Ever feel like you are speaking a different language that only you can understand? I've got some insight on a tricky thing that might be making your days a bit crazier and having you feeling like no one understands what you're saying: miscommunication.
In this episode, I'm sharing my personal experience of miscommunication at a recent event and ways to improve miscommunication.
Check out the show notes: www.realhappymom.com/222
NEXT STEPS
Grab Your Freebies: https://www.realhappymom.com
Check Out the Course: https://courses.realhappymom.com
Ever feel like you are speaking a different language that only you can understand? I've got some insight on a tricky thing that might be making your days a bit crazier and having you feeling like no one understands what you're saying: miscommunication.
In this episode, I'm sharing my personal experience of miscommunication at a recent event and ways to improve miscommunication.
Check out the show notes: www.realhappymom.com/222
NEXT STEPS
Grab Your Freebies: https://www.realhappymom.com
Check Out the Course: https://courses.realhappymom.com
Remember of a game of telephone where you tell one person something, and then they tell another person, another person, and then it comes back around. And it is totally not what was said in the beginning. Well, that's how miscommunication can be. And that's how it can be when you are sending information to someone and things are communicated incorrectly. And it just kind of ruins your day. So in this episode, I am going to be talking to you about how miscommunication can decrease your productivity, and ways that you can avoid miscommunication. Hey there, my name is Tony. And I'm the podcast host of the real happy mom Podcast, the podcast for busy working moms who need help with time management, and achieving their big goals without pulling their hair out. And fun fact about me, I have all Mac products, except for my phone, I have a Samsung phone, which I think is very funny. And in this episode, today, we are going to tackle miscommunication. So let's go ahead and jump on in. I recently had a birthday party for my oldest son, I consider myself pretty good at planning parties and actually really enjoy it all through the help of Trello. Of course, I have a Trello board that I use to plan out the party and know exactly what to do and when to do it. And it just makes life easier. The day of the party is even more fun setting up blowing up balloons, because to me, a party isn't a party unless there's balloons. And just seeing the kids having fun that always just lights me up. So we have this party, I have been planning this party for about two months and the day of the party. That's when I felt like things just came crumbling down. It still went off great, everything was fine. But there were some key things that I noticed had I have done better, it would have made things go a lot smoother. And I probably would have enjoyed myself just a little bit more. And the big thing that I found was miscommunication, was the biggest, biggest thing that was really hindering me from having a really great time at the party. This miscommunication is something that I have found is something that decreases productivity, not only for myself, but for us as working moms, at home and at work. And so I wanted to talk about this today just really quick. And just point out a couple of things. So hopefully that you can see some of the ways that miscommunication is being one of those productivity blocks in your life and ways that you can kind of clear up those lines of miscommunication and make things even better. So first thing was when we were planning the party, I talked to my mom, who is the party planning guru, I've learned from the best. And as she called and asked me, Do you need any help? Do you need me to come early? Because my mom lives two and a half hours away. And I was like, No, Mom, I'm good, I got it. All I have to do is just blow up the balloons and get everything there. I'm good. That was Strike one. I should have told her mom, I'm good. I have all the decorations, but I could use your help with setting up the room. Because setting up the room always takes me forever. I literally spent, I think it was 40 minutes setting up the room. And I had, I want to say three or four people helping me. It was a lot of stuff and a lot of going things going on. So being really specific and tell my mom exactly what I needed would have helped. Because what happened was, Is my mom came to the party, but she came right when the party started. And I needed her before the party started to help me with getting things set up. So that is the first thing when being very clear on what you need. And making sure the person on the receiving end understands exactly what it is. Because it's easy to think that you can handle everything or, you know, with you multitasking you can get all the things done. But really when you're needing help. In particular, it's very important to be very specific in what you need. So after I got over the hump of taking forever to set up the room, the kids were enjoying themselves it was just me and some of the parents. It of course my parents helping me with set up the room. The next major pitfall I found with my miscommunication was with my husband, I was telling him certain things that I needed. And I thought he understood but clearly he didn't. And one thing I found is that miscommunication can strain relationships. It can constrain relationships between colleagues, supervisors, clients, spouses, children. So that's why again, this miscommunication is one thing to really tackle and really make sure that you're paying and attention to so that you can not only be more productive, but you're not straining those relationships. So going back to me and my husband, things, were starting to get a little tense between us because we thought we were saying something, and we weren't. But I ended up coming down and being like, you know, thank you for all that you're doing. You know, I'll take that from you go enjoy yourself. And everything was all good. So now that I've shared some of the ways that miscommunication affected me, during the party, let's talk about some effective ways to communicate. So of course, I love all the digital tools out there. There are many tools that can help with making sure that you're staying on task and communicating with not only others, but also with yourself, some of the things that need to get done, or some of the things that you need to do so that you are staying productive. So of course, I already mentioned one of my favorite tools, which is Trello. for organizing tasks and projects, you can even add team members, and whether it be your spouse, your kids, friends family, on to these boards that you make within Trello, to collaborate with you. So for instance, with the birthday planning board that I had, for my son's birthday, I added my husband on so that he can see what task I needed him to do and what I needed to get done. And then we can both see where we were as far as planning and getting things done for the birthday party. So that is one really effective tool for communication. Another really great effective tool for communication, especially with spouses and kids is a Google Calendar. I know there are many calendars out there. But I love the Google Calendar for a couple of reasons. One, it can be used on Apple or Android phones, too. You can sync it anywhere, your phone, your tablet, your computer, and three, almost everybody has a Gmail account or can get a Gmail account. Utilizing your Google Calendar and syncing it with those who are important to you in your life will help with communicating where you are going to be spending your time and where you'll be throughout the day. So for instance, for me, I have a calendar that I share with my husband, he knows the days that I'm recording for the podcast, so he knows, Okay, it's time to leave the wife alone. Or when there's open locks in the day, he can reach out and be like, Hey, I see you don't have anything going on. Is it cool if we go and hang out with our friends down the street. So, again, having a Google calendar that is synced with whoever is important in your life can be really, really effective with helping with miscommunication. And actually talking to people in person, I feel like it's very, very important to be very clear, when you're communicating. Don't try to beat around the bush. Don't be extra fluffy make it sound real, pretty just be very direct and assertive is what I have found is helpful when you're communicating what you need or what you're feeling. But it's imperative to use clear and concise language, especially when you're writing. You don't want to add in too many words, because it's easy for things to get misunderstood. When you have a whole bunch of words, especially super long sentences that I like to write, you want to make sure everything is clear and concise, keep it tight. That's what I always tell myself, keep it tight. So when you're talking, make sure that you're very clear. And then when you are writing, in form of communicating, make sure that it's very clear and concise. Then lastly, I would say regular check ins is something that I think is very, very important. Doing some one on one check ins whether it be at work with team members or at home with your spouse and kids, I think it's super important to help with making sure things are checking in things are going along nicely, but also to see if there are some things that have come up that may have been misunderstood in the process. So if you're checking in regularly, you'll find if there was a miscommunication, you can correct it quickly so that things don't proceed on being communicated incorrectly. So those are some of the things that I have found helpful. I hope that this episode has been helpful for you and seeing how miscommunication really does decrease productivity, can stress out relationships and just make it really hard for you. So hopefully you have found one of the strategies that I mentioned, to help you with decreasing the amount of miscommunication in your life with the people that you love and work with and have an awesome day. So that's it for this episode of The Real happy mom podcast. To find the links and show notes head on over to Real happy mom.com/ tu tu tu. There you will find the show notes, as well as any links that are relevant to this particular topic. And make sure you stay tuned for next week for an episode that I will be having with Risa Williams. This is a really fun conversation that I had with her all about time management for busy moms, because that's one thing that you will hear a lot of different advice about. But she brings a really different perspective that I have found was very, very helpful. So make sure to stay tuned for that. And before I leave, I want to make sure that you know about the real happy mom Christmas giveaway that is going on right right now. So if you haven't already, make sure that you enter into the giveaway so that you can be one of the 12 lucky winners to win one of the awesome prizes valued at over$1,000 If you want to enter in that giveaway, make sure to head on over to Robbie mon.com/christmas. Or you can just go down to the description of wherever you're listening to this podcast episode. You'll find the link mentioned there. Alright, that's it for this week. Stay tuned for next week. Take care and with lots of love