VERTICAL COMMUNICATION?

Vertical Communication consists of communication up and down the organization’s

chain of command. Downward communication starts with top management and
flows down through management levels to line workers and non-supervisory
personnel. The major purposes of downward communication are to advise, inform,
direct, instruct, and evaluate employees and to provide organization members with
information about organizational goals and policies. This is what Hockaday is doing
at Hallmark. The main function of upward communication is to supply information to
the upper levels about what is happening at the lower levels. This type of
communication includes progress reports, suggestions, explanations, and requests
for aid or decisions. At Hallmark, Hockaday participates in both downward and
upward communication processes. In some companies, hotlines provide vehicles for
additional upward and downward communication. More than 100 companies now
offer hotlines, such as “Helpline” at Waste Management, “Guideline” at Nynex, “We
Care Hotline” at American Greetings, and “the 800 number” at Raytheon. Such
hotlines are used for different purposes, though many are used to inform managers
of situations involving employees, such as allegations of sexual harassment. In the
light of the federal sentencing guidelines that mandate stiff fines for corporate
crimes, it pays for companies to offer such services, often toll free and anonymous
because fines are decreased for companies who can prove that they teach
employees about ethics.

At Ogilvy & Mather, on line information is available through “Ogilvy OnLine,” which
works as a kind of corporate culture machine. A menu enables employees and
guests to scan up-to-date information about the company, its client, and the
industry, and to hear from the company’s legendary founder, David Ogilvy. He is a
passionate man and it is wonderful to hear the words coming out of his mouth. One
month he is doing something on direct marketing, another month he is in India. His
perspective is what started it all. A V.P says they make an effort to maintain what
David Oglivy started in terms of the Ogilvy culture. He has particular views on very
on every aspect of communication [and on conducting] businesses in a gentlemanly
manner. Getting some of him on film is very meaningful. It’s a great way to keep in
touch with the client stories. Problems of vertical Communication: Downward
communication is likely to be filtered, modified, or halted at each level as managers
decide what should be passed down to their employees. Upward communication is
likely to be filtered, condensed or altered by middle managers who see it as part of
their job to protect upper management from nonessential data originating at the
lower levels. In addition, middle managers may keep information that would reflect
unfavorably on them for reaching their managers. Thus, vertical communication is
often at least partially inaccurate or incomplete. Problems in downward
communication exist when managers do not provide employees with the
information they need to carry out their tasks effectively. Managers are often overly
optimistic about the accuracy and completeness of their downward communication.
In fact, they can fail to pass on important, information (such as a higher level
change in policy) or to instruct employees adequately on how to perform their
duties. This lack of communication is sometimes deliberate, as when managers
withhold information to keep employees dependent on them. The net effect of
incomplete downward communication is that employees can feel confused,
uniformed or powerless and might fail to carry out their tasks properly.

Improve Communication Skills

The world is completely reliant on communication to perform even the most basic of all daily
tasks. Without communication almost all daily functions would cease and the world as it is known
today would grind to a halt. On any given day, one participates numerous times in the
Communication Process.

Importance of Effective Communication Skills

The importance of effective communication skills becomes apparent when one looks at how much
of one’s life is dependent upon communication. Think about it, every time one sends an email,
updates a Facebook status, leaves a voicemail, writes a memo, makes a phone call, or rolls eyes
in frustration, they are actively participating in the communication process.

And those are just a few examples of the many times and ways people communicate on a daily
basis! At any stage during the communication process misunderstandings and conflict known as
miscommunication can occur. With these things in mind, it is clear to see why effective
communication free of misunderstandings is a necessary and valuable skill.

Barriers to Effective Communication

Miscommunication happens because of barriers that can arise at any stage during the
communication process. A communication barrier is anything that gets in the way of the purpose
of communication or causes people to misunderstand each other, information, or a message.
Learning to recognize and identify various communication barriers is the first step toward
minimizing misunderstandings and building effective communication habits.

Physical Barriers is any physical thing that hinders effective communication between one
person/group and a second person/group. A physical barrier can be an actual physical structure
or distance. Examples include walls, desks, cubicles, doors, yelling down a hallway, or being
located in different buildings or rooms. Physical barriers are also anything that causes
distractions or breaks concentration. Examples include background noise like radio or ringing
phones, poor lighting, seating, or temperature that is too hot or cold.
Perceptual Barriers is any individual perception that causes intended message to be received
incorrectly causing barrier to effective communication. No two people view the world exactly the
same. Each person has different ideas, thoughts, behaviors, mentality, experiences, and
backgrounds. When people communicate, they formulate words to transmit messages based on
their own perceptions. The receiver can perceive and interpret actions and words very differently
than the sender intends and vice versa. This makes effective communication very tricky!
Psychological Barriers are any emotions or personal feelings that cause misunderstandings that
hinder effective communication. A person’s emotion at the time the message is communicated
can impact how it is sent or received. Fear, mistrust, happy, sadness, anxiety, and anger are all
strong emotions that can heavily influence communication if one lets it. If one does not trust a
co-worker because of some deceit, one will hold back and not communicate what is truly
thought.

Gender Barriers is any misunderstanding or confusion in intended message caused by male and
female differences resulting in communication barriers. Each gender has distinct ways of
communicating that often cause misunderstandings. Each gender’s communication style is based
on the brain’s structure and how information is processed. Men are direct, logical, task-oriented,
analytical, and assertive with a “report” type style of communicating. Women focus on bonding,
feelings, are relationship-oriented, intuitive, and submissive with a “rapport” type communication
style.

Language Barriers are any differences in language like slang, jargon, translations, dialects, or
semantics that hinder effective communication. Companies, schools, clubs, and even some
neighborhoods often have their own group specific lingo and assign unique meanings to many
words. Miscommunication occurs when people from different areas or companies are
communicating and assign different meanings to words or are unfamiliar with the terminology.

Cultural Barriers are any barrier to communication that occurs during the communication process
attributed to differences in culture. Every country in the world has a unique history and culture.
Growing numbers of people are communicating with people from other countries. Different
linguistic and cultural backgrounds impact communication. Understanding other cultures will help
lessen miscommunication. In America, splitting the bill on a date happens frequently and is not a
big deal. However in other countries it is viewed as disrespectful.

Effective communication is when the receiver hears and understands the exact message the
sender intends to transmit and feels the information at the end of exchange is clear. Effective
communication can only take place when barriers to communication are eliminated during the
communication process. By identifying the common barriers that impact communication, one can
begin to understand the reasons for miscommunication and conflict. Recognizing communication
barriers is the first step in overcoming them and improving communication skills.
 Improving Your Relationship Marketing Skills

What should you continually work towards in online marketing? Look at improving your
relationship marketing skills on an ongoing basis. This will serve you well, help you sell
more products, and could help you gain free advertising as well. You may be good at
relationships but you can never truly master the art of relationships because to master
it means you don’t have to keep working at it. It’s an ongoing process. The existence
and building of relationships will make a hugely positive impact on your online success.
Relationships result in referrals, free traffic, and overall respect. And if people respect
you, they’ll trust what you say and may buy some of what you recommend. Your online
reputation is important in the world of web-based marketing and the best way to
develop a good reputation is to establish the type of presence that results in
relationships. In a business that’s known for a degree of disloyalty, because customers
don’t really get to know their suppliers, those who have perfected their relationship
marketing skills will find that they have a lot of repeat business, referrals and loyalty.

Improving Your Relationships With Customers And Prospects

It’s important to get the prospect to become a customer and the customer to
keep paying attention so that they’ll be a repeat customer. By being helpful and
providing value on a regular basis, you’re more likely to have that happen. A lot
of internet marketers are painted with the same brush as the epitome of a used
car salesman. People are often waiting to be pitched and many expect to be
spammed. Surprise and delight your customers and you’ll develop respect and a
relationship.

Four Ways To Do That Include…

• Writing valuable content. Give something to them. Some marketers share

enough to make people drool in the hopes that they’ll buy. This may work but
those who actually give away something for free tend to develop even better
results. Become an authority and be helpful and your customers will remember
this. Be active. Relationships won’t be built and maintained if your customer
gets a chance to forget you. Regularly communicate through your blog, your
newsletter, on social media sites, and via autoresponders.

• Be the one to teach them something new. If you’re almost always the one to
tell them about a new development or new information, you’ll earn respect and
people will pay attention. Be sure to keep your finger on the pulse of your
industry so that you can do that.
• Be authentic. Do more than ‘toot your own horn’. People develop relationships
with people, not with egos.

As you can see, building your relationship marketing skills can serve your online
business very well in many ways, you never know, you may even make some
life-long friends from doing so!

Communication is Key

My hope for the outcome of the Copenhagen conference is, like many people
hope, a strategic plan for implementing a reduction in carbon emissions.
However, as part of the plan, I believe a plan of communication needs to be
the first step in moving toward a reduction in greenhouse gases.

A lack of effective communication, especially in America, is the key problem

in the global warming debate. The main flaw, is the communication coming
from the scientific experts. This is in part due to a distrust in science by the
general public. In the article, “Death of Environmentalism” the authors state
that , “Over the last 15 years environmental foundations and organizations
have invested hundreds of millions of dollars into combating global warming.
We have very little to show for it.” Fighting global warming needs to be more
of a multidisciplinary effort to be effective. The scientists have collected the
data, now it is time for communication experts to relay the information to the
public—effectively. For the most part, the data has been presented in a very
direct, scientific manner which has not been widely accepted by society. This
is supported by an article recently published by the Washington Post which
describes a decrease in Americans that believe in global warming. In
Environmental Communication and the Public Sphere, the author talks about
the large movement to undermine scientist, “Sometimes, the conflict over
the legitimacy of scientific consensus may be fought over the terrain of
language itself, by engaging in what one political consultant called the
‘environmental communications battle.’”

Communication about global warming has failed to effectively communicate

the risks of global warming and also has failed to make individual citizens
feel as if they are stakeholders in this issue. In Environmental
Communication and the Public Sphere, technical risk communication is
defined as, “the translation of technical data about environmental or health
risks for the public consumption; with the goal of educating a target
audience” and outrage is “factors the public considers in assessing the
acceptability of their exposure to a hazard.” Risk is comprised of technical
risk and outrage. In most cases concerning environmental risk, the outrage is
present but there is not sufficient data to support the outrage. In the case of
global warming, many argue that the data, or technical risk, is present, but
there is a lack of outrage. There is not enough of a perceived risk in a large
portion of American’s minds.

Communication is going to play a huge role in the success of failure of the

United Nations Climate Change Conference in Copenhagen. We will never be
able to make citizens feel like stakeholder’s in this effort to move toward
sustainability if we have failed to communicate in an effective way. This is
why it is so important to include an effective communication strategy as part
of our overall plan to curb emissions and move toward sustainability.

Trust and Communication

When bringing a new dog home I think that among the most important
things to accomplish are establishing trust and communication…through
gentle training. Remember that everything is new to this dog. Including
you. If your dog is a rescue, she has an unknown history which could include
unpleasant treatment by humans. She may be under socialized to the world
around her, which could make her nervous in new situations. Even if she is
perfectly confident you’ll want all of her first impressions to be good ones. If
your new dog is a puppy she has just left the warm comfort of Mom and her
siblings. It’s important to make sure she feels safe with her new family.
Please avoid any of the harsh methods that are out there for dealing with
unwanted behavior. The last thing this dog needs is for someone to swat
her or do something scary like shake a penny can or spray her in the face
with water. That sort of training does nothing to establish a trusting
relationship. In fact, it could give your dog a first impression that you are
pretty scary. There are positive solutions for behaviors we don’t like.

It can help a lot if you start out making positive associations with everything
new that your dog encounters. First impressions are very powerful. As you
introduce your new dog to strange people and places, make sure that it is
always in positive ways. Have strangers give your dog treats. Give your dog
treats yourself when you encounter a loud noise or an unusual sight. Happy
talk your dog as if you are having the best time ever! Never force your dog
to meet someone or deal with a situation that makes her uncomfortable. If
your dog shows any sign of fear or anxiety, consult a positive trainer for
strategies to help your dog to be more settled and comfortable. Make sure
you get your dog or puppy into a positive training class as soon as possible.
Training establishes a line of communication with your dog. Positive training
is fun and, so, can help establish a good relationship.

Be as gentle with your dog’s training as you possibly can. Remember that,
until your dog learns the things you want, she’s just guessing. Don’t hold it
against her if she guesses wrong about, say, where to go to the bathroom.
This is not information that she has until you teach her. So, with all
unwanted behavior, prevent it until you teach the appropriate behavior. The
more you know about dog behavior, the more prepared you are when your
dog tries something you’d rather she didn’t. And you’ll you know how to
train the behavior you prefer. Again, get into a positive class as soon as you
can. A good one will teach you about natural dog behavior and management
while teaching you how to train your dog. It is especially important to get
started with puppy training as soon as possible. Temperament and
socialization training are time-sensitive things. Developmentally, a puppy is
best prepared to learn life’s most important skills well before she turns 18
weeks old. Those skills are the ones that prepare her to live socially. After
the age of 18 weeks her ability to be adaptable diminishes. So, Puppy
People, please get that puppy to a class as soon as possible!

Until you and your dog get some training you will most likely get lots of
training advice. Please keep in mind that much of the advice still out there is
based on the old fashioned notion of pack leadership and dominance.
Please just ignore any such advice and seek out positive resources (trainers,
books, internet info, TV shows, etc….). Try to think in terms of preventing
unwanted behavior (through puppy proofing, supervision, exercise, things to
do….). Then think about rewarding the behavior that you do want. No need
for harsh consequences that can affect your relationship with your new best
friend.
Communication Skills Training - Effective Communication

Being an effective communicator takes real skill. Communication skills have to be developed,
honed and added to on an on-going basis. They are the heart of interpersonal skills and the
greater your awareness of how it all works, the more effective your communication will be. To be
effective in business, you have to communicate well. To be a good manager, you have to
communicate exceptionally well.

Here we look at basic communication dynamics, learning skills to improve your communication,
using effective communication to improve and promote interpersonal relationships, creating an
effective communication strategy.

We could write a book about the importance of communication key skills, but for now you can
content yourself with some essentials for becoming a more effective communicator.

Communication Core Skills - The Essentials

Communication is Individual

We’re Not All The Same

When you look at communication, presentation skills are not all there is to it. Far from it.
Everyone communicates differently and sees the world differently. The greatest skill you can
have in order to instantly and significantly improve you communications skills is to understand
the other person’s point view and how they see the world. Then you can adjust your own
communication to take that into account.

Change Yourself to Change Others

Alongside this has to be the knowledge that the only person you can be sure of changing in any
communication is you. Therefore, the most effective way to be in charge of what happens in any
communication dynamic is changing what you do. When you can do this you are well on the way
to promoting better relationships.

You are the Only One of You

There’s never one right way to communicate. Authentic effective communication always happens
when we reply on those things we know to be true about or for ourselves. Remember your
personal style probably says more for you that all the words you use can.

What’s Already Working?

Most people tend to look at what’s wrong with themselves and other people rather than focusing
on what already works. Remember, something (more than one thing, of course) has to be
working well for you to have got this far already!

How Communication Happens

Verbal and Non-Verbal Communication

Interpersonal skills. Everything communicates. Remember! If you aren’t clear about what you
mean and what your intention is, the other person (or people) could easily (and sometimes
deliberately), misinterpret what you mean.

What you do matters as much as what you say. It’s now accepted that the words account for
only 7-11% of a communication. Your behaviour will ‘read’ unconsciously to other people and
you can certainly be more in charge of the reading matter!

Language is one of the most powerful reflections of how we think and feel about ourselves and
others. You need to be aware of the padding, justifications and excuses you use and whether
they are appropriate. You can make a big impact simply by changing some of your language and
developing your verbal skills, This way you can significantly improve your communication skills.

Communication Cycle

There is a neat communication cycle we’ve come across that can help you understand how to
make communication work better. It means that you can take responsibility for every stage on
the Communication Cycle:

Spoken - Heard - Understood - Agreed To - Acted On - Implemented.

Be aware of where you or others tend to fall off the cycle.

What can get in the way of Effective Communication

Here are some Common Barriers to Effective Communication.

We all make Too Many Assumptions

Be aware of the assumptions you make, especially making something up and then acting as
though what you made up was true. Notice if you alter your behaviour with certain people
because of the assumptions you make about them. Also be aware of the assumptions you think
other people make about you.

Assumptions aren’t necessarily ‘bad’. Sometimes it’s important to let people keep their
assumptions (or some of them at least!) about you.

One effective way to deal with assumptions is to say to the other person, ‘I’ve assumed such and
such. ‘Is that true?’ or ‘I’m making an assumption here about… Do you agree?’

Good communication in the workplace is often sabotaged by too many unconfirmed assumptions.

Patterns/Reverting to Type

We are pattern-making beings, which is good. However, sometimes we get so used to behaving
and responding in certain ways that it’s hard to see that there’s any other way of doing things.
When the pressure is on or we are under stress, even our best intentions may go out the window
as we revert to type.

Habits, patterns, routine ways of thinking and behaving are difficult to change. Noticing your
patterns at least gets you aware of them! One way to practise this is to see how many
communication habits and patterns have crept into your workplace. Try not to judge them. You
can always decide if you want to change them or not.

Needing to Be Right

This is one area we all know about - the need to be right and in turn for the other person to be
wrong. One skill that does need practise is to let go of needing to be right. Think of it as
presenting information or a point of view rather than having to bludgeon someone else with your
arguments.

If you want to promote effective relationships, this is one of the greatest communication key
skills you can have is to be able to change what you want from a communication. You may have
started out wanting the other person to agree with you, but by giving that up you can change
your want to letting them know you understand their point of view.

Conflict Resolution

Conflict

One of the purposes of conflict is to arrive at a resolution, so if you avoid conflict, the problem
usually (though not always) gets worse. The earlier you can identify that there is a problem and
intervene, the better it will be. Good communication skills require you to be able to resolve
conflict.

Agreement

Find something (anything will do) in the other person’s argument which you can genuinely agree
with. This is a great way to take the wind out of someone’s sails and ensure you don’t get drawn
into an insoluble argument. People usually won’t listen until they feel heard.

Bridge Building

Really listen to what the other person is saying - they usually give a lot of information without
realising it. Building bridges by making an offer can help enormously, as can changing what you
want.

‘I’ not ‘You’

Use ‘I’ statements, not ‘You’ statements to avoid blaming. This also means that you take
responsibility for how you feel, rather than making the other person responsible for making
things all right for you.

Improving Communication Skills

Be a Good Influence

Attitude

You can change the direction of a communication if you change your attitude. There is no one
attitude that’s the ‘right’ one to have, though being direct and clear certainly helps.

Effective Listening and Responding

You can have tremendous influence on a communication as the listener and the responder. When
we get little or no response from the listener, we often project our assumptions onto them about
what they are thinking (and usually we assume they aren’t thinking good things about us!).

Be Positive

Use affirmation and encouragement to get the best out of people. Notice when others do things
well (even if it’s part of their daily routine). This shows you’re being attentive; most people
respond well when they know that others are aware of what they do.

Quite simply, the workplace can be a far better place to be if you consciously sprinkle your
communication with positive feedback.

The Importance of Basic Communication Skills

What’s most important is that you don’t leave the business of communication to chance. Raise
your awareness, develop your skills and you’ll be a role model for effective communication.
Improving Communication and Time Management

Time is of the essence, especially when you’re part of an organization. If you forget
to submit your year-long goals and plans on time, or when you just simply wait for
work, you will be affecting not only your job but also of someone else’s. Moreover,
you’re wasting company’s time, which is a very valuable resource. Whether you’re a
manager or someone in charge of creation and monitoring of projects, you need to
go through project management courses. These are workshops and lectures that
will show you how to make good use of your time, prioritize projects, and create
milestones along the way. The teachings of project management courses will not
only be helpful in managing employee time but also your own personal time.

Project Management Courses: Wide Selections

When it comes to project management courses, you definitely have plenty to

choose from. You can join all of them, or you can start with one. Your choice
will just depend on the aspect that you need to improve on immediately. To
give you an idea of the courses available, you can refer to the following list:

1. Time Management. One of the most important aspects of project

management is time. You should learn how to make good use of it—being
able to produce an output given a limited amount of time. This part of
project management courses will demonstrate to you how you can use 50
percent of your office time to the maximum. You will learn how to plan out
your time based on your working habit or behavior. This includes looking for
the appropriate period during the day where you will be most productive.
Furthermore, you will also learn how to utilize different software that will
help you keep track of your time and your progress. You will also develop the
right techniques in delegation of tasks, one of the best time savers but rarely
practiced by managers and team leaders. Other interesting inputs with this
course are setting goals and objectives in time frame; creating daily, weekly,
as well as monthly to yearly plans; and evaluating your time management
skills.

2. Communication Skills. One of the common reasons why a project is delayed,

wrongfully executed, or isn’t pushed through is because of poor communication. It
could be that the information was misinterpreted, the person was misinformed,
there are communication barriers, or there are conflicts that need to be settled. You
will learn how to effectively convey your thoughts to another person. Furthermore,
besides talking, you will also learn the art of proper listening. You will be taught how
to come up with win-win situations through negotiation and provide feedbacks to
your colleagues, especially to your team members. Lastly, you will know how to
make good use of your voice and body to deliver a message.

The project management courses are essential to ensure that everyone is on track,
and that all are simply moving in one direction. With project management courses,
you will clearly see the path the company is heading.

Communication Had Never Been So Easy and Effective

Throughout the course of human evolution one thing that has aided
human being’s success is the ability to communicate. Our ability to
communicate among ourselves is one of the primary reasons that we
are at the top of the food chain. Science and technology have further
enhanced human being’s stature and the advancements in the domain
of communication have taken human stature to an altogether sublime
level. The advent of GSM technology is another watershed event in the
story of mankind, which has made it more enriching and fruitful.

Buy a GSM cell phone and all that you would experience is a whole new
way of communication. GSM technology originated in Europe and now
is present in almost all the corners of the world. People who want to
arm themselves with the latest technology have already prepared
themselves to buy a GSM cell phone. One important reason for which
people should buy GSM cell phone is that these gadgets can enable
them to communicate with their near-dear ones from any corner of the
world. Another benefit that you would accrue if you own a GSM cell
phone is that GSM cell phones operate at different numbers of
frequencies. In addition, the GSM technology uses a variety of voice
codec in order to squeeze audio links.

The GSM technology is only going to make this world a small place and
if you own a GSM cell phone then you would never be too far from your
loved ones. World phones have further made communication easier for
us. Irrespective of the geographic location, staying connected is very
much possible. Easy maintenance and innumerable benefits have led
to high proliferation of mobiles worldwide.

The Value of Communication

“As soon as you move one step up from the bottom, your effectiveness
depends on your ability to reach others through the spoken and written word.”
Peter Drucker

If I had to indentify 2 areas that I believe PPM Leaders will need to increase their focus
on in 2010, it would be communications and change management.

I have adopted a simple approach to communication over the years, breaking it down
into outbound communications, inbound communications, and continuous polling.

Outbound communications is the classic concept that most people think of when they
talk about communications, i.e. what do we want to tell people? The problem is for
most project centered organizations the answer to that question is often as little as
possible. I prefer starting the process of outbound communications with the question
“what information do people need and want from my organization in order to be
comfortable with the work we’re doing?” Another secret about phrasing the purpose of
outbound communications this way is that it should automatically start to lead to what
change management efforts might be necessary to support the work currently
underway.

Inbound communications as a process is something most PPM organizations simply

ignore. Smart program managers generally stumble across the need for inbound
communications management as a separate function because of the criticality of
coordinating so many diverse functions and people. Inbound communications
management is a little tougher to do right than outbound, because it requires creating a
mechanism whereby team members and stakeholders feel free to communicate and are
comfortable their messages will be heard and acted on appropriately, and no what I’m
talking about isn’t issue management. The trick with inbound communications is often
hearing what isn’t being said as much as what is. If anything inbound communications
management is a risk management technique.

Continuous polling is an outgrowth of the hallway and the water cooler conversations.
It’s one of the reasons why we talk about management by walking around. People
need an ability to share ideas and concerns that are too poorly formed to make them
official. On the other hand they are perfectly willing to share them on a casual basis.
Essentially the channel needs to fit the message.

Obviously I’ve only hit the high points here but I think we need to start talking more
about how we communicate, with whom, and how often if we want to deliver better
PPM results

Telepathic Communication

We only use ten percent of the brain to function and survive throughout life. A huge part of our
brains remains unused. We all have the power within us to transfer our thoughts to others
without using anything other than the brain. This ability is present at birth.

We are trained from childhood to conform to our parent’s expectations and the boundaries of
society. The true powers of our minds are not explored as we are not encouraged or trained to
think outside the box for fear of ridicule. We involve ourselves with other things in life and forget
about such nonsense until the day comes that we know something we should not and ponder for
a short time only to push it further to the back of our mind again.

Are we being warned about events that are soon to happen by a superior being or are we
receiving these signals from others when they are thinking about us? We connect subconsciously
with others all the time. Our minds have the capacity to learn to do this on a regular basis
anytime we feel a desire to. We can develop this natural ability to use at will.

Mental telepathy is a talent we are all born with. The fact is most people never consciously use it
therefore our natural ability to communicate with our mind is never developed. As a result most
people never learn or even realize they have this power. In fact many believe they have this
power is but do not know how to make it work for them. According to scientists our thoughts
have a certain frequency, somewhat like radio frequencies. This frequency can be measured.
Directing these thoughts to a targeted area is the key to using your mind as a means of
communication.

Some techniques to enhance your telepathic abilities

*A trance like state – When you get into a trance like state and become very relaxed, you will be
able to send and receive messages at will. It is somewhat like being hypnotized, your mind will
be open and receptive to communication. If you are wanting to develop the ability to be
telepathic, work on getting into the trance state to be successful with it.

*Focus – When you are relaxed and in a quiet place, think about a person you’d like to contact
you. Focus on that person. Imagine that person receiving your message. Project positive, happy
emotions and allow your thoughts to convey that you want this person to contact you. Don’t feel
as though you need to concentrate on a command. That simply won’t work. Just continue to
send positive impressions.

*Believe – You have to believe in what you are doing and have an open mind about it. As you
grow your telepathic ability, always believe the person will get the message.

*Let go of the Trance State – Do not drift off, deliberately bring yourself back to reality and go
on with day to day things. There is a good reason for doing this.

As soon as you are finished and withdraw your good feelings from the person, he or she will be
prompted to contact you. This is because you cut off the communication and the person will no
longer feel your presence. They will miss you more and take steps to reach out to you.

If you’re practicing alone, this technique can be a great way to learn to focus your mind and your
innate telepathic ability. There are equally powerful ways to learn to focus using two people.

Here is a quick method to practice your telepathic communication using two people.

*Sender and Receiver – Decide which of you will be the message sender and which will be the
receiver. For the purpose of this example, we’ll assume you are the sender. Since you are the
sender your friend the receiver needs to have a pen and paper handy and be prepared to write
down what comes into their mind. The receiver may feel silly at first so remember to stress how
important it is to write everything down regardless of how trivial it may seem.

*Visualize – You are the sender so you should have some simple images in mind to send to your
receiver. These should be well known objects, for instance, a star, an orange, or an apple. These
will be simple and easy to focus on and easier for you receiver to get than more complex images.
*Transmitting – Relax and shut your eyes. Imagine a line of communication flowing to and from
your receiver, perhaps an imaginary line between the two of you. Get as clear of a picture as you
can of this line of thought flowing back and forth. Visually place the object you want to send on
or in the line you have visualized and then send it. Follow it all the way to your receiver and
picture it clearly as you watch it going to its destination.

The act of visualization is a powerful tool in allowing your mind to focus on getting your message
across.

*End Transmission – When you feel that your thought-object has reached its destination, stop
projecting and allow your mind to be blank. This pause in transmission is important because it
allows your receiver time to realize that an image really did appear. When it stops it also allows
the receiver time to take a note of what image he saw.

*Receiver – As with the sender, the receiver needs to relax and be as receptive as possible. He
or she should also keep their mind open and record anything they perceive. He or she also needs
to have good focus and a desire to see messages.

We all see have things flowing through or mind when we relax and are receptive to it. A receiver
should write anything down that he or she sees, even if it is believed to be a random thought.

*Results – When your telepathic training session is complete, compare notes of what images
were sent and what images were received. You should see that even untrained minds will be able
to pick up vague images and even though you won’t get 100% of them right on the first try,
there will be a few that match up.