Episode 14: Read The Room: Customizing Your Communication with 3 P's | 12MinuteLeadership

Communication is the golden thread that weaves together trust, clarity, collaboration and results in leadership. I share how customizing your communication to match your audience's core motivation can transform your effectiveness and help your ideas gain traction.

• The Three Ps framework identifies core motivations: People (relational, story-driven), Performance (results-oriented, big picture), and Process (detail-oriented, structured)
• Real-life example of John, a creative director who transformed his presentations by speaking to his executives' performance motivation
• To communicate effectively, identify your audience's primary motive and adapt your message accordingly
• With people-motivated individuals, connect personally before diving into work
• For performance-motivated people, skip the fluff and lead with results
• When addressing process-oriented individuals, provide structure, detail and data
• Your ability to communicate differently with different people builds influence, trust and buy-in

Go to eliseboggs.com/core-strengths to learn more about how the three Ps can help your leaders and teams be more effective.

Follow on Instagram: @12minuteleadership

Order my book, Lead Anyone!

Chapters

• 0:00 Introduction to 12-Minute Leadership
• 1:29 The Power of Communication
• 2:56 John's Communication Challenge
• 4:16 The Three Ps Communication Framework
• 5:54 John's Success Story
• 6:35 Your Communication Game Plan

Transcript

Elise: 0:03

Welcome to the 12-Minute Leadership Podcast where, in 12 minutes or less, I'll share small things that you can put into immediate practice that will make a big difference in your leadership effectiveness. I'm your host, elise Boggs-Morales leadership professor, consultant and coach. For the last 17 years, I have helped thousands of leaders level up their influence and achieve remarkable results. If you want to trade compliance for true commitment and create your dream team, you are in the right place. Get ready for a quick hit of practical wisdom to increase your team's engagement, inspire top performance and retain your best talent. Ready to level up your influence and get better results. 12 Minutes starts now. Hi everyone, elise here, welcome to episode 14.

Elise: 0:57

Over the last two episodes, we've been exploring the three Ps people, performance and process and how understanding these core motives can help you read the room, prevent conflict before it starts and strengthen your relationships as a leader. If you haven't listened to episodes 11 and 12, I suggest listening to those first and then circling back to today's episode, because today we're going to apply the three Ps to a real life situation taken straight out of my new book Lead Anyone. I'll share the magic of how keeping these three motives front of mind can completely change how you communicate and have a noticeable impact on the results you're getting. But first I want to share this quote by Simon Sinek, author and speaker, who says Communication is not about saying what we think. Communication is about ensuring others hear what we mean. I learned this lesson early. When I was in college, I changed my major 10 times yes, 10. Eventually, I landed in communications, not just because I had some natural ability, but because I was fascinated by it. I love that two people could start with the same exact idea but get completely different outcomes just based on how they communicated it. Later, in my consulting work, I started to see this truth everywhere. Leaders, teams and entire organizations rise and fall on the quality of their communication, and that's why, in both the professional and personal sphere, I consider communication the golden thread. It weaves together trust, clarity, collaboration and, ultimately, results.

Elise: 2:45

If you tend to speak off the cuff, without much forethought, your intended message often gets misunderstood or you struggle to get people on board with your ideas. This episode is for you. Let me introduce you to John, a creative director at a marketing and branding agency I worked with. John came to me for coaching because he felt like he wasn't being heard in meetings when he presented ideas, people tuned out. He had a tendency to get overly detailed and wordy, losing people in the weeds. His natural instinct was to give every detail up front, but the executives he was pitching to, they wanted big picture, not the 40-slide breakdown. I explained to John that communication isn't a one-size-fits-all. The key is to customize your communication to your audience. And here's where the three Ps come in. So if you've been listening to the last episode, you know these well now.

Elise: 3:42

The first motive is people. Those with the people motive are relational, story-driven and connection-focused. The second is performance. Those with the performance motive are results-oriented, big picture and action-driven. And finally, process. Those with the process motive are detail-oriented, structured and accuracy-driven. If you want your communication to land, you need to identify which motive is most important to your audience and speak in that language.

Elise: 4:16

So, with John, I asked him to think about the decision makers he was presenting to. He realized they were performance oriented. They valued speed, results and a clear bottom line. So we restructured his presentation to start with a high-level overview, use bullet points for major components focused on results and impact, and only dive into details if they asked the result. The shift was immediate. At his next meeting. People stayed engaged. They asked questions. They complimented the clarity of his presentation. He hadn't changed his ideas, just the way he delivered them. Over time. John applied this approach in client meetings too. Eventually, his presentations became one of his biggest strengths.

Elise: 5:04

If you want to get results like John, here's your communication game plan. Pick one person you need to communicate with more effectively. It could be a colleague, a client or a team member. Identify their primary motive. Is it people, performance or process? Remember, if they have the people motive, they want to connect personally before diving into the work. Show them appreciation and link ideas to human benefits. If they're performance motivated, skip the fluff, keep it concise and lead with results. And finally, if they're process oriented, remember to go straight to structure and detail. Back your points with data and give them time to consider. Then plan your next interaction around their motive and then deliver and observe. Did they engage more? Were they quicker to align with your ideas? Here's the bottom line. One of your greatest superpowers as a leader is your ability to communicate in a way that resonates with different kinds of people. Is your ability to communicate in a way that resonates with different kinds of people, and when you align your communication style to their motive. The three Ps you don't just get your point across, you build influence, trust and buy-in.

Elise: 6:20

I hope you enjoyed today's episode. If you found this episode helpful, share it with someone on your team, or even listen together and discuss where you can apply the three Ps in your own meetings this week. And if you want to learn more about how the three Ps can help your leaders and teams be more effective, go to my website, wwweliseboggscom. Slash core strengths to learn more. I'll see you next time to learn more. I'll see you next time. Like what you heard on today's episode and want to go deeper? Subscribe to this podcast so you never miss an episode. You can also pick up my book Lead Anyone on Amazon. Then go to my website to check out ways that we can support your leadership goals. From executive retreats to customized training and coaching, my team of experts will help you level up your leadership and accelerate your results. Go to wwweliseboggscom for more info.