The Hindu Business Line : Learn how to communicate with blind people

Business people say too much irrelevant stuff: all the time, every day, to every type of person. “When you speak like this, it’s very much like filling a bucket with jelly, and flinging it at the other person, hoping some of it will stick,” writes Andy Bounds in The Jelly Effect ( www.wiley.com).

Such an approach is wasteful of effort and time, of yours and others, but there’s an even bigger problem with ‘jellying’ when you’re on the listening end: “You feel like you’re on the receiving end of a big wet, useless barrage. A needless barrage. You feel like a target, not a person.”

No, things can be better, and communication, more effective, assures Bounds. The secret ingredient to jelly-free communication, according to him, is ‘the afters’ – because the speaker and the audience have different focuses. Whereas you, as a speaker, focus on your expertise, “audience doesn’t care what you say – they only care what they are left with AFTER you’ve said it.”

Therefore, the sequence in which you present your ideas is critical to ensuring audiences engage, buy-in and, ultimately, act on what you say, explains the author. As a person blind in one eye, and with the ‘good’ eye at minus 14.5, he declares that the rules governing how to communicate with blind people are totally transferable to business, “because business people don’t see things from your point of view.”

The rules

To help, Bounds prescribes AFTER: an acronym for the five rules of communication. Rule one says, ‘Always context first’. That is, “Explain the big picture first, so any subsequent detail is relate-able to something.” For example: “You’re sitting in a large rectangular room. Your chair is positioned at the side of the room, halfway along one of the short walls. To get to the door, stand up, turn right, walk three metres – there are no obstacles between you and the door.”

The second rule reads, ‘Frame of the other person’. Meaning, “Think from the perspective of the other person; get into their skin.” Next, ‘Thoroughness’; it is key. “Expand on the relevant and important subjects, to give more detailed information.” Like, “the floor is wooden, and has a big rectangular rug on it. The rug finishes one metre before you come to the door, so you will know when you’re nearly there. It’s a double door, with both doors opening towards you.”

Rule four, ‘Extra info?’ Always ask if anything else would be helpful, so you know they have all the information they need, advises Bounds. “Don’t assume the blind person has all the information they need, just because you think they have. Remember, to assume makes an ‘ass’ of ‘u’ and ‘me’.” And, lastly, rule five is to give ‘Required info’ only, rather than fling jelly at them. “Would you like me tell you about colours, pictures on the wall, etc.?”

Right Networking

The longest chapter in the book is devoted to ‘networking’, something that happens everywhere. Alas, the exercise does not work for many people owing to ‘two biggest problems with networking’: one, people don’t work the room well; and they’re not even in the right room in the first place!

Bounds guides you, therefore, to work the room (‘meeting and impressing as many big fish as possible’) and follow up (because “the ultimate aim of networking is not to work your way round the net. Instead, it’s to arrange to have a cup of coffee with a big fish, on a subsequent date.”)

Messages that amazingly stick.

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