Canadian Government Executive - Volume 27 - Issue 05

T hirty years ago, communication in your workplace revolved around face- to-face communication, with the oc- casional memo for organizing deeper thought and/or mandating action. Even before the pandemic turned many of us into remote workers, communication had become much more heavily digital, with email, text messages, and connectors like Slack holding sway, even with col- leagues a few yards away let alone collaborators in other locations. “These days, we don’t talk the talk or even walk the talk. We write the talk,” notes com- munication consultant Erica Dhawan in her book Digital Body Language. Face-to-face communication counts on body lan- guage to help interpretation. Our facial expressions, positioning of arms, posture, and tone of voice are critical. They are thought to make up 60 to 80 per cent of face-to-face communication, “the silent lan- guage,” in the words of anthologist Edward Hall. They, therefore, need to be replaced by a digital body language that can serve the same purpose. That will mean slowing down in our written messages and using more, not less words, as well as emoticons and exclamation marks. It will mean using the chat function more on Zoom and “liking” other people’s messages when that is possible. You will have to consciously fight time pressures and the constraints of handhelds to connect with others and give them positive signals, replacing the traditional cues used to show appreciation, notably a smile. Quick, curt emails can send negative sig- nals you don’t intend, particularly hasty responses to barely-read emails from colleagues. “Reading the emails in our inbox with care and attention is the new art of listening,” she says. Putting effort into digital body language will help reduce poor communications or miscommunica- tion. She also argues it will increase engagement, since the loss of non-verbal communication has been leading employees to feel disengaged. “Disen- gagement happens not because people don’t want to be empathetic but because with today’s tools, they don’t know how,” she writes. Start with email, since it’s the prime communica- tions medium today. Individual messages, she ob- serves, have become Rorschach tests, like the inkblots used to illuminate thought processes, preoccupa- tions, and personality. Often they provoke anxiety in recipients, because of brevity, passive-aggressiveness, slow responses, and the level of formality. On brevity, she says at Morgan Stanley there is a running joke that the more senior an individual is in the hierarchy, the fewer characters needed to express gratitude. A person starts with “thank you so much” and after a promotion or two that becomes “thanks,” before moving on to Thx or TX, and perhaps ulti- mately T. Too busy to say thanks – and, perhaps, take the words to send a clear message in the email. Those cryptic messages lead recipients to overthink things or fill in missing words and absent meanings. She recommends in such situations asking clarifying questions or picking up the phone to get additional context. Passive-aggressiveness might show up in phrases like “as per my previous email,” “I’ll take it from here,” or “am I missing something????” Your re- sponse depends on the degree of power and trust in the relationship. If you have a high degree of trust in the other person and the power differential is not significant, pick up the phone and call. Otherwise, be specific and polite in your responses and use for- mal channels. If you can, stay in a place of reason, assuming good intent. In your own messages to oth- ers, show empathy and encouragement. Replace “Do this” with “Could you do this?” The sounds of silence in email come through slow responses or messages lacking in expression or emo- tions. You get an email, “Dinner soon?” and then after you agree hear nothing back but notice the other person has lots of time to post on Facebook. Your anxiety rises. Dhawan urges you, however, to not jump to conclusions. Unless an ASAP response is critical, remember the other party may have a lot on their plate. If you follow up and after two requests hear nothing back, switch to another communica- tions channel. The formality of your emails will to some extent re- Digital Body Language By Erica Dhawan St. Martin’s Press, 267 pages, $38.99 26 / Canadian Government Executive // September/October 2021 THE LEADER’S BOOKSHELF BY HARVEY SCHACHTER DIGITAL BODY LANGUAGE BY ERICA DHAWAN