Let's get technical
Featured in the Listening Skills training manual
By Jessica Madge
Category: Communication Skills
Credit price: 3 download credits (Single user)
When receiving instructions, trying to understand complex information, or trying to diagnose a problem, our communication skills face a difficult challenge. The listener needs to steer the talker into giving the information in a form that is understandable, accurate and complete. Sometimes the communication is taking place across a technical divide that could be compared to the Grand Canyon. One person has a whole technical vocabulary and a whole set of mental models that the other one lacks. The technology which is bread and butter to one person in the conversation may be as mysterious as magic to the other. It can be either party – the listener or the talker, who has the technical knowledge. In either case, the listener has a great deal of work to do. By using questioning, reflecting facts and summarising, we can obtain clear, precise technical details, and make sure that the finer points have not been missed. This combination of skills, therefore, is vital to anyone involved in talking about complex subjects in today’s ever more complicated and technological world.
This training activity begins with participants working in pairs, one trying to replicate a drawing that their partner describes to them. Next, there is an exercise, in teams of three, with one person viewing a model, another person trying to build a replica, and a third person acting as a go-between, passing information back and forth. As the information is conveyed down the line, the skills of questioning, reflecting facts and summarising are used to make understanding as clear as possible. Finally, participants review the benefits of the combined skills of questioning, reflecting facts and summarising to their own work situations.
Who is it for: This training activity is intended for use by trainers to teach participants to use the powerful combination of questioning, reflecting facts and summarising to obtain clear, precise technical details.
| Resource Type: | Activity |
| Min Group Size: | 4 |
| Max Group Size: | 20 |
| Typical Duration: | 01:30:00 |
| No of Pages: | 16 |
Resources: View standard resources for Fenman training activities
Additional resources: Clipboards for participants, Sticky labels, Sets of K'NEX® (one for you and one for each team), Trays, boards or small tables (one for you and one for each team).
Purpose: This training activity can be used as part of an ongoing development programme, or as part of a formal training course on topics such as dealing with complaints, helping people with technical problems, receiving instructions, receiving a brief, consultancy, fault diagnosis and medical diagnosis. It is not a basic training activity, but one which builds on earlier work on questioning and reflecting facts. It is therefore assumed that there is a knowledge of open and closed questions, probing, and reflecting facts.
Download the training activity, Let's get technical as featured in the Fenman training manual; Listening Skills