AudienceAnalysis.docVIP

As the discussion in the previous chapter makes clear, you can’t set achievable goals without persuading various audiences to help you achieve them. Audience analysis means understanding the interests, values, and goals of those people who you want to influence to do something. It is perhaps the most critical and underpracticed skill in management. Success in business communications derives heavily from a ability to provide the framework for a motivated consensus—what organizational behaviorists call participatory management. Often, the course you choose matter less than the degree to which others are committed to achieving your goal. This means that you must understand how they think; how they perceive their interests; what will move them to support you or, at least stay out of the way. It also means you need to give them something to believe in. this involves keeping your channels of communication open before, during, after the decision making process. Audience analysis remains the most frequently and perilously ignored challenge in business communication. By the time you have decided what you want to accomplish, why you are the person to do it, and how to go about it, you will probable see your recommendation ad inevitable—and self-evident to others. Often, it won’t be. Start your audience analysis by posing a few key questions: Who are my audiences? What is my relationship to my audience? What are their likely attitudes toward my proposal? Hoe much do they already know？ Is my proposal in their interests? Defining your audiences may seem obvious. They are the people you want to act—the consumers who should buy your products, the boss whose sign-off you need, the employees who could achieve greatly productivity. In almost any communication situation, however, the support-or at least the neutrality-of secondary audiences will be critical to achieving your goal. What opinion makers or other sources of information may shape consumers’ behaviors irrespective of your