Some of the best communicators I have met have taught me that you are truly big when you communicate small. That is, you get up from your plush designation, push aside the corporate façade, slide down the hierarchy balustrade and “stoop” to talk and connect with a simple, solitary individual.

Enduring connection
There was this owner of a group of companies, a true monarch of the market. He would look everyone in the eye, greet by name and enquire about the immediate family. 
Last I ran into him, some four years after our last meeting, cruel circumstances had reduced the monarch to a pauper. But, he still greeted me by name, asked about my wife by name, named both my sons and correctly guessed their grade. He remains a communication king in my heart. 
Of course, not everyone is blessed with that kind of memory. However, if you think it is important to communicate small, you will find a way.
 
Tech help
The CEO of one of the country’s largest companies used his secretary and his laptop to communicate small, big time. I helped him with a few templates. Just by adding a name and changing a few words, he would convert those into very personal letters to suit every occasion—from congratulations to condolences. Before he started a telephone conversation or his secretary ushered in a visitor, his database would bring up the gist of their last exchange—personal and professional. 
Goes to show you can’t blame technology for the all-pervading disconnect. Use it right and it can help you connect—if it matters to you.
  
True healing touch
She was not just a doctor, but a demigod. I was sceptical. She treated the same diseases and prescribed the same drugs like everyone else. Yet, people loved her and stayed put in her waiting room for hours. Why? How? 
I was with one of her patients, when I realized the magic was not in her stethoscope. She was 30 minutes late and my friend was in serious pain. Just then, he received a call. It was the doctor. She apologized, explained the delay and told him when she would reach. That call acted like a placebo.  My friend settled down comfortably for a long wait. 
That doctor’s reputation and her healing touch was not as much in her prescription as in the thoughtful, small communications like that one-minute call.
 
Back the pat
Talking of calls, I can never forget the Monday when I got a call from a very senior executive of a client organization. My regular contact was about five levels down the hierarchy, so this was a surprise. He took barely a minute to tell me that the presentation I had helped his team make was very impressive and did its job well. That call made my week.
The irony? My contact never bothered with mundane things like feedback. Unless, of course, I had made a Himalayan blunder. Or what was needed yesterday, till a minute ago, was now required the previous week.
Months later, when I told the big boss how his call had had such a positive impact on me, he had no clue what I was talking about. But he shared a secret, “Someone told me a long time ago that you should never miss an opportunity to pat someone on the back for a genuine reason. And you must do it without delay. I just try to follow that always.”
Back the pat to work wonders.

Grace under complaint
I wish my bank would grow up to be big one day. I had emailed a complaint about a wrong charge. When there was no response even a week after the promised 48 hours, I followed their protocol and took up the issue with “higher authorities.”
Four days later, someone from my branch called. “Did you check your account before you escalated the problem?” he sounded very irritated with me. “The issue was resolved two days before you complained higher up.” But, no one told me the problem had been resolved. Else I would not have bothered to escalate the issue. And am I supposed to monitor my account every minute? “When you escalate any issue, the branch must answer. I have to answer.” Did he want me to apologize? “You should understand customer complaint emails are handled by a different department,” he explained.
All he had to do was tell me the issue was resolved. Instead, he made it amply clear that me the small customer was being a nuisance to him, the busy boss of big bank packed with so many departments.
 
Talk beyond script
My internet service provider (ISP), on the other hand, is beginning to grow up. I am used to tiring cut-paste email responses when I post a complaint. This time it was no different and I had almost given up.
Surprise! A live human being, who knew my name and my problem called up to admit they had not figured out a solution yet. Two days later, he called again to say that the company had sorted out the issue and went on to share his personal number, in case I faced any problem.
Admitting a problem, taking the initiative to make a call and conducting a conversation with a small, solitary customer, without a script. Yes, my ISP has suddenly grown big in my eyes.
Image source: www.dogkneeinjury.com​

Some books inspire you, so do some people. Some people walk with you and give you just the push to find and use your own wings.
They are often inconspicuous and unaware of how they influence you. Yet, you realise their worth and contribution when you pause to take stock at some juncture. Or, like it happened this morning, an obituary catches your eye and pulls you back in time.

A gruff introduction
Chandrakant Khandelwal. I met him at a time when I had just stepped into the unknown domain of business, leaving the comfort of a job. Life was fun. I was earning money doing what I enjoyed. That I could not escape some mundane stuff like keeping books and filing returns had not yet sunk in.
It was my accountant who introduced me to Khandelwalji. He was a chartered accountant and his firm was to handle my tax matters.
Maybe I expected a warm welcome and exclamations of how happy he was to get my business. Instead, the hello was intimidating to say the least. “This is what we charge and we don’t help you cook books,” was the gist of his introductory proclamation.
I was tempted to find another CA, one who smiled, at the least. For some reason, I decided to stick on. “He has got a great reputation; his firm is very respected,” my accountant reassured me.
The senior Khandelwal and I barely interacted because his son handled most of my work. Very often he would walk by when his son was helping me make sense of the numbers. “Good morning” was frequent; a smile, rare.
I got to know from the son about his father’s work ethics. Don’t try to dodge hard work. If you can’t do it ethically, walk away, no matter what the price. Whenever I faced a problem, the son would resolve it but I would draw reassurance from the fact the father was backing that resolution.
After some years, his firm went on to become my client. The senior Khandelwal would participate in briefing sessions but barely spoke. He would keenly watch the interaction among others. His occasional comment made it amply clear that he was with us and thinking ahead. In fact, he even smiled at me once or twice.
The firm grew in leaps and bounds. He could have sat back and enjoyed the success. Instead he preferred to come to work every day. Until he was too frail and ill.
This morning the obituary told me he was gone, never to return.

RIP Khandelwalji
At the condolence meeting, a speaker pointed out that Khandelwalji was always available to solve problems, whether it pertained to regulations, to relationships or to religion. From the little I knew of him within the confines of his office, I was sure that was no eulogical exaggeration.
As mobiles sullied the chanting of the prayer and the members of the sizeable gathering surged to pay their respects to the family, I imagined his small figure walking past my chair. His booming voice would have requested everyone to be patient and not to rush. If that failed he would have sat down on a chair, hand to chin, pensively waiting for the world without him to settle down.
Accounts and returns are no longer a terror and I manage the little I need to do without help. Did that searing introduction fire me up to handle my own battles with numbers? Did the unacknowledged desire to be in the good books of a tough task master inspire me to balance my books? I would like to believe so.
Thank you, Khandelwalji!

This morning I got an instigating call. “Remember that letter you had written for me? Maybe you should send a version of that to the new President. He would love to hear from his illustrious predecessor.”
He was still laughing when I cut the call. Advise the new President? No way! There is enough out there to see and read about both, the one who has come in and the one who is gone. Everyone seems to be asking both the same question, “Why, oh why?”
Neither needs advice from the 16th in their line. But, some years ago, my friend did. Yes, the same friend who called me this morning.

Enter the fighter CEO
My friend used to be the chairman of a company that was fighting for survival. He was keen to appoint a strong CEO to lead the battle and win.    
There was a candidate within the company. He spoke his mind and cared two hoots about the outcome. He frequently quarreled with his bosses. He did his best to overthrow two CEOs. His juniors hated him. About what he thought of the women in the company and, in turn, what they thought of him, the less said the better. But if your life depended on fighting, he was your go-to man. He was obnoxious; his performance was towering.
My friend, the chairman, wanted my help to write a formal letter of appointment on behalf of the Board of Directors. In that letter, he wanted to welcome the new CEO, and subtly, very subtly, admonish and caution him.
Why all that in a letter? Why not have a chat in private? The Board wants it in writing, my friend said. “You know how it is. If things go wrong and we have to remove him in a hurry and the media asks questions ….” I applauded my friend for being very prescient.
I hoped Google would throw up some inspiration. It did. A letter from Abraham Lincoln!

If Abe were to write
I have placed you at the head of this organization. Of course, I have done this upon what appear to me to be sufficient reasons. And yet I think it best for you to know that there are some things in regard to which, I am not quite satisfied with you.
I believe you to be a brave and a skilful executive, which, of course, I like. I also believe you do not mix politics with your profession, in which you are right. You have confidence in yourself, which is a valuable, if not an indispensable quality. You are ambitious, which, within reasonable bounds, does good rather than harm. But I think that during the reign of the previous CEO, you have taken counsel of your ambition, and thwarted him as much as you could, in which you did a great wrong to the company, and to a most meritorious and honorable colleague.
I have heard, in such way as to believe it, of your recently saying that both the company and the Board needed a Dictator. Of course, it was not for this, but in spite of it, that I have given you the command. Only those executives, who gain successes, can set up dictators. What I now ask of you is corporate success, and I will risk the dictatorship.
The Board will support you to the utmost of its ability, which is neither more nor less than it has done and will do for all CEOs. I much fear that the spirit which you have aided to infuse into the company, of criticizing the CEO, and withholding confidence from him, will now turn upon you. I shall assist you as far as I can, to put it down. You could not get any good out of an organization, while such a spirit prevails in it.
And now, beware of rashness. Beware of rashness, but with energy, and sleepless vigilance, go forward, and give us victories.

The Presidential original
With apologies to President Lincoln, what you just read is an adapted version of the letter he wrote more than 150 years ago, on January 26, 1863, to be precise. It was addressed to Major General Joseph “Fighting Joe” Hooker, who was being appointed to head the Army of the Potomac during the American Civil War. The website of the California Military Department begins the section on Major General Hooker by describing him as “One of the most immodest and immoral of the high Union commanders ….”   
I did try to humour my friend with this adapted letter and a staider corporate version, but my friend rejected both. And now he wants me to send a new version to the President!
Going back a century and a half, this is what Major General Joseph Hooker told reporter Noah Brooks about the letter from President Lincoln: “That is just such a letter as a father might write to his son. It is a beautiful letter, and, although I think he was harder on me than I deserved, I will say that I love the man who wrote it.”
Hmm! The CEO never got to read it, but does that sound like how the President would respond if Lincoln were to rise and give him such a letter this January 26?

The last time this house magazine figured in a conversation was when a new friend called me from my old company. Once upon a time, they had recruited me to launch and edit their house magazine. Now, after nearly three decades, my friend had been asked to revive the same magazine.
Same? I began writing for the magazine hammering away, two-fingered, at a borrowed typewriter. Now, he was trying to figure out how to use social media and the company’s intranet to bring the magazine digitally alive on laptops and smartphones.
We used to send each copy by first class mail to every employee’s home, I told him. He could hardly suppress a chuckle. “Mail? You mean as in post office?” He tried to explain it to me, speaking slowly, “We are talking of some 20,000 employees.”
I was fortunate that the number was just a little over 1000 then. Made it easier for me to know almost every name and face I communicated with.
I had joined as a proud writer, confident of bowling them all over with my clever writing. And they taught me that communication was not about English but about listening and sharing—sharing experiences, memories and moments.

Good language makes for better communication. Yet, the best communication often needs no language. That’s what I learned from a little girl just beginning to flap her wings and from a couple at the other end of life.

The little story teller
She must have been six or seven years of age. I landed in her class close to lunch time. The children were used to visitors and, right on cue, the teacher orchestrated a chorused welcome.
The hungrier ones were already moving towards their lunch boxes. The teacher persuaded one of them to repeat the story she had just told them. It came out pat, the mouse and the lion living happily ever after without any error or emotion.
This girl was at the back, hand raised, jumping up and down to catch the teacher’s eye, eager to tell the story.  I requested the teacher to give that girl a chance before my conducted tour moved on to the next class.
“Once upon a time …” the girl began, panting a little after all the jumping. She soon lapsed into her mother tongue. “Speak in English,” came the sharp rebuke. The girl stopped and started again. Again, English deserted her by the second or the third sentence.
“But I am speaking in English,” she started crying. Her friends were laughing at her. The teacher was getting angrier. My tour conductor whispered it was time to move on.
I knelt before the girl and asked her to tell me the story. She wiped her tears and began. Within moments, everything else vanished. There were just the two of us.
I saw the terror the mouse felt in those round eyes. The almighty roar of the lion emerged from that little mouth. Her hands captured the cowering plea of the mouse. And I felt the anger and frustration of the lion when her entire body fought the net. Then the finale, the triumph of friendship.
The sudden silence brought me back to the class. I didn’t hear what the teacher was saying. I didn’t hear the giggles around me. I just applauded her. Did she speak in English? I had no idea. She had just brought the story alive for me. Language did not matter.
As we walked out of the class room a little tug on my trousers stopped me. She stood there, offering me a biscuit from her lunch box and a wide smile.

They held hands
At the palliative care centre, there were several instances of love and perseverance winning over excruciating pain and crushing misery. Some I witnessed; many the team would share with me.
“I don’t know what you are going to write about this case,” the social worker said. “They just sit and hold hands.”
The husband would come from work every evening. The nurses would have wheeled her bed out of the ward and closer to the garden by the time he arrived. She was too weak to get up. He would sit next to her and hold her hands. During those hours, they were oblivious to whatever happened around them.
It was a moving sight. But the social worker was understandably sceptical. Indeed, what was I going to write? That they held hands?
That’s exactly what I wrote.
​
He knew she didn’t have much time
Maybe she did too
That didn’t matter
This was out of their hands
The sun played hide and seek
With the leaves and the flowers
And people flowed around them
That didn’t matter
At times they spoke
Most times they didn’t
That didn’t matter
They yet had each other
To love, to care for
That was in their hands
That was all that mattered
So they held hands, always    

​What would you do?
My first instinct was to ignore the email. Let him stop cribbing and figure things out for himself. Maybe he knew that. Is that why, after all these years, he dragged Charu into this? So that I would take him seriously?
Now you know why I need your help. They say the corporate world has changed a lot from the time I was an employee decades ago. So, I want to ask all of you readers who know better.
You can’t think of a life outside the company or the cause you are serving. And you are dying every moment that you are inside. What would you do?

This is very strange, I told my friend. You are a well-known journalist, you teach journalism in at least two colleges and you don’t want your son to take up journalism? And you want me, an ex-and-not-well-known journalist and who lives by writing to give him that advice? Why? Don’t like his writing?
“Don’t be funny! You know he writes very well. You were his mentor once, remember.” I knew I had to be guilty somehow or the other. “Have you seen the plight of journalism today? You should know how good writers are faring.” Ouch!
Her son, a fresh MBA graduate, was staying with me the night, purely to save hotel bills and was slated to take off for a trek early the next morning. Given that our sleeping and waking hours had a very narrow overlap zone, I dutifully started my counselling as soon as we were in the car on the way back from the airport.
I had no clue what I was in for.
“So, how is your writing?” I thought that was a safe, neutral opening.
“Oh, fine uncle! Hold on for a sec! My mother has been talking to you, right?” he laughed out loud. “Did she tell you that I should take up writing or I should not? Don’t answer that. I will tell you. She doesn’t want me to become a journalist like her. And she is afraid I would. Right?”
I felt like a batsman who was run out even before he could take his guard.

Know him; he knows
Once we were home, he sat me down.
“Uncle, I know your pet prescription to all your students who want to become better writers. Read more, write more. I fully agree with it and I will never forget how you had helped me once.
“Maybe, thanks partially to you, I love to read and I love to write.”
​Ah! That felt nice. He was just starting, though.
“I read and write not to take up writing as a career. I climb mountains. I play the guitar for a rock group. I enjoy cooking. I am a champion swimmer. So, should I become a mountaineer? A chef? A musician? Or a professional sportsperson with all those fat endorsements?”
Fortunately, he did not wait for answer and went off to take a shower. I went to the kitchen to fix a quick dinner for both of us.
“I have spoken to some of my friends about you, uncle,” he said as I joined him at the dining table. Now, where was this heading?
“Told them you are a super coach. You have helped create several good writers.”
Was this a compliment? Na! There must be a but coming soon ….
“But, that’s ok for regular people.”
“By regular, do you mean, older people?” I ventured.
“Well, you know, older, working, married and all that.” Such a broad definition of regular!

​Old medicine; new prescription
“For someone like me, you have to change your prescription. Today, guys don’t read. And what they write is WhatsApp, that too when they cannot forward something readymade.
“You can’t become a champion swimmer like me if you don’t want to enter the pool, right? So, whoever wants to become a writer must write. So, your advice is spot on. What you are missing out on are the two Es.”
Wasn’t I supposed to be the psychologically superior coach? When did I end up on the couch?
“Experience. Enjoyment. I keep telling my friends to write about what we experience and what we enjoy. They are so lazy, they just copy-paste what I write.
“It is time you added the two words to your prescription. Put Experience right in the middle. And Enjoy last. Read. Experience. Write. Enjoy. By experience, I don’t mean what you have gained or lost over the years.” The rascal deliberately looked at my paunch and my bald head.
“By experience, I mean the world around me, beyond me. Which unless I venture, I wouldn’t know. And writing for me is sharing, which is necessary to complete the enjoyment.”
When I woke up the next morning, he was gone. There was a note below the cup, which he had used for coffee and left for me to clean.
“Thanks, uncle! Keep coaching. I will send my friends to you. Tell mom not to worry. I can take care of myself. And tell her I love her.”
I called her up and read the note out to her. Told her she had a very intelligent young man for a son and there was no need to worry.
Then I asked her, a little hesitantly, “Do you think I should change my profession? I mean am I a little old—”
Her laughter cut me short. “Every time I talk to him, he leaves me with the same effect. It wears off. You are doing fine. Take a shower and read the newspaper. The poorly-written reports of sundry evil acts will make you feel wanted and normal.”
I followed her advice.

The question came out of the blue. “How do we know that the changes you suggest are the best possible changes?” And the question was dipped in teen scorn.
I could sense the teacher, my facilitator for that workshop, bristling at the questioner’s temerity. I motioned her to remain seated. After all, I was the coach, the expert who had travelled all the way to help the students and teachers of the school write better English. Surely, I could handle this?
Some 15 minutes earlier, they had all sauntered in, noticed a stranger with their teacher, deposited their bags and extracted a notebook. While I was being introduced with teacherly gravitas, some 20 pairs of eyes beamed two clear questions at me. “What are you doing here?” “What are we doing here?”
It took a while but I managed to get the notebooks closed and the pens put away.

The thaw
​Most of my jokes ended up wriggling on the floor having bashed their heads against a still-standing wall, but a few managed to loosen some bricks and reveal some smiles. More importantly, I discovered some writers.
“That’s a very good question,” I said, although a good answer was nowhere in sight. Then I took the safe route and smashed it right back! “Would any of you like to answer that question?”
One hand was already up, much to my relief. It was the quiet poet.
“I don’t think there is something like the best in writing,” she declared. “You express what you are feeling or what you want to say. It is your expression. Maybe someone can do it better. Maybe on another day you will do it better if you try again.”
“But who is to judge what is best?” a would-be journalist questioned. “You may love what you have written, but the reader may not. Or you may write something that is ordinary and the readers may make it a best seller.”
“I think best is relative.” This was from someone who had confessed to loathe “pointless” writing. “You may like it today, hate it tomorrow. Your readers may not appreciate it today; and when you are dead, someone might discover the relevance of your work.”
Wow! It was turning out to be some debate. While the teacher helped to keep things civil, I tried to ensure the punches were legal. Somewhere along, I inserted a few words about my role as a coach—understand what they wanted to say and help them put it in a manner that was clear, convincing and interesting to the reader. Probably that little pitch did not survive the heat of the debate.

Don't correct, don't read
At the end of the session, the teacher summoned the boy who had thrown the tricky question. Was she planning to take him to task? Before she could say anything, I shook his hand and thanked him for initiating a very interesting debate. There was no stopping the teacher. “So, did you get the answer to the question?” It was a hostile question. Thankfully, he did not bite. He looked her in the eye and said, “Yes, ma’am.”
The three of us walked out of the class together. The teacher was headed elsewhere and directed the student to walk with me to the room where a group of teachers were waiting for my next session. She made it sound like a punishment.
We started walking in silence. “I am writing a novel,” he announced without any preamble. Surprise!
But I just nodded by head as I felt there was more coming. “The teachers correct whatever I write. And I must change it, whether I like it or not.” I was surprised at the intensity of his emotion. “The novel is mine. No one will change it. I don’t care if no one reads it.”
I jumped at that chance. “I would love to read it. When it is ready and only if you don’t mind. And I can assure you I am not interested in correcting it.”
He stopped near a room, my destination. He stood there facing me, running his fingers through the straps of his bag.
“You promise?” he asked. “You will not correct?”
“I don’t have the time to correct everything I read,” I replied earnestly. Unintentionally, I ended up mocking his serious tone.
He smiled bashfully and then asked for my email ID. I gave that and quickly walked into the room.
The waiting teachers must have wondered what this guy was grinning about. They didn’t know that I had just uncovered a stone and I had a strong feeling it would turn out to be precious.

The CEO’s office called just hours after I had emailed my profile. And I was sitting in his office in another city just a couple of days later.

I had seen several inspirational posters on the wall while I waited for him in the reception. There were more posters along the long corridor to the corner office.

That gave me a nice opening.

“Interesting collection of posters, Mr T N. Each an inspiring piece of communication.”

“Yes!” he was beaming. “Call me T,” he said dismissively. “I believe as a leader you cannot possibly over-communicate. Good communications make the organization.”

The writer and the businessman in me smiled in unison. What luck to land such a client, a fellow lover of good communications!

There was this minor issue that every quote was a slight rearrangement of some common maxim. And that no poster carried the author’s name, not even “Anonymous”. Of course, that was hardly the time to bring it up.

“All my work, you see!”
“Excellent, T!”
“Come, let me show you more.”

We walked through all three floors of his office. He paused to read some of his favourite lines. All along, the members of his team got up to greet him and to smile at me.

When we returned to his office, he took me to an adjoining conference room. I had barely taken a seat when one of the guys I had seen during our walk-through rushed in. He looked rather agitated and clearly didn’t expect to find me there.

“Yes, tell me. Don’t worry, he is a communications expert and he is going to help us. You can talk.”

While I busied myself with my notebook, the tea and some biscuits, I could not help overhearing their conversation that was fast worsening into an argument. The visitor appeared to have some valid points to back the course of action he was recommending. T did not agree and was beginning to lose the argument and his patience.

Suddenly, T stopped talking and pointed at me. A moment later I realized he was pointing at something behind me. It was another poster.

“Happiness is a matter of choice. Choose to be happy here, or choose to be elsewhere.”

Suddenly, the tea turned bitter in mouth. When I turned back from the poster, the visitor was leaving and T was trying to compose himself.

“He is my chief lieutenant. These are people I have trained. Very good people. But you know how it is, training is also like communications. You can never afford to stop.”

Both of us smiled. Neither of us could hide the strain.

I worked closely with all his lieutenants for four years. All of them were wonderful people. They were in awe of T and told me several stories of his remarkable achievements.

Two years after my association with that client had ended, I got a call in the evening. It was that chief lieutenant. He was in my town and could we meet for dinner?

He had parted company with T N and was now heading his own enterprise. As the dinner progressed, I learnt that he was the last of T’s lieutenants to leave. Every departure was bitter and acrimonious.

“But, why?” I asked. “All of you admired him so much.”

“The posters,” he said. T was apparently using the posters to push through his own point of view. “His favourite was the big one in the conference room. You remember that?” I did.

“The writing on the wall was clear. But we all loved him so much that we pulled on. Finally, we had to accept that every favourite writing of his was virtually a wall and if we wanted to grow, we had to get out.”

“Wow! You put it so well. Maybe we can make a poster—"

“Stop!” He grabbed my hand. “I like your work and I want you to work with me, but if you have any poster ideas, forget about it!”
​
We laughed and moved on to dessert.

In a recent survey of the English proficiency of countries and industries around the world reported by Harvard Business Review, India has scored 58.9 on the Common European Framework of Reference for Languages (CEFR) scale. Netherlands tops the list at 73.8, with Iraq at 33.6.
​
The survey covered 510,000 professionals across 16 major industries in 40 countries. The respondents worked in 2,000 different companies, with sales ranging from less than $1 billion to more than $60 billion.
​
The results are published in the EF English Proficiency Index for Companies, the “the world’s largest ranking of countries by English skills”. 

​The report laments that not a single country could score an “advanced” C1 or C2 CEFR level. And that “despite a near universal recognition of English as the international language of business, wide gaps in workforce English proficiency persist between countries.”