Communication Skills Power

One way of assessing your social skills is to come up with a list of activities that are believed to be useful in gaining social acceptance. Engaging in these activities may improve your social skills if you happen to put them into practice right now.

The following activities can help a person gain peer acceptance, belongingness and increased self-esteem:

1. Cooperation. When one volunteers to help, one develops a sense of self-worth and the other party on the other hand benefits from the support extended towards achieving their goals and objectives.

2. Sharing. When you share time and other resources with someone it is a simple way of letting others feel cared for.

3. Participation. Voluntarily submitting oneself to be involved is one way of being recognized.

4. Be a friend. Have you tried being a friend to a friend in need? If gaining friends is one of your goals in developing your social skills, there may be people around you who maybe in need of a companion.

5. Be patient. Stop being temperamental. People will tend to shy away if they find you to be uneasy and irritated with simple matters.

6. Following Directions. Listen first before arguing.

7. Taking Turns. Learn to give way for others. Do not be greedy of attention.

8. Remaining on Task. Stay on the task assigned. Be responsible for the task assigned to you.

9. Accepting Differences. Accept if you are at fault. Avoid arguments and realize your mistakes. Be humble and say you are sorry.

10. Listening. Respect others’ opinions as they try to respect yours.

11. Praising others and Refraining from put downs. Negative comments bring negative feelings towards you. See the good of others and avoid finger pointing.

12. Be polite and courteous. It is best to be polite and courteous at all times. Regardless of age, sex and status in the community your show of respect for others also brings out the real person in you.

13. Use good manners. You need to be good mannered in order to be welcomed by your group or environment. A person who loves to pick fights is a person not liked and is considered to be a negative influence to the group.

Now, that you have assessed your social skills it is time to improve your social skills. Use the following strategies to get started today:

1. Role playing. You try to act out a short real life situation that happened to you in your community. Your role playing would show how you look at the situation that just occurred. Observers would be able to ascertain the aspects of your personality that affected the outcome.

2. Warm Up Exercises. This tool is designed to allow you to perform and carry out the different behaviors being taught during social skills learning. Such warm up exercises are not real life related.

3. Modeling. Somebody tries to demonstrate the appropriate behavior for you.

4. Homework Assignments. Homework assignments allow you to try new learned behavior. It is expected that exercises based on real life situations will produce positive results.

5. Instruction. Different behavioral patterns are taught in detail and the importance to social situations is explained.

6. Reinforcement. The knowledge acquired through verbal instruction and modeling is put into place.

Assessing your skills and how you would like to go about it is your choice. You should learn that social skills are used to interact with others. Assessment of our social skills, whatever techniques it might be, will help towards building social interaction and awareness of the social situation. Evaluate yourself and decide what to do next.

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No matter how smart you are and how good you are in individual or group gatherings, there is still a need to know and learn the proper social skills as you interact. It is not enough to learn the basics of social interaction. Learning social skills is a continuous process.

The more social skills you learn, the more successful you will be in gaining acceptance from people. You will feel more comfortable with your environment and find it easier to choose your friends wisely while resisting those individuals who are a negative influence.

Here are some social skills learning tips you need to know:

1. Observe your interactions with others in different situations. If in an initial interaction there seems to be no rapport or sense of being comfortable, you might consider getting to know more about the person before making a second attempt. The person may not be ready for interaction and you may be trying to be pushy. You might need to change strategy.

2. Be aware of your real intentions. What are your true feelings about your interaction with the person? Are you interacting because you want to gather information that you need and that person is not freely giving the information you need? Social skills are a one on one communication. They involve give and take, listening and understanding the messages being conveyed by both communicators. Do not just focus on your needs. Try to understand the other person as well.

3. Be open for any criticisms. A constructive criticism helps towards improving oneself. As you interact be sure to ask for feedback whether that be positive or negative feedback. Ask frequently and make it known that you need honest feedback. It is through their honest feedback you are able to correct yourself and to note your mistakes. Such feedback will enable you to improve your social skills the next time you are faced with the same situation.

4. Take responsibility for your behavior. Apologize for mistakes committed or acts of insensitivity to the issue. Be humble enough to say you are sorry.

5. Be aware of your verbal and non-verbal social skills. Be careful of addressing words that do not go well together with what you feel or your real intentions. Words and actions are often times misinterpreted and can create a lot of confusion. Try to be clear in the things that you say and do.

6. You need to be an active listener before any suggestion or criticism can be learned from. You may hold on until the person delivers his opinion and ask later for clarification. Make it appear that you are interested in fully understanding what is being communicated.

7. Don’t be in a hurry to improve everything. Think of one or two interpersonal behaviors you would like to give attention to. But don’t obsess over it as there may be be the tendency to not meet expectations and feel discouraged instead. Aim for gradual improvement.

8. Ackowledge your interpersonal strengths and maximize them to the fullest. If you think that your expertise in cooking could have a positive impact in drawing people to you who share your interests, you might want to host a party and let them taste your special dishes. Who knows you may not only draw friends who will enjoy your cooking but make some new life long friendships.

Learning social skills and applying them in practice makes a person more credible to the social group. Keep on updating your social skills learning in preparation for more challenging situations in life. Get ready and take control.
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Everyone wants to shine and be accepted by people. If your goal is to achieve a successful life, personal and career, you will need the help of others. And, to feel accepted and get along well with others, you need to
focus on developing your social skills to win more attention.

For someone who is just starting to develop his or her social skills, here are some tips to consider:

1. Have a ready smile always

A person with an approachable outlook is likely to draw people who smile back and start talking. A gloomy face causes individuals to backslide and feel cautious that you might not be open for a chat.

2. Have simple start up conversation questions ready

Questions like age, status in life, school last attended or anything about family. You may also think of ready answers that may come along the way, questions you think might be asked that are occasion related.

3. Take an interest in the conversation

Do not show boredom towards the person you are talking to. Be responsible for taking interest in what the person is talking about. It is your fault if you are getting bored as you do have a hand in making it more interesting by asking interesting follow up questions.

4. Get involved and stay focused

Be attentive to the person you are talking to and use give and take listening and follow-up questions to liven and explore the conversation. Apply your verbal and non-verbal skills. Ask appropriate questions based on related topics being talked about, set your vocal tone and quality and apply bodily movements if necessary to display your feelings.

Nodding of the head, smiles and eye-to-eye contact are non-verbal gestures. Both verbal and non- verbal social skills make the conversation valuable. Your partner will have the feeling that you give due importance to his/her topic, thus giving both of you the feeling of acceptance.

5. Be ready to adapt to situations

If at some point in your conversation, out of the blue, someone tries to butt in and totally twist the topic - adapt to the change. You need to have some flexibility when you are in a group gathering. This will help you to get more accepted by the others. Flexibility is one thing people look for when having a conversation.

6. Choose to feel relaxed

There may be times when you will run out of topics to discuss, and get worried about what to say next. Well, relax and let the conversation go as it is. As the saying goes: go with the flow.

Nobody will notice you if you just sit out when there are opportunities to speak up. Make sure to get involved so that your finer qualities and potential are noticed.

These tips to develop social skills will guide you towards the achievements of your goals. Expand your networking. Remember that success is not all about money but also about the number of friends you have made and how you live your life. Get out there and apply these social skills tips as you socialize.

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