In the 20th century ideas on leadership skills have undergone a change that had a tremendous impact on electronic information exchange. Find out how information exchange takes place in the 21st century, who are opinion leaders, and how you can become one.

Throughout the first half of the 20th century the Information Exchange Theory believed that mass information acted as a “magic bullet” – everything that was told by the media reached the audience directly and was passed on by it with the same emphasis as in the source. But in the second half of the 20th century, the concept of interpersonal skills began to change.

Communication in present-day society

In the 1950s the “magic bullet” theory was replaced by a two-stage model of the information stream. In this model the communication looked quite different. According to the new theory, information exchange and transfer is a process that uses middlemen – opinion leaders. These are people whose opinions, due to their erudition, profession, or personal experience, carry a lot of weight in a certain community (in their family, among friends, or at work).

Opinion leaders are the first to bring some media fact to their community. Since media leaders are trustworthy, their role in communications is a very important one. This way, information exchange with other people whose opinions are credible, precedes forming an opinion on the information published in the media.

New unified communications emerged in the 21st century and spheres of influence of the opinion leaders began to expand. Here is some advice on how to become an opinion leader by using the present-day effective communication methods and, using the terminology of the French sociologist Pierre Bourdieu, how to enhance your cultural capital.

Become an opinion leader using unified communications

If the CommFort application is used for your corporate communications your task becomes much easier. There are several nice features that unified communications using this application provide to those who are trying to become opinion leaders.

Confirm facts. A photo or a screenshot can be dropped directly into a chat with just a mouse click. Everyone will become the file recipient and they will not have to receive and save the file; they will see the picture just as they see your chat remarks. That is how unified communications become quicker and more convenient.

Segregate personal and public communications. Praise publicly, censure privately. In order to have such leadership skills – separation of information flow, the CommFort application provides public and private channels as well as personal messages.

Feel the conversation atmosphere. Use smiley faces if the atmosphere is conducive to it. Some channels of CommFort application even have meme smileys available. Even though emoticons are usually reserved for informal communications – they are, nonetheless, means of effective communication that should not be discounted.

Choose the right communications format. Text is for questions that do not require immediate answers or for exchange of information that needs to be transferred exactly. Voice is for a quick discussion (especially if you need immediate reaction of all conversation partners). Video is for those occasions when you need everyone’s complete involvement in the information exchange process. Remember that web camera and microphone are not luxuries, but important information exchange devices.