The Communication Queen

Renowned strategist, executive coach, and author Dianna Booher discusses where leaders can fall short in connecting and why the skill is critical to success.

Have interpersonal skills always come naturally to you, or were they learned?
I’ve always thought personal communication was easy. But I also think you can teach yourself many of these skills. The reason I got into this line of work was that I saw so many bad relationships, whether personal or professional, caused by communication issues. Even concerning marriages, it’s always said that people argue over money or how to raise their kids. Most of the time, it’s really about how they talk about those things.

What set you on this path professionally?
Years ago, my ex-husband was suffering from extreme depression. I knew he wouldn’t be able to support my two young kids and me much longer, so I needed to decide how I could support us. I talked about it to a friend, who asked, “What do you like to do?”

I responded, “I used to like to write English compositions in school. But how do you make a living doing that?” He said, “I didn’t ask you how to make a living; I asked you what you like to do. I suggest you find a way to do that.”

So I went to the public library and checked out a bunch of books on how to write a book and how to get published. I penned my first one, and as soon as the book tour and PR started, companies started calling me. For example, IBM reached out about teaching workshops on strategic writing and presentation skills. Eventually, I began to teach anything that had to do with communication, whether writing, leading a meeting, resolving conflict, or interviewing people—just about any situation you need to use words. That’s what I’ve done all my career.

When did you start your company?
1980. I was very young. In fact, I never actually held any other position except teaching for a couple of years. It has been a dream to help improve communication around the world because it’s a critical skill for any endeavor in any country. When I go abroad, I’m amazed that my audiences sometimes speak three or four languages. When I compliment them on speaking English so well, they’ll invariably say that in the business world, they must communicate in English because they have to do business with the US.

Is communication an underappreciated skill in business?
Yes. People point out that we’re born communicating. But giving information is not the same as really connecting with others (communicating). For example, life-of-the-party-type people sometimes assume they’re good at it when they’re not. They merely talk a lot. Talking may come naturally to an executive when speaking to their team, yet when they try to translate their thoughts into a performance review or chit-chat casually at a social event, they struggle.

Our communication skills affect almost everything we do, whether it’s being persuasive to get funding for a department or talking to venture capitalists while trying to start a business. In building a career, excellent communication skills are necessary for anyone who wants to get promoted.

When an executive sends a C-suite candidate to me for coaching, they often don’t even know how to tell me what the person needs to get promoted. Instead, they’ll just comment that the person needs “polish.” And, of course, “polish” isn’t exactly clear feedback to that team member! They need to learn specific skills to enhance their personal presence: how to think on their feet to respond to questions, make a persuasive case, connect emotionally, and express themselves clearly in both writing and speaking.

You’ve published fifty books. Which are your most popular?
The one that’s been referenced most often is Communicate with Confidence!. I’ve expanded it since it was first published. It now contains 1,250 tips in twenty-three different topic areas, from contributing ideas in a meeting to listening carefully to clients in a sales situation. Yet it’s the easiest book to read because each excerpt is brief: to the point with strong examples.

Another popular one is Creating Personal Presence: Look, Talk, Think, and Act Like a Leader. It offers advice for people who haven’t gotten promoted to the business rung they aspire to. For example, you can actually see someone’s confidence—or a lack thereof—by the way they walk across the room, shake hands, gesture, or maintain good posture as they present ideas to a group. As listeners, we assess someone’s personal presence in several other ways: What words do they choose? What sentence patterns do they commonly use? Are they always throwing out buzzwords and colloquialisms, or are they creative in their speaking?

Why did you start doing book camps?
I started the Booher Book Camp program because people would constantly ask if I had a class on how to get published. The answer was always no. I guess I should have listened to the market back then. [Laughs] I eventually started doing the book camps once or twice a year. And when COVID started, I began doing them online. Now, most often I coach aspiring and seasoned authors one-on-one either in my office or via Zoom. The camps help leaders narrow their subject until—to use their favorite term—it’s polished into a publishable manuscript that a major publishing house would pick up.

In general, people have no idea how difficult it is to publish a book. They don’t learn the real steps in developing a great book proposal, so they take shortcuts and send junk. You have to learn what goes into a solid book proposal and agent query. Once you do, your chance of success increases exponentially!

You’ve touched on nonverbal communication. How key is that in business?
Most people are unaware of their own body language. For example, I once observed a senior executive who leaned back, shook his head, and looked disengaged while others spoke—unintentionally saying to them, “I’m not listening.” Leaders often need a metaphorical mirror to see how their posture, gestures, or facial expressions may undermine their message.

Years ago, I was talking to a major law firm in Washington, DC. One woman there said that she felt invisible, complaining to me that the senior leadership just refused to make the female attorneys partners in the firm. However, when I observed her presenting to the group and in social settings, I had a different take on the situation. When speaking to others, she tended to lean slightly forward and point a finger at her listeners, body language can clearly be taken as lecturing.

Is not adjusting communication to an audience a common mistake?
Definitely. Too many leaders fail because they reuse the same presentation for every audience. But engineers, customer service teams, and executives all have different priorities, vocabularies, and levels of knowledge about any specific topic. Effective communication starts by asking questions like “What’s their primary interest in my topic?” “What terms resonate with them?” “What do they have a bias for or against?” and “What do they already know?” Without those answers, buy-in suffers.

Many executives rely too heavily on slides, cramming dozens of them into a thirty-minute talk. I still recall helping a CEO at his organization’s annual shareholder meeting cut a sixty-slide deck down to three powerful visuals, which made his message far more impactful. The presenter carries the impact; the tools are mere support.

Communication techniques that help keep everyone mentally involved include rhetorical questions, storytelling, and even visual props. Such engagement builds retention of your points. Without it, people very well may tune out.

What other tendencies cause leaders to unintentionally sabotage themselves?
One common issue is confusing information-sharing with real communication. Employees often complain (either in employee surveys or in person) that “There’s just no communication around here!” Leaders shake their heads in disbelief and push back by listing their meetings, emails, and other “official” notices as proof that they communicate frequently—but those are one-way efforts. Communication is about how people perceive and experience the exchange, not how often information is distributed.

Also, many leaders overlook structured ways for employees to initiate communication. They focus on sending information out but don’t create clear channels for incoming ideas and feedback. True listening requires systems that invite input, not just surveys or suggestion boxes but ongoing dialogue.

Frankly, listening signals respect. Without it, people disengage. Leaders must design communication processes that encourage upward feedback, not just top-down messaging.

When leaders appear human and relatable, trust increases. Perfection can distance you, but vulnerability invites engagement.

You’ve helped so many people. What does that mean to you?
I don’t think about it, actually. My husband reminds me of my work if I’m discouraged about something. But what brings me a great deal of satisfaction is seeing situations changed, both in organizational settings and in personal relationships, such as a couple at the point of divorce who are now madly in love again.

Business is dog-eat-dog. Everybody’s competitive. When I work with a business year after year and see the whole organizational culture change, that’s extremely satisfying. So are promotions resulting from better communication.

I’ll always remember coaching Gloria, a lower-management leader at a major telecommunication company. She got promoted several times, from local manager to regional director to an executive role at their headquarters before making her way to a high-level position in politics. She credited her dramatic rise to her improved communication skills and stayed in touch with us for thirty years. Such stories make me beam with pride—not necessarily because of my part in them but because people unlocked communication skills that changed their lives.

For more info, go to booherresearch.com