Your body speaks as much as your mouth.
12 June 2015
Read by 3729 persons
A candidate tells you one thing, but their body and facial expressions say something else entirely. How to decipher this parallel discourse?
"When it comes to truly understanding a person, the main thing is not to separate the verbal from the non-verbal," explains Guy Bilodeau, president of Voir autrement, a communication consulting firm.
Verbal communication is the realm of reason, of ideas, the one over which the person speaking has the most control... including the control not to say what they really think or feel.
Non-verbal communication is body language, the realm of expressing emotions. This form of communication being much more spontaneous, only professional poker players or the best actors succeed in properly concealing their emotions, and in creating the image they decide to project.
Ordinary people, on the other hand, are rather transparent to an eye trained in body language. "What is interesting is to observe the synchronization between the verbal and the non-verbal," continues Mr. Bilodeau. "If your candidate claims that they are very enthusiastic about the position, but their whole physical attitude screams the opposite, there is desynchronization. They are not inhabiting their message, which can only be poorly received."
Watching for the agreement between speech and simultaneous physiological signals, that's fine. But how to interpret these signals? "The first mistake people often make is that they imagine they know if someone is lying by the fact that they scratch their ear or look down to the left. However, there is no scientific basis for any relationship between such details and lying. What you need to look at is the person's overall attitude, which gives indications of their inner state," explains Mr. Bilodeau.
Sensing your interlocutor
In order to know what inner state we are dealing with in our interlocutor, there is a cognitive mechanism known as mirror neurons. These are the nerve cells responsible for the spontaneous reflex of imitating the facial and bodily expressions of the person in front of us. The beauty of it is that, by doing so, we also reproduce the emotions they are feeling.
To get an idea of what is going on in your candidate's head, you just need to become empathetic enough with them so that your state of mind becomes theirs. "You have to try to stop looking for precise signs," advises Mr. Bilodeau. "On the contrary, become permeable, let yourself go and be on the lookout for your own reactions and feelings," since the work of bodily imitation is done automatically.
"You can also train yourself to put yourself in the shoes of a person you are watching on TV or in a public place to understand what they are feeling," advises Mr. Bilodeau.
Be careful not to forget that the communication relationship needs to be nourished in both directions. "Some recruiters will try to have the most neutral attitude possible during an interview," says Mr. Bilodeau. "Unless they want to test the candidate's resistance to stress, this is a very bad idea, because having no expression will make the candidate uncomfortable and block communication. If you wanted to learn more about the person, you've failed," he concludes.
That's all well and good, but who's to say that such a posture in me means the same emotions as in someone else? In other words, is this method of mimicry really reliable? "Studies show that the agreement between facial expressions and feelings is a universal language," says Mr. Bilodeau. "What can change is the degree of permission that our culture gives us to express such and such a feeling. But the non-verbal language used to do so remains the same."
Antoine Palangié.
Workopolis.com
"When it comes to truly understanding a person, the main thing is not to separate the verbal from the non-verbal," explains Guy Bilodeau, president of Voir autrement, a communication consulting firm.
Verbal communication is the realm of reason, of ideas, the one over which the person speaking has the most control... including the control not to say what they really think or feel.
Non-verbal communication is body language, the realm of expressing emotions. This form of communication being much more spontaneous, only professional poker players or the best actors succeed in properly concealing their emotions, and in creating the image they decide to project.
Ordinary people, on the other hand, are rather transparent to an eye trained in body language. "What is interesting is to observe the synchronization between the verbal and the non-verbal," continues Mr. Bilodeau. "If your candidate claims that they are very enthusiastic about the position, but their whole physical attitude screams the opposite, there is desynchronization. They are not inhabiting their message, which can only be poorly received."
Watching for the agreement between speech and simultaneous physiological signals, that's fine. But how to interpret these signals? "The first mistake people often make is that they imagine they know if someone is lying by the fact that they scratch their ear or look down to the left. However, there is no scientific basis for any relationship between such details and lying. What you need to look at is the person's overall attitude, which gives indications of their inner state," explains Mr. Bilodeau.
Sensing your interlocutor
In order to know what inner state we are dealing with in our interlocutor, there is a cognitive mechanism known as mirror neurons. These are the nerve cells responsible for the spontaneous reflex of imitating the facial and bodily expressions of the person in front of us. The beauty of it is that, by doing so, we also reproduce the emotions they are feeling.
To get an idea of what is going on in your candidate's head, you just need to become empathetic enough with them so that your state of mind becomes theirs. "You have to try to stop looking for precise signs," advises Mr. Bilodeau. "On the contrary, become permeable, let yourself go and be on the lookout for your own reactions and feelings," since the work of bodily imitation is done automatically.
"You can also train yourself to put yourself in the shoes of a person you are watching on TV or in a public place to understand what they are feeling," advises Mr. Bilodeau.
Be careful not to forget that the communication relationship needs to be nourished in both directions. "Some recruiters will try to have the most neutral attitude possible during an interview," says Mr. Bilodeau. "Unless they want to test the candidate's resistance to stress, this is a very bad idea, because having no expression will make the candidate uncomfortable and block communication. If you wanted to learn more about the person, you've failed," he concludes.
That's all well and good, but who's to say that such a posture in me means the same emotions as in someone else? In other words, is this method of mimicry really reliable? "Studies show that the agreement between facial expressions and feelings is a universal language," says Mr. Bilodeau. "What can change is the degree of permission that our culture gives us to express such and such a feeling. But the non-verbal language used to do so remains the same."
Antoine Palangié.
Workopolis.com
