son, you call them again, higher social presence, higher media richness, you explain it clearly. And then you send a follow up email. 

 

So as you can see, it won’t fit well, with those of you that have this kind of. You really have this hunger for a one size fits all, it is a gray area, because it’s going to depend on a lot of different factors. But that’s everything guys, what food you should eat, I don’t know, what are you allergic to? What are your health goals? What medication should you take? I don’t know, do you need medication? Why? What’s your family history? Again, what are you allergic to, you have to personalize communication. You have to personalize it just like you do your medication, your exercise. I mean, we have a world that personalizes their coffee, more than their communication. But remember, if you want to come across as more warm, more authentic, you want to stand out more caring, and you want to decrease the risk of misunderstandings. Choose things that have higher social presence, higher media richness, face to face, video, audio, things where all this information can be carried, then go down to written. If you own a business, these things flip a little bit and we’ve given some examples. 

 

All right, I’m going to stop there. I want to know what questions you guys have about this. I want to know what questions and remember, this is all about decreasing the risk of misunderstanding By choosing the right medium, the medium is the message. Two things said the exact same way. And on different mediums can be misinterpreted or interpreted in wildly different ways. So when in doubt, go with the most media rich and socially present form. I hope this helps. I can’t wait to hear your feedback. I know it’s immediate topic. I’ll talk to you soon.

 

Oh, wait, you guys are still here. Awesome. I appreciate it. Hey, if you want more behind the scenes info, we’re going to be putting a whole lot of new things on our newsletter. So if you like behind the scenes kind of day in the life type stuff, you want raw thoughts, helpful tips, and you just are the type that likes to think more critically, go to artofcoaching.com/begin. We share stuff on our newsletter all the time that you’re never going to get on our Instagram. You’re not always going to get on the podcast. We’re really trying to create a helpful ecosystem of information here. So that’s artofcoaching.com/begin. Thanks again and be sure to tell a friend or two about the show.