When introduced or in conversation, one is expected to maintain steady eye contact. This suggests an upturned face, willingness to be direct, and to engage with the other individual.

The eye has been used to send out important signals – hence the descriptions of eyes as flirtatious, inviting, shifty, open, penetrating – or even, in some cases, as evil. There is a phrase which says someone “threw daggers” at me – to suggest use of the eye in hostile situations. When people wink with their eyes, it sends out a specific signal as well.

The eyes are clearly a part of facial expressiveness and play a key role in communication.

Malaysians are often reluctant to make eye contact. Witness the behaviour of front line staff at supermarket counters, service centres, restaurants and department stores.

If you pose a question in relation to a product or service, chances are the person you are engaging with will speak to the next person in line as if to pass the buck; he or she will not hold your eye.

In restaurants, it is rare to expect eye contact from a waiter. Waiters are often predisposed to looking at the floor or at the vacant space in front of them.

There is an expectation that every waiter must be attentive. In order to show attentiveness, the waiter must maintain interest in the customer. Maintaining interest is often demonstrated by frequent eye contact.

Hence we resort to waving, pointing, calling and even using sign language to ask for water, a glass or the menu or bill.

Does education have anything to do with this lack of willingness to maintain eye-to-eye contact?

Perhaps this is an Asian aberration in human communication.  This could be why  the Japanese invented the clap  to demand attention in restaurant.

Mark Twain has said it takes him three weeks to write an impromptu speech. Such speeches are spontaneous and off-the-cuff and yet they require mental prep time.

Having observed speakers over many years, I believe they fall into three categories:
▪ Born Communicators who enjoy standing up in front of an audience
▪ Hard Workers who prepare with cue cards or mind maps, to remain focused
▪ Readers who read remarks prepared by speechwriters.

Being in the second category, I would first commit to a rough sketch of the three key messages (or how I intend to divide my speech); this, the body of the speech, is the most challenging in terms of content development. Once done, the topping and tailing ie the introductions and the conclusions, is easy.
What structure works?

Tony Buzan’s Mind Map is excellent for speech-giving with some modifications. I would have a central core – for example, Congratulations (if I were to acknowledge someone’s success), then I would have three main rivers of thoughts – his or her main achievements, for example, and from these, the tributaries would provide the flesh on the bone.

A Story House works equally well. The roof of the ‘house’ forms the takeaway impression, i.e. Congratulations, while the three rooms would constitute the primary message pillars (education success, professional success, and personal success).

Supporting this ‘house’ would be its foundations or stilts – the facts and figures that build a complete picture.

Visual mapping – Story House or Mind Map – offers an instant memory aid. Successful speakers who appear as if they have just conjured up an entertaining joined-up speech without reading or referring to notes, are actually relying on the mental image in front of them.

If more speakers did their homework in this way, fewer message opportunities would be lost.

It is a truism that stress compromises one’s ability to communicate effectively. When under stress, one does not retain the inner harmony that allows one to communicate with ease and efficacy.

When one’s body is under duress, one is hard put to speak rationally. Emotions can come into the picture and affect one’s ability to think and speak with reason and logic.

Hurt by stress, people lose their centre of equipoise. No matter how hard one tries, it may not be possible to return to the place from which one can speak with compassion and understanding.

How does one avoid bringing stressful situations to bear on one’s communications?

The best approach would be to manage just enough production of work in one’s day to ensure sufficient rest from deadlines and deliverables.

But what is enough?

The body is often one’s best indicator. When tired, the body reacts in different ways – anxiety, irritability, and other negative feelings are usually barometers of the level of stress one is subjected to. Too many projects, unnecessarily high expectations, and lack of sleep and exercise time leads to elevated stress levels.

One could listen to the body for signals that the work-life balance has tipped unfavourably to one side.

One could then manage to take on just enough work to ensure one remains on an even keel – and that positive, rather than negative, emotions surface. This is easier said than done, of course.

When in positive mode, one’s communications are spontaneous, kindly, fresh, honest.

One’s humanity shows through communications.

It is hard to achieve a friendly work environment. Work is enjoyable – but it can lead to stress. The challenge is to manage that stress.

Watch your communications quality and language – it is often a good way to know you need time out.

If one looked at Etiquette in its broadest sense of Communication at the Workplace, there would be an appreciation of all the challenges that communication demands of the true professional – inter-personal skills, persuasive skills, the skills of instructing and directing and managing people, of listening, of running meetings, the art of introductions and of conversations, the science of dining and social etiquette, telephone and electronic manners, relationship skills, networking, inter-cultural appreciation, grooming, and more.

Etiquette – or should I say Life! – in the 21st Century is a Challenge. The world has moved from a formal structured class-based society where poise and decorum and a posh accent reflected one’s breeding, to a much less rigid and egalitarian society where everyone is on a first-name basis and T-shirt and jeans are de rigueur.

There has to be compromise – but where?

In the workplace, no matter what the new etiquette gurus say, one must not pick one’s nose in public or pick at one’s teeth after dinner. By all means concede that a man need not stand up when a woman enters his room – but, man or woman notwithstanding, never barge into a lift when others are stepping out, or jump queues at supermarket check-outs and taxi stands, nor agree to lunch meetings and then cancel an hour before.

Such breaches of etiquette would be frowned upon in polite, more sophisticated societies. Here in Malaysia, last-minute cancellations, calls not returned, and no-shows are a common feature of everyday life. No problem, la!

We switch queues when driving, we invite people to lunch and walk away without paying, we are ethnic-insensitive, we don’t respect punctuality, and we adopt, in some workplace cultures, a manana atttide to deadlines and service.

While Malaysians are friendly, caring people, our Etiquette sucks.

Time to change.

Companies communicate with the outside world all the time – through their actions and words, via advertising, branding, products, media appearances, people and service.

Internal stakeholders do not receive as much attention.

How many companies care enough about the internal climate and do something about it? The internal health of the organization determines its external posturing. Without collegiality and committed teams, companies are hard pressed to present a confident image to clients and customers.

I work with a client with a large internal population, which takes time to listen to its people via feedback sessions and the use of various measurement and monitoring tools  – Internal Customer Service Index, Employee Engagement Index, Focus Groups, CEO teh-tarik sessions and Turun Padang campaigns. These are not ad-hoc but fairly regular and institutionalized.

Sustained alignment via relevant and current messages is the goal. Staff appear happy with the quality of communicativeness although there are pockets of need and gaps.

Communication is not just top-down but bottom-up, not one-way but two-way, as horizontal as it is vertical. Companies that prize a climate of transparency and openness tend to enjoy better staff morale. People don’t want to be the last to know. They want to be engaged, and to believe they are an important cog in the wheel.

Communication gurus would describe continuing internal conversations as necessary in the new transparency movement, where dialogic behaviour is prized over monologic behaviour (read as leadership messages rammed down week upon week). These experts criticize monologic cultures as not only inappropriate but also unethical. Others must be given a share of voice. It is not about monopolizing the airwaves!

At least one global insurance company is building its brand on its listening skills.

And I know at least one global bank that isn’t .

Called to run a workshop on Business Etiquette in the 21st Century, I found the subject of Mobile Etiquette took on new meaning, given the contents of my last posting.

It has become a habit that people constantly fondle their phones or blackberries at meetings and workshops. I wonder where the impulse comes from. A downside risk is loss of valuable information and more – the loss of real time. By this I mean the Moment, the Now and all that it offers.

Writers and celebrities have extolled the virtues and the power of Now – including Ekhardt Tolle. When you are immersed in the moment before you, in the present, you maximise its opportunities, you enjoy its currency and the people that come with it, who are sharing themselves. But instead of embracing the Now, you are in digital mode connecting virtually Elsewhere. Why?

Unless the issue is critical, I would put it off for later.

I would opt to enjoy my Moments as presented to me by the day : A chunk of time to be with clients at a meeting, another chunk for colleagues over coffee, and yet another to write a speech or cook a meal. I would certainly not want to be on three tracks at one time, robot-like, nodding at my client as if to say ‘I am Listening’ but jabbing away at my blackberry to respond to an email, while eating a sandwich.

Mobile Etiquette calls for controlled management of the Mobile Device – leaving it on silent mode at meetings; turning it off completely when entertaining or being entertained to show respect to guests or hosts; softening its ringtones to an acceptable decibel; checking in every hour for messages rather than subjecting oneself to its every whim….

Think about it.

Unwired. Unplugged. Disconnected. Immobile. In other words, Not Contactable While On The Move. I have been without a mobile device for 31 days now.

Mercury, my ruler, went retrograde, causing me to leave my Nokia at a Brussels chocolatier and my Blackberry to malfunction and seize. The first days I spent in shock … then bliss (a service provider had better pay me to shut up). I have never felt better in my life.

Like a weird Mad Men episode, I dawdle over lunch, knowing no one will break the spell with a rude phone call, telling me a client has brought an appointment forward (Mr Client, our boss is not contactable). I relax at an agreed Saturday lunch venue with none of the last-minute text-flurry like I’m running late, order for me first …; I thot since J already in BV why not we change plan from BSC; can’t make it la, waxing took 2 long can reschedule to 4pm?

Blah-blah.

Everyone in my stakeholder community has been trained to manage me now. I have missed nothing. Instead, I have Technology all under control. I visit my desktop every now and then to attend to emails. I clear my inbox every single day. If there is an emergency, resourcefulness ensures a message will reach me (via bank teller, driver, barista, masseuse, maitre’d).

I feel sorry for the folks glued to their devices like their lives depend on it. I watch them jump at every electronic beep, ring and wail and I think how much having a mobile phone resembles having kids with attitude who won’t go away.

Can’t the business wait? Will the world end? Must we be mobile slaves?

I will get radio-ed again, in time. But life will be different.

Chuckle.