Communication Strategies

One of the biggest sources of misunderstandings and communication breakdown is language

-Francisco-

1.Nomination
• speaker tries to open a topic with the people he/she is talking to.
Strategies
• When beginning a topic in a conversation, you may start off with news
inquiries and news announcements as they promise extended talk.
 Keep the conversational environment open for opinions until the prior topic shuts down
easily and initiates a smooth end.
 This could efficiently signal the beginning of a new topic in the conversation

2. Restriction
• any limitation you may have as a speaker
• Instructions confine you as a speaker and limit what you can say.

e.g. You might be asked by your teacher to brainstorm on peer pressure or deliver
a speech on drug addiction.

Strategy
 Remember to always be on point during the conversation to avoid communication
breakdown

3.Turn-taking

 process by which people decide who takes the conversational floor because sometimes
people are given unequal opportunities

CODE OF BEHAVIOR BEHIND ESTABLISHING AND SUSTAINING A PRODUCTIVE

CONVERSATION
Primary Idea - give all communicators a chance to speak

 Keep your words relevant and reasonably short enough to express your views or
feelings.
 Be polite even if you are trying to take the floor from another speaker.
 Do not hog the conversation and talk incessantly without letting the other party air out
his/her own ideas.
 Acknowledge others; employ visual signals like a nod, a look, or a step back, and
accompany these signals with spoken cues such as What do you think? or You wanted
to say something?”

4. Topic Control
• covers how procedural formality or informality affects the development of topic in
conversations
e.g. In meetings, you may only have a turn to speak after the chairperson directs you to do so. (In
contrast this with a casual conversation with friends over lunch or coffee where you may take the
conversational floor anytime)

Strategy
• Regardless of the formality of the context, topic control is achieved cooperatively.
• This means that when a topic is initiated, it should be collectively developed.
HOW?
• avoiding unnecessary interruptions and topic shifts
• Make yourself actively involved in the conversation without overly dominating it by using
minimal responses like “Yes”, “Okay”,” Go on” and by asking tag questions to clarify
information and even by laughing.
 e.g. Tag Questions
• Are you excited, aren’t you?
• It was unexpected, wasn’t it?

5 Topic Shifting
 involves moving from one topic to another
 It is where one part of a conversation ends and where another begins.
Strategy:
• Be very intuitive.
• Make sure that the previous topic was nurtured enough to generate adequate views.
• You may also use effective conversational transitions to indicate a shift like:
-By the way
-In addition to what you said
-Which reminds me of, etc.

6.Repair
• refers to how speakers address the problems in speaking, listening, and comprehending
that they may encounter in a conversation

e.g. If everybody in the conversation seems to talk at the same time, give way and appreciate
others’ initiative to set the conversation back to its topic.
Strategy:
• If there is a problem in understanding the conversation, speakers will always try to
address and correct it.
• Although this is the case, always seek to initiate the repair.

7. Termination
• participants initiate expressions that end a topic in a conversation.

Strategy
• Although not all topics may have clear ends, try to signal the end of the topic through
concluding cues.

e.g. Share what you learned from the conversation.

Solicit agreement from the other participants (usually completes the discussion of the topic
meaningfully)