Day 16 - Interpersonal Skill

Picture credit - Cassandra Mainiero

Day 16 - Interpersonal Skill

What is Interpersonal Skill?

Interpersonal Skill is an ability to recognize and understand other people’s moods, desires, motivations, and intentions. 

These skills are part of interpersonal skills - negotiation and conflict management, assertiveness skills, refusal skills, influencing/ persuasion skills, networking and motivation skills

How to improve Interpersonal Skill?

Set a goal to become a go-to person by mastering the art and science of Interpersonal Skill. 

Follow the LAST model to build your personal brand as a Guru of Interpersonal Skill. 

1. Learn - Invest time in learning different models/ techniques of Interpersonal Skill 
2. Apply - 
• Identify a model suitable to you
• Create a template to document the flow of the process
• Find opportunities to use the selected method/ template
• Maintain record/ process flow of every important Interpersonal interaction you did
• Maintain notes of your thoughts/ insights/ failures/ challenges…. to be used for sharing/ training others
3. Share - Share the insights captured in step 2 above in a planned manner (social media posts, blogs, videos, study notes…)
4. Train - Generate opportunities to train your peers and team members so that, over time, your organization benefits from your efforts

My learning for the day

Source - How to Express Feelings... and How Not To

Author - Susan Heitler

Do you think WE hold the power to generate a caring and empathetic response? Yes we do. 

Here are the two statements (feelings) and responses to the feelings. Your vote goes to? - 

A - “You make me feel unattractive.” (Response by A’s spouse - “Well, that’s because you make me feel terrible.”)

B - “I feel unattractive.” (Response by B’s spouse - “I’m so sorry you feel that way. I probably could tell you more often how much I appreciate you”)

Expressing feelings (effectively) is a great interpersonal skill. 

Knowing how to express feelings tactfully is vital if you want to feel close to people and to sustain your relationships.

Saying what you feel can intensify your connections—or wreck your relationships.

It is amazing how one small word ‘that’ can convert a ‘feeling’ into a ‘thought’ in the listener's mind. The word ‘that’ indicates that what will follow is going to be a thought (a dry piece of information, coming from the brain), NOT a feeling (a call from the heart).

Impact of the sentence starting with “You make me feel…” - 

1. “You make me feel…” comes across as an accusation or a statement of blame—not a statement of your feelings

2. “You make me feel…” is disempowering

3.“You make me feel…” invites counter-accusations

4. “You make me feel...” is based on a misunderstanding about what triggers feelings

5. “You make me feel…” focuses you on the listener, taking your focus off the person you are responsible for understanding - yourself

Three great ways to express feelings - 

1. Anger invites defensiveness. If your feeling is “mad” or “angry,” calm down before you start talking. An angry voice invites an angry voice in return

2. Choose a word other than a word from the anger family (e.g. I am mad, I am exasperated, I am irritated…). Choose something from sad, scared… families. You will be heard without defensiveness

3. Begin with “I feel…” “I felt…” or “I have been feeling…” For example, "I feel discouraged about..."

Hope this learning inspires you to check how you express your feelings. Thank Susan everytime you say “I feel” instead of “You make me feel”.

One more tip from me - whenever you hear your colleague say “You make me feel....”, stop before responding, take a deep breath, convert his/ her statement in your mind - “I feel....” and then respond. You will see magic happening. 

Send Susan’s article to the person the next day. You will see magic happening again.  

Purpose of this document

I took a 66 day challenge to study Life Skills last year (10 April 2019). To my astonishment, I succeeded in studying for 66 days one skill a day. 

My objectives of learning these skills were - To strengthen my mind to face life’s challenges with ease, To use these skills in my worklife for a better performance, To use these skills in my personal life for enriching my relationships, To open new possibilities to surprise myself. 

This is my next 66 day challenge (from 10 April 2020) - To share my Life Skills learning with my social media friends. 

I pray that my toil helps you in your success journey.

What are Life Skills?

UNICEF defines Life skills as - psychosocial abilities for adaptive and positive behaviour that enable individuals to deal effectively with the demands and challenges of everyday life. They are loosely grouped into three  broad categories of skills

• cognitive skills for analyzing and using information, 
• personal skills for developing personal agency and managing oneself, 
• inter-personal skills for communicating and interacting effectively with others.

Which LifeSkills are covered?

The World Health Organisation identified these basic areas of life skills that are relevant across cultures: 

1. Decision-making
2. Problem-solving
3. Creative thinking
4. Critical thinking
5. Communication
6. Interpersonal skills
7. Self-awareness
8. Empathy
9. Coping with emotions
10. Coping with stress.

Some trivia

‘Life skills’ was never part of the school curriculum. WHO/ UNESCO mandated academia to teach these skills in all schools across the globe in 1993.

Different countries educate their children in these skills with different objectives

• Zimbabwe and Thailand - prevention of HIV/AIDS
• Mexico - prevention of adolescent pregnancy
• United Kingdom - child abuse prevention
• USA - prevention of substance abuse and violence
• South Africa and Colombia - positive socialization of children.