Immediacy in Communication

let me ask you do you come across as a
warm person or a cold and distant person
in this video we're going to talk about
immediacy and its implications for you
as a leader so let's get into the
details hello there friends and welcome
back to communication coach if this is
your first time tuning in I am Alex Lian
and this channel is all about helping
emerging leaders and part of the way we
do that is through looking at
communication skills and so today we are
talking about immediacy and its
implications for us as leaders and I
would start like to start off by
thanking Professor Joseph DeVito he's a
retired professor from Hunter College
and he wrote a really informative blog
post on immediacy and he pulled together
a bunch of resources and I will put a
link to that blog post in the
description below this video so that you
can check that out on your own so Thank
You professor DeVito so let me
paraphrase his definition of immediacy
Media see is the creation of a sense of
closeness and togetherness between a
speaker and listener you're
communicating immediacy when you show
interest attention liking and warmth to
the other person so again that's my
paraphrase and before we get into
exactly what that sounds like
and looks like I want to talk about the
benefits because the benefits are of
immediacy are really impressive so for
example when you are communicating with
immediacy people will respond to you
more favorably so I can think of endless
situations where that would be really
beneficial to me so I'm giving them
immediacy and they're going to respond
to me more favorably it sounds like a
pretty good exchange they will also find
you more attractive when you communicate
with more immediacy so some people think
it looks cool for example to give the
stone face the tough expression but the
truth is is that when you communicate
with warmth and connection people
literally find you more attractive so
that may come in handy that's something
interesting to know now on this channel
we talk a lot about leadership and
frontline supervisors for example and
there's some research on immediacy and
how when supervisors communicate with
immediacy their subordinates respond to
them differently so for example when a
supervisor is communicating with
immediacy that subordinate sees the
supervisor is more interested and
concerned in them which is a really
positive thing all you do is change the
way you're interacting and yours your
subordinates are going to have a
different impression of you the
subordinates also will speak more freely
and honestly in ways that help the
supervisor and help the organization's
overall health so that's really a
benefit of connecting with people with
immediacy and also the people that you
supervise your subordinates will have
more job satisfaction and motivation so
literally just by changing a few things
about the way you're interacting with
people you get a whole different
response from the people that you are
supervising so it's really important so
I wanted to share those benefits with
you because as we talked about this list
of verbal and nonverbal behaviors I
really want you to realize how important
these can be so the first way is to self
disclose when you talk about some
personal information the other people
the other people are around you're going
to feel more connected and close with
you so self disclosure you tell them
something that they might not ordinarily
know it doesn't have to be super
personal just any little detail about
your life and that will begin to connect
you you also can mention the other
person's good qualities so you might say
you know I noticed you pick up on new
tasks really quickly so by mentioning
the other person's good qualities they
feel more connected and close to you you
can talk about things that you have in
common with the other person or perhaps
things that you've done together in the
past that makes them feel more connected
you can give them positive feedback cues
when you're listening that show that
you've heard them and that you have
understood them so we all know what good
listening looks like and feels like at
the moment you want to make sure that
you communicate that when you are
listening to the people around you you
can sit a little bit closer to people
rather than further away you may notice
in a lot of movies for example when they
want to show people are having a
conflict they position them further
apart when they want to show them
getting along they
position and closer together and that's
the same in real life did a lot of
nonverbal things that you probably
already have heard about like good eye
contact smiling a warm facial expression
these things can sound a little
superficial but really this good
communication has these benefits that we
talked about it's worth it to take the
time to make direct eye contact instead
of glancing around the room and really
focusing on the other person and showing
them that you like them and appreciate
them now one of the key parts about
immediacy in my experience is that
people often think I often think I'm
coming across as warmer and more
connected than I actually am for example
a few days ago I was posing for a
photograph with a friend of mine and at
the time I remember I thought I was
smiling and then when I saw the
photograph it didn't really look like I
was smiling very much in the photograph
so I think what happens often times is
we feel as if we're showing appreciation
and warmth and connection with people
but oftentimes we're not really coming
across exactly how we think so I believe
that the key takeaway here is that each
of the each of us probably has a little
more room than we realize
to show other people that we care that
we appreciate them and so big shout out
again to Professor DeVito from Hunter
College for putting together a wonderful
blog folks that we can benefit from and
again I encourage you to check out that
link in the description below so
question of the day what do you think
the biggest benefit of immediacy is in
your life let's say you're a supervisor
a leader or maybe just someone who's
moving in that direction what are the
uses you see of communicating with
immediacy with the people around you I'd
love to hear your comments in that
section below so god bless take care and
I will see you next time okay there
before we go I wanted to tell you about
a free resource that I have created for
you it's that PDF download with the
essential communication skills that
every professional should learn I put
that in the description below the video
as well as pins and the first comments
and the comments section of the video
and you put your
email in there and then I send you that
PDF download and you can get to work on
it so thanks god bless and I will see
you next time