LearnaBytes

INTRODUCTION

Managers spend a lot of time communicating. The quality of their communication will determine the effectiveness of their management. ‘OARS’ summarises four key skills for verbal communication and in this session, participants will explore what ‘OARS’ skills are.

LEARNING OBJECTIVE

By the end of this session, participants will be able to describe the components of the ‘OARS’ skills.

THE ACTIVITY

What are ‘OARS’ skills?

To answer this question, you will give the participants a brief description of ‘OARS’ and then get them to do a reading activity. They will read information about ‘OARS’ and reflect on it and you will discuss what they read afterward.

Display the slide titled – WHAT IS ‘OARS’?

Tell them that:

• ‘OARS’ is an acronym that describes four verbal communication skills.
• ‘OARS’ skills are used in fields such as counseling and coaching to understand people and respond to them properly.
• Managers can use ‘OARS’ to become better verbal communicators.

Allow them to read the information on the screen and after 2-minutes let them know that they are going to do some more reading about ‘OARS’ and reflect on what they read.

Direct them to the section in their workbooks titled – WHAT IS ‘OARS’?

Each person should read the information in the section and do the accompanying activity. Give them 10-minutes to do that.

When the time is up, stop them and get their attention. Review the activity they did by telling each person to type a summary of their understanding of ‘OARS’ in the chat window.

Allow a maximum of 5-minutes for the chat activity and encourage everyone to participate. As they are writing their answers, read through them quietly so you don’t distract them.

After they’ve finished, thank them and read out all their answers. Make sure you appreciate and acknowledge each person after you’ve read their answer.

End of activity.