For effective communication to take place, there are certain guidelines that must be followed for communication to be made effectual. Effective communication therefore depends on the elements making all the communication processes either written or spoken and how the potentials possessed by each are maximised.
The seven Cs of communication:
- Clarity: This has to do with accuracy of words used in communication. Therefore, for an effective communication to take place, words must be used such that expression would depict exactly the intention of the encoder. The encoder must take into consideration the need for mutuality of meaning of words and/or gestures used in the process of communication. Therefore, the expression used must be packaged such that they obey all rules of grammar. It suffices it to say that they should be no ambiguity or complexity, that is to say that ambiguity or complexity must be avoided in totality.
- Completeness: The idea of feeling the encoder wishes to transmit must be transmitted in its entirety in such a way that encoder includes only words and sentences that could fell his desire completely.
- Correctness: It is of paramount importance that the information to be transmitted must be accurate. Be that as it may, the communicator must ensure that the information it desires to transmit is free of errors. The language must also be grammatical error free capable of distorting information received by the decoder.
- Conciseness: A communicator must put in mind that words must be correctly expressed in very few words in order that time and space are not wasted. Whatever the information it is, it must be clearly stated or succinctly expressed.
- Concreteness: Information to be transmitted should be specific in terms of purpose that is to say there should be no doubt as to the goal that the piece of information is supposed to achieve.
- Candid: The communicator must be sincere since honesty goes a long way towards building trust between the encoder and the decoder. Without which effective communication may be difficult to achieve. For example, if a receiver has already pre-conceived a notion of insincerity against an encoder, then the information transmission between the two of them may be affected by the assumption.
- Courteousness: In all human endeavour, there is need for a certain degree of politeness. In the process of communication, due attention must be paid to civility. This is best achieved in the choice of words as well as the tone with which the words are used. It also gives room for a way to sustain relationships which is the primary aim of communication.