Screen-after-screen of lengthy text, in a small barely legible font size (because a small font size is only way to fit all of words onto slide), which manager duly and dully reads verbatim.

Ugh!

The psychological reality is that unless a person is interested in subject of message they are highly unlikely to pay ANY attention.

Which means that if you force them to attend to your message you will actually turn them against you and be even less likely to receive their attention in future.

Save your in-depth budget and performance analysis Excel- generated charts for those who genuinely care and need to know about such things.

If your business communication needs to touch on several areas that might not be of interest to your entire audience, let them know of alternative resources that more fully address each of these additional areas.

You can do this by, for example, providing them with an easily-remembered and written link to a webpage where a greater depth of information can be stored.

Primacy/Recency ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ It is essential to know that, one week later, a business communication is remembered by one or both of two things:

* power and memorability of its opening * power and memorability of its close

Psychologists call effect of remembering first few items presented as a 'Primacy Effect'. Similarly, they call effect of remembering last few items presented to you as a 'Recency Effect'.

Since individuals differ in which Effect is most dominant for them, it is best to 'cover your bases' and make an effort to have both a powerful and memorable opening and a powerful close.

A powerful opening can be anything that captures audience's attention: * a quote, * a joke, * a loud noise, * a preposterous statement.

Just make sure that your opening remains consistent with and relates to subject of communication.

Equally, a powerful close that bears no resemblance to main body of communication would just confuse and disappoint an audience brought up to expect something more.

And don't think that humour will save you.

Business communication is a serious business and very few people have skill to be able to deliver a humourous message that audience will retain and act upon.

As Granville Toogood says in his excellent book 'The Articulate Executive', humour is a very risky strategy.

If you are determined to use humour in your presentation, then please follow Toogood's recommendation:

* Tell story as if it were true. The punch line is a lot funnier if we aren't expecting it

* Tell story to make a business point. If you don't make a point, you have no business telling a joke

* Make sure you tell story correctly, don't mess up punch line, and make sure it's appropriate.

The opening and closing of your business communication are two most easily remembered and therefore essential elements. Make sure you give your audience something to remember.

The Psychological Rule of 7±2 (seven plus or minus two) ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Psychologists have long known that human brain has a finite capacity to hold information in short-term or 'working' memory.

The brain is also structured to retain information in 'clusters' or groups of items. These clusters average, across whole of mankind, at seven items, plus or minus two.

Which means that your audience is only able to hold on to between five and nine pieces of information at any one time.

Now do you see importance of clarity of message and of having a distinctive and memorable opening and close?

If you want your key points to be remembered even five minutes later, it is essential that you limit your business communication to between just five and nine key points.

Equally, if you want your key action points to be remembered five weeks later, ensure that your communication is amongst five to nine most memorable messages your audience has attended to in last five weeks.

Conclusion ~~~~~~~~~~ There are seven essential elements to successful business communication:

Structure Clarity Consistency Medium Relevancy Primacy/Recency Rule of 7±2

If you are going to communicate effectively in business it is essential that you have a solid grasp of these seven elements.

Of course, spam filtering software is not perfect and sometimes emails genuinely don't get through, but in genuine business relationships such instances are rare. There are exceptions, of course -- one of my clients *never* gets my emailed invoices, even when I send them back via 'reply' to an email they send me. But she gets every other email I send. And yes, I *do* track those errant emails via delivery and read receipts. Bizarre, huh?

If you find that you are having repeated problems with undelivered emails and 'blacklisting', you may want to take advantage of Ken Evoy's "Deliver My Mail" campaign. Details are at http://deliver-my-mail.sitesell.com/hsis.html.

2. SMS Similar to email, but slightly more intrusive (because many of us find it hard to ignore our mobile phones, even if it is just a txt message coming in). I don't want to interrupt my recipient, but I do want them to be aware of an upcoming requirement or request. Or I just want to wish them 'bon voyage' without interrupting them from packing.

3. Phone call Only used if I have an urgent need to resolve an issue.

I have found that even highly personal matters can be first discussed using non-intrusive technology like email. I don't have to go into detail, but I can let my recipient know that there is something I would like to discuss when they have a free moment. It gives them a chance to collect their thoughts before we talk over phone or, preferably, in person.