Business Communication Course Outline
This course is aligned to unit standard 12153 – Use the writing process to compose texts required in the business environment. Level 4, 5 credits.
Duration: 3 Days
Course Outline
Communication: its nature, scope and purpose
- A common thread
- The special ingredient
- The management dimension
- The nature of communication
- The bonus of message plus method
- Seeking after excellence
What makes for effective communication
- The difficulties of making communication effective
- Aids to effective communication
- Positioning your communication
- Projecting the right impression
- Amplifying communications
Prerequisites for success: preparation and listening
- A fundamental truth
- Listening
- Preparation: a moment’s thought
- Setting objectives
- Deciding the message
- Putting it together
Being persuasive: getting agreement from others
- The logistics
- Do unto others
- The thinking involved
- Your manner
- Making a persuasive case
- Feedback
- Securing agreement
- Anticipating objections
- Options for handling
- Excuses
- Reaching a conclusion
- What next? – follow-up action
Presentations: speaking successfully ‘on your feet’
- The importance of presentations
- A significant opportunity
- The hazards of being ‘on your feet’
- Presenters’ nightmares
- Preparing to present
- The structure of a presentation
- Speaker’s notes
- Visual aids
Telephone communication: its special nature
- The nature of voice-only communication
- An inherent fragility
- An opportunity
- The switchboard
- Taking a call
- Projecting the ‘personal/corporate personality’
- A telephone ‘handshake’
- Making the voice work for you
- A wrong impression
- Voice and manner
- Use of language
- Listening
- Creating a dialogue
- Projecting the right image
The nature of the written word
- A fragile process
- A major opportunity
- What makes good business writing?
- Why are we writing?
- Powerful habits
- Earning a reading
- A significant opportunity
The writing process: what to say and how to say it
- The difference language makes
- Readers’ dislikes
- The writer’s approach
- The use of language
- Making language work for you
- Mistakes to avoid
- Following the rules
- Personal style
The different forms of written communication
- Write right
- First principles
- Letters with specific intention
- Reports
- Formats demanding special approaches