The ability to communicate in an effective manner is an essential one for any and every healthcare professional. From communicating with patients and their families to engaging with colleagues, support staff, and administration, you must know how to present information to people of different knowledge bases.
In school or initial training, you are instructed on how to talk to your patients about their diagnoses and medical problems, but being a leader in the field of healthcare now means that you must also have effective business communication skills. These skills are certain to come in handy when you’re dealing with a wide range of more administrative tasks, such as negotiating better rates with insurance companies and presenting to hospital and facility administration.
Here are a few very practical steps that healthcare leaders and employees should take to improve the quality of their communication:
- Make communication part of your organization’s culture. – When leaders take the time to explain and model positive communication behaviors, employees will be encouraged to do the same in their communication methods. Incorporate this task in everything from employee evaluations to communicating with patients.
- When presenting information to a non-healthcare audience, carefully craft your message with the right words. – In order to communicate in a truly powerful way, be sure that the words you are using details your message in a clear and succinct way. Opt for concise language that will be understood by any audience member whether they have a background in the medical/healthcare field or not. When explaining the topic at hand, be clear on exactly what your message is and what it means to the audience members. It is best that you find the core principles of what you are trying to convey, but do not focus on delving down into the details of everything either. This would turn an hour-long presentation into a six-hour lecture. Instead, consider the audience that you are presenting this information to and try to use the details that further enforce your point specifically to them.
- Make communication training a part of your mandatory program. – Healthcare professionals of all types cannot be expected to communicate effectively without being given the tools and training to do so. Mandatory communication training should be put into effect to give all professionals the skills that they need to be able to understand the elements of dialogue with any type of audience.
Communication skills are sometimes an overlooked requirement in the field of healthcare, but they are some of the most important abilities to have in the repertoire.
If you are looking for the training needed to improve the communication skills of your employees or your own abilities as a leader, check out Communispond’s Communicating Business Value™ training. This program gives participants the skills that are necessary to demonstrate value, advance a point of view, and tailor information to the needs of a specific audience. Contact us today to learn more about our communication skills training!