Business etiquette: How to succeed in communication 4.0
The basic rules of credible communication include presence and attention. After all, people are relationship creatures: If you don't communicate properly, you sabotage the relationship. Much is self-evident, much is a matter of education, and some is learned. For the business world, the good old etiquette manual is still used to calibrate specific rules of conduct. This also applies, and even more so, to communication. But what does business etiquette 4.0 look like?
There is currently a boom in demand for information on the subject of communication etiquette. In the course of changing infrastructures, many behaviors have emerged rather creepily that have produced certain excesses - and it is precisely these that now need to be recaptured. The big question here is how we can (once again) succeed in showing appreciation to our counterparts with style and class.
Anyone who looks into a meeting, a workshop, or any other kind of event today will be familiar with this example: Many participants have adopted an annoying behavior that is not at all like etiquette. Right at the beginning, the laptop is routinely placed on the table and immediately opened. Opening the technology is one thing. Even if it looks a bit bulky from the front or from the point of view of the manager: Man focuses on machine. It's like IT training, but it has the relational charm of a prefabricated garage.
Even during the start and the greeting, but especially during the further course of the event, this scene is continued: The eyes remain on the screen, even though people are speaking in front or even in the round or a presentation is being held. The fingers write in unison with the events - an unmistakable sign that the participants are not taking lecture notes as in the university auditorium, but are simply working through e-mails and other tasks. The whole thing is often garnished with the noise of typing. This acoustic disturbance increases when hard plastic keyboards are used and is squared again when long fingernails are involved...
Typing noise as a normal case?
At times, this seems to have become a matter of course and the norm. Is that the way it is? Is this merely the view of a supposedly stagnant mid-fifties person who, in the eyes of many, has missed the boat on digitization? No. Here, relevant forums, essays and exchange rounds of (also digital) experts speak a clear language: this is indecent per se and tends toward disrespect.
You may want to put up with such behavior, but you have to be aware that this is what you radiate and (due to feedback) it is also increasingly perceived that way. Just as indecent as making any human sounds or wearing an unwashed shirt. In principle, this has no serious consequences, but in our latitudes, especially in a business context, it triggers reactions that are not necessarily always expressed - but are perceived, thought about and noticed.
Solid studies (for example by a large insurance company) have even converted inattention into lost hours: Those who don't pay attention have to ask for more. Those who don't pay enough attention have to spend more time asking. Or didn't hear important tasks. A live test over several events showed: In a short survey on the content of discussion topics (so it's not just about possible, boring presentations), the laptop typists perform massively worse, they achieve less than 50 percent of the result of the others. The fact is: multitasking doesn't work even if you live in the digital age. Because the human brain still works identically as it once did. And you can practically always tell by looking at the person typing whether they are writing notes on live events (there is actually a small percentage of people who have this discipline) or are busy answering emails. Distinguishing one from the other is a sensorium that we now have infallibly, and even more so than many participants realize.
The closed laptop as a statement
In the meantime, there are also more and more reports from people who are bothered by this. That's why, in my roles as a speaker, trainer, or simply communicator, I've started to ban open laptops from my events and meetings unless it's absolutely necessary in terms of content or methodology. Real digital freaks use a tablet with a digital pen anyway - they stay in touch with the action, work psychomotively, and still have everything stored digitally or in the cloud.
In return, there are "office times" within a day. This means that, if the group so wishes, there is a specific 30-minute period over the lunch break or in an afternoon lull, for example, to devote to compelling business. If that is necessary. Some, however, see an opportunity to organize a day in such a way that, for once, they are not available all the time.
A closed laptop or one that remains in the bag can also be a statement. I myself experienced a meeting of an exclusive club with top-class participants. There, it is a point of honor not to check e-mails on the open laptop. It is clear to everyone in this group that this is both disrespectful and a sign of poor organization.
Don't miss a thing - especially indoors
And finally this: For some months now, the aforementioned well-known insurance company, which is by no means a small one, has simply issued a ban on laptops in meetings and similar events. On the other hand, it is also and even more important that anyone who leads a meeting or, for example, a workshop, should be so well prepared that the participants' inner urge to miss out on something outside is kept to a minimum. The quality demand in return must be high. But you could also exchange feedback about this within a setting, as long as you have closed the laptops...
Conclusion: Four business etiquette tips
Here are concrete tips that will help you communicate successfully within the framework of Business Knigge 4.0:
- Laptops should remain closed, everything else restricts the attention too much (reasons: Decency, multitasking is not possible, efficiency or avoidance of lost hours, disturbance by noise and mental absence).
- Tablets (or, of course, paper and, increasingly, so-called notebooks) make more sense for actual meeting and course notes.
- Alternatively, "office hours" can be offered on off-peak hours so that any tasks that cannot be rescheduled can be worked on.
- Speakers should also be aware that a lively meeting that is well prepared lays the groundwork for maintaining attention.
To the author:
Stefan Häseli is an expert in credible communication, keynote speaker, moderator and author of several books. He runs a training company in Switzerland. Currently, he is also writing a book under the title "Hannes managt". regular column in the print edition of the ORGANISATOR.
