February is a month when love of all kinds is on the mind – love for our sweetheart, friends, family, maybe even coworkers (but hopefully not like that). One of the primary ways we express love of any kind is through our words. When thinking about how to communicate with loved ones, there are lessons we can also extend to professional relationships. As attorneys, nearly all of our work consists of persuasive communication. This month, let’s get back to basics and practice communicating with HEART:
How will your message best be sent and in what setting? In an email, text, phone call, Facetime, working lunch, over coffee, or self-destructing letter delivered by carrier pigeon.
Expectations–what do they want to hear from you? What message do you need them to understand?
Articulate–say all the important parts. Don’t assume your conversation partner already knows something or picks up on an implication.
Revise–I don’t know of anyone who regretted revising a text or email before hitting ‘send,’ but the opposite is certainly true!
Tone–try to match the appropriate dynamic for your recipient. Word choice, tone of voice, and body language can all make a critical difference in how your message is received.
These suggestions may seem obvious, but hopefully they are a good reminder for how to handle the myriad daily communications with all the people who matter in our lives (whether loving or love to-hate). Let’s also try to always be kind to whoever we are interacting with. We never know what the other person may be going through, and our words have the power to bring people down or lift them up. I think we could all use a bit more lifting up in 2025.