Communication Optimization
Everything the Guide points you to.
The Communication Optimization Implementation Guide never prints a web address. It prints an ID — C4.1, C8.2 — and the ID is on this page. That way the book can stay right for years while what sits behind an ID gets rebuilt, renamed, or replaced.
Start here
Four lenses. No stages, no ladder.
Communication is not one of the five pillars, and nothing here assigns you a stage. The Guide works in four lenses — Read, Translation, Candor and Responsiveness — with ten mechanisms underneath them. C0.3, the map, is where to start: score the four, circle the lowest, and open that chapter first.
The Communication Optimization Assessment that scores the four for you is in build. Until it is live, the map does the same job with a pen.
How to use this page
Find the ID printed beside the exercise you are working on. The number in an ID is the chapter of The Communication Advantage the sheet came from — C8.2 is the second sheet drawn from Chapter Eight — so the ID tells you where to read more without a cross-reference table.
Every printable is a clean copy you can print as many times as you need, for yourself or for forty people. Print a fresh copy per person and per instance — a worksheet somebody has already filled in is not a worksheet anybody else can use, and these are per-person by design.
They will all live in one free library, opening when the Guide ships. There will be nothing to buy. Your name is never shared with your organization, and you are not added to a mailing list.
Before you start
Two sheets from the front of the Guide. Neither belongs to a lens.
C0.2
The Two QuestionsTwo questions, a grid, and the quadrant you land in — with no number anywhere on the page. Then the same two about one person you have friction with.
C0.3
The MapFour lenses, ten mechanisms, and the chapter each one came from. Score the four and circle the lowest.
Read · chapters 2, 3, 4 and 10
Whether you are reading the person in front of you accurately — and what you do once you find out you are not.
C2.1
Two Versions of YouThe version under pressure beside the version on a quiet Saturday, across four columns. The widest gap is the one other people have to live with.
C3.1
One Person, One AdjustmentOne person, one change. Deliberately singular — and it closes with what to do when the adjustment feels fake.
C4.1
Your Blind Spot, NamedIf a name arrived immediately, that is one finding. If no name came at all, that is a different and larger one.
C4.2
Before You Get ThereThe early warning, and the move decided in advance — then the part almost nobody does, which is telling one person what your early warning looks like.
C4.3
What, Then WhyThe order the message goes in, and who needs which half first.
C4.4
Strengths, Struggles, StrategiesRun in both directions, and again for the stressed version of each person.
C10.1
The Label AuditThe label you have been using for somebody, and the one thing you would have to find out to replace it.
Translation · chapters 6 and 8
Whether what you believe reaches the people who work for you in a form they can act on.
C6.1
Four Ways to Say the Same ThingOne message, four versions. The one you wrote first is your own style, and it is the version the other three have been getting.
C6.2
The Line From Their Week to the DirectionOne person, one real task from this week, the joining sentence in their language — and the date you said it out loud.
C8.1
When Two Values Pull Against Each OtherOne real collision, and the sentence about which value bends first. If you cannot think of a collision, it is being absorbed below you.
C8.2
What This Value Looks Like on an Ordinary TuesdayOne value, the observable behavior that settles what you meant by it, and one real story from the last ninety days. An empty story box is the finding.
Candor · chapters 7 and 9
The conversation you are not having, and the recognition you are not giving.
C7.1
The Conversation You Are Not HavingThere is one. What it is costing while it waits.
C7.2
Before You Have ItThe prep sheet, including your opening sentence written out.
C9.1
Is It Actually On the CalendarAn intention with no date on it is not a practice.
C9.2
Who Have I Not RecognizedThe people doing the work you have stopped noticing because it keeps going right.
Responsiveness · chapters 5 and 11
What your silence says, and what the channel says before the message does.
C5.1
The Open Loop AuditTwo columns, and the right one is the point. Find the oldest item and close it today — closing does not mean solving.
C5.2
Your Response StandardThe window, the named exceptions, and telling people — the step almost nobody takes.
C11.1
The Channel TestThree questions before you send, and an honest note on what video does and does not give back.
C11.2
The Worst-Day Read-BackRead it as them, on their worst day, and name the line most likely to be misread.
When you would rather measure it than estimate it
The Read lens asks you to estimate how somebody is wired, and an estimate is enough for every sheet above — the Guide never asks for more than that. When you would rather have it measured, Dove Development & Consulting runs the DISC instrument behind this work, and there is a person there to run it with you: dove-development.net/EffectiveCommunication
