Communication: The One Leadership Skill That Makes People Listen

This is, in fact, one of the most commonly recognized leadership skills among people interested in becoming leaders or among those asked what skills great leaders have.

But let’s pause for a moment.

1. What is the “magic” that good communicators have?

2. What makes us admire them?

3. And what do we need to develop essential communication skills?

These are the big questions we’ll explore in today’s article. After that, you’ll dive into a coaching exercise designed to help you put at least one meaningful action into practice.

To be honest, becoming a great communicator is part of my own leadership journey too!

So let’s begin, and let’s do it together.

Imagine this scenario:

In the middle of a meeting, the room goes completely silent. You’ve just shared your opinion about the direction you believe the team should take.

When the silence ends, someone says: “Do you mean… A, B, C?” — and their words don’t match your message. Or they simply ask: “What do you mean?”

It has probably happened to all of us at least once.

So… what was missing? What could that be?

It was CLARITY!

Clarity means your message is easy for the audience to understand. Your words are clean, simple, and people don’t walk away confused.

In communication, clarity means:

• Using simple words

• Following a logical structure

• Sharing the right level of detail

• Being understandable and free of ambiguity

So what goes wrong? And what can we do to start being clearer?

The first practical step to improve clarity is this: Slow down and state your main point in one simple sentence before you say anything else. If you can’t express the core idea simply, the listener won’t understand it either.

The second step is to remove any complex or not professional vocabulary in your message and finally the third one is to end with a clear what to do next.

Following our conversation about great communicators,

Why they inspire and everyone listen?

Great Communicators usually add this magic ingredient: Passion!

Passion brings high energy and enthusiasm, and it is contagious. Passions comes from believing in the message strongly, from an emotional connection with the topic (deep meaning) and purpose, the person know why to talk about it and why it matters to the audience.

It is shown through the speaker's tone (warmer and more expressive), body language opens up and because words flow more naturally. This makes communication memorable and magic.

The third Element that makes Communicators exceptional is:

To be CONCISE!

So, short, clear and complete.

It’s communication that gets to the point, removes filler, and keeps only what the listener needs.

A great communicator knows how to balance the amount and type of information needed for the specific audience.

A very famous practice is to say only three things about the subject to be communicated you want to explore. It seems people remember easily up to three ideas.

Let's use it:

Finally, what are the 3 key behaviours of great communicators?

1. They start with the main point

2. They use simple, concrete language

3. They end with a clear next step

What are you going to practice this week?

My favourite podcast about Communication is the Jefferson Fisher one on Youtube! If you want to further expand and improve Communication.

Paola,

Career and Leadership Coach - Lead with passion, enthusiasm, and humanity.