In many of our workshops, we talk about the importance of building trust with partners. If your partners don’t trust you or feel that you believe in what you’re saying, then your message will be relegated to the big file of unmemorable sales presentations.
“Trust is established through congruence — that perfect alignment between what is being said and the body language that accompanies it”. In the attached article, Dr Carol Goman explains that if a speaker’s gestures are not in full agreement with the spoken words, the audience consciously or subconsciously perceives duplicity, uncertainty or (at the very least) internal conflict.
But to use gestures effectively, we need to be aware of how those movements will most likely be perceived. Here are some common hand gestures and the messages behind them.