Communication Skills in Practice

Diana Williams is a full-time lecturer at The Central School of Speech and Drama. She teaches on the MA in Human Communication and is coordinator for continuing education programmes.

• Section One: Communication Skills - A Definition; non-verbal communication: proximity, eye-contact and eye-gaze, facial expression, gesture, body posture, head movements. Para-linguistic features of communication: tone of voice, quality of voice, volume, intonation and pitch, rate of speech, conversational oil (e.g..mm,er). Verbal communication: what makes a good verbal communicator? Advanced verbal skills relevant to professionals. Section Two: Interviewing; purpose of interviews, scene setting, gathering information, involving the interviewee, completing the interview, dealing with difficult situations, working with interpreters. Interviewing skills in context: clinical, appraisal/disciplinary, recruitment and media. Section Three: Professional Meetings; preparation, communication roles, presenting self. Meetings skills in context: business meeting, multidisciplinary, case conference and committees/working parties. Section Four: Presentations; preparation, establishing rapport with the audience, effective use of voice, delivering content, using non-verbal communication and effective use of audio visual aids. Presentation skills in context: client/carer workshops, presentations to other professionals, lectures, selling your service and presenting your research