Lewis Cracknell

The rule states that 7% of meaning is communicated through spoken word, 38% through tone of voice, and 55% percent through body language.

• 38% is tone and audio

• 55% is body language

• 7% is spoken word

I’m often one for slight exaggeration to make a point, so here goes:

The way I spin this is, your email could have a 93% chance of failing to land its message with the recipient. Why? Because an email doesn’t have spoken word – it is written, with no voice tone and no body language.

Think about this next time you go to send that email….The next time you send a Teams/Slack message in a rush. Are you communicating effectively?

Think about this next time you join a call with your camera off. Sure, you are well within your rights to have your camera off, but don’t kid yourself into thinking that you’re having as effective communication as if you were on camera, where your body language can be seen and transcended. As we know from the above, body language is a huge part of what makes effective communication. Cutting that off is like slashing more than half of your communications effectiveness. Be aware of that!

I was the incident manager for a major incident. I needed to convey a tricky message where one incident bled into the other. We had three incidents in a week, all related to one system. Two had been resolved and we had one active incident that we were working on. I thought, how am I going to explain this? I know a long email would get lost in translation or quite frankly, just wouldn’t get read. So I designed a simple table, linking the incidents and the supplementary word doc. I found myself thinking, this still isn’t easy to explain. And if something isn’t easy to explain, can you imagine how “easy” it must be to digest and understand? So I decided to record a short video where I talked through the situation, the incidents, and where we stand today. The video was 3 minutes. I emailed it with some context in the email. Sometimes a pause to reflect on the 38-55-7 rule can help you convey the message you really want to send. Ultimately, it can help contribute to the way in which you want your message to be perceived and felt.

A few more thought provokers:

• When was the last time used an alternative communication approach, such as a video or a voice note?

• When was the last time you asked the recipient what media they preferred?

• Got an important message to convey? If your using just written words, the odds are stacked against you!