Diplomacy
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An individual’s ability to negotiate and find a balance between his needs and the needs of people he works with, through navigation of social situations with grace in order to avoid any ill will, is known as his diplomacy skills.
Diplomacy skills, in workplace, support effective communication not only during a negotiation but also when an individual attempts to be assertive or persuasive. They, however, revolve around understanding the opinions, feelings, ideas, and beliefs of other people and showing sensitivity towards them. Doing so allows you to reflect back or assert your own feelings and ideas in a well-meaning way such that it avoids ill-feelings or awkwardness.
Why are diplomacy skills important
Your career as well as job success depend, to a great extent, on your ability to relate with your employers, managers, and coworkers. Collaboration, nowadays, is required for almost every project you work upon throughout your career and has become a determinant for excellence and success on an individual level as well as in the form of teams.
All of this makes diplomacy an invaluable skill to possess in any workplace. Diplomacy skills improve workplace relationships and develop mutual respect such that communication becomes easy and less stressful. Diplomacy skills, if used effectively, enable an individual to come out of an important conversation or a difficult situation with his reputation still intact.
Therefore, it is safe to say that diplomacy skills are good for your morale as well as for making you more effective in the position that you hold.
How to improve diplomacy skills
Following are some effective measures that, if taken, can help in improving your diplomacy skills:
- Get to know others. The key to having ideal diplomacy skills is getting to know other people. The more you know about their strengths, weaknesses, demands as well as the pressures they face at work, the better you will be able to identify the areas where you could benefit their efforts with your expertise.
- Never criticize anyone, especially in public. For improving your diplomacy skills it is important that you have a relationship of mutual trust and respect with your coworkers. Only then will they have faith in you when you ask them to make a compromise in order to reach the ‘win-win’ point. You must learn to put forward your opinion and needs in a very delicate manner, showing all due respect and tolerance to those of others.
- Work upon your body language. You must focus upon and learn to use positive body language. For example, try to use speak in an even and audible tone, relax your body, make eye contact, and keep an appropriate distance from the people you are conversing with. With the help of your body language you should be able to make an impression such that others see you as a problem-solver who shall come up with the best solution. This will increase their faith in you and your solutions.