One day, as one of my clients read an email from one of her employees, she received another notification from the same employee.
Then another.
Then another.
What’s happening here? “Why is this employee sending me rapid-fire emails?” she thought.
Wait! She stopped herself and asked, “what is this employee’s human wiring?”
My client knew that her employee was naturally wired with a high amount of communication; in other words, she was an External Thinker and also had a high sense of urgency. Her employee seeks opportunities to connect with others, needs acknowledgement, and wants to verbalize to crystallize her thoughts.
The External Thinker’s Dual Process
With External Thinkers, there is a dual process that happens. They cast their thoughts aloud and respond to the reactions received from others. This helps them to develop the idea and weigh the merits of their idea or concept.
When little or no response is received from the other person, this motivates an External Thinker to repeat, restate or break down the idea further to the listener. They want to ensure that their concept is fully understood and that a personal connection has been made to prompt a listener response.
When the employee didn’t get her natural need met, she resorted to rapid-fire emails. Knowing this individual also needs to verbally bounce ideas off of others to formalize her thoughts and to honor this person’s natural wiring, my client went to see the employee to give her an opportunity to verbalize what she was thinking. Face-to-face communication also allowed her employee to get an innate need met making for a more productive interaction.
Silence is Golden
External Thinkers also tend to be sensitive to silent gaps in conversation, body language or reactions that are not in tune to the situation or circumstance. External Thinkers will continue to verbalize to fill in those silent gaps, which may not be beneficial particularly if the person you are talking to is an Internal Thinker. Internal Thinkers need silence to process their thoughts.
As one of my clients who is wired as an External Thinker facilitated a class, he asked a question to his audience. The entire room just stared at him. In his External Thinker mind, because he didn’t get an immediate answer from the class, he thought something was wrong.
A person chimed in that she was processing her thoughts and needed a minute. Then he remembered that he just needed to wait and manage his own wiring and respect what his class needed. Internal Thinkers need silence to process their thoughts.
For an External Thinker, a long pause or silence seems like an eternity. For an Internal Thinker, silence is golden for creating and thinking through ideas.
As my clients discover, wiring answers why people do what they do. With this distinctive knowledge of someone’s wiring, you are able to:
• Appreciate what matters to the other person and understand what’s underneath their behavior.
• Clearly and confidently communicate naturally with anybody regardless of the circumstance or content.
• Equip yourself with a framework giving you access to operate masterfully as a leader.
Can you see how understanding just one element of human wiring can transform interactions? When you understand all of the elements, you become masterful at navigating any kind of communication with ease.
Inspired Action
If you’re inspired to learn more about your human wiring and how it transforms your work environment, engagement, and results, I invite you to attend our high-value class, Wired to Win! Your Path to Passion, Purpose, and Prosperity.
As soon as you register, you’ll receive your link to take your human wiring assessment and schedule your one-on-one Welcome Strategy Call. It’s important to us that you leave with the tools you need most to implement the training so we’ll have a call on the most important outcomes you want to get from this class. During the class, you’ll experience live coaching and interactive exercises so you can spot human wiring in action.
Registration information at http://excellerateassociates.com/wired-to-win/
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