Marketing Your Consulting Services.pdf - epiheirimatikotita.gr

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for someone they met coming in. They are enthusiastic and will provide the most
creative energy for your projects.
Luick tip . . .
Sign up for a communication styles course. It will be the best investment
you have ever made in yourself.
Most Important: Flexibility
Knowing styles is important to improve communication and increase your impact
on others. However, the ability to adapt to others’ styles and to be flexible in any
given situation is even more important. This can’t be stressed enough for consultants
who regularly interact with many different styles. Flexibility is the invisible
shield that lets you glide with influence from person to person.
Most successful people easily move along the two continuums. This is called
flexibility. Flexibility is your ability and willingness to adapt to the situation, as well
as to the individuals with whom you are communicating. You can be flexible or
inflexible. Imagine a sheet of ice between you and another person. If you are highly
flexible, the ice is smooth and slippery, making it easy to glide to another person’s
comfort zone. If you are not very flexible, the ice is rough, making it difficult to
glide to another’s comfort zone. Let’s consider what it takes to be flexible.
There are many characteristics to consider when describing flexibility. We have
selected ten of the most important. You will see that some of these may be more
natural to some styles than others. For example, it would seem that analyzers and
collaborators have a tendency to be better listeners because they do more asking.
Of course, you realize that just because they aren’t “talking,” it doesn’t mean that
they are listening!
As you examine the list of flexibility characteristics that are described below,
you will probably recognize that they are all skills required of consultants, whether
or not they are using the communication styles model.
Listeners Flexible people are naturally good listeners. This is probably not due to
learning and practicing listening skills, but because they genuinely like to listen to
others. Flexible people ask questions and are interested in others’ answers. In fact
Marketing Your Consulting Services