Yellow Communication Dominance

“Hello, Anyone There? Listen to What Happened to Me! You Want to Know, Right?”

Yellows are very good communicators. With an emphasis on “very.” None of the other colors come close to the Yellows’ ease in finding words, expressing themselves, and telling a story. It comes so easily, so simply, so effortlessly, that you can’t help being impressed. It’s common knowledge that most people don’t like speaking in front of others. They get heart palpitations and sweaty palms, terrified of making fools of themselves. This is totally alien to Yellows. Making fools of themselves isn’t part of the deal, and if the improbable were to happen you could always laugh it off with another amusing anecdote.

However, it may be too much of a good thing. Regardless of what you are good at, there is a limit, a time to break off. Yellows, especially those without self-awareness, don’t have such a limit. It would never even occur to them to wrap up; if they have something to say, out it comes. The fact that no one else thinks it’s important is neither here nor there.

A Yellow behaves exactly like most people—he does what he’s good at. And he is good at talking. There are countless examples of Yellows who completely dominate a conversation. Then add a hefty dose of poor listening and an interesting (read: one-sided) communication takes place.

Many people become hugely frustrated by this limitless verbosity. It’s often perceived as egocentrism. The terms “windbag,” “verbal diarrhea,” and “motormouth” were more than likely coined with Yellows in mind.

Countless times I’ve experienced the following: A group of people are sitting around a boardroom table. The top dog in the room expresses an idea; it can be about anything at all. When the time comes for comments, all the Yellows will reinforce the idea by repeating the exact same thing, possibly with their own words. (I would like to say to the women reading this that I am aware of the fact that this is more male behavior than female.) Why do they do that? Well, first, it’s important to signal when you are in agreement, and second, they can say it so much better.

A few years ago, I was with a management team studying group dynamics. I had just purchased a cell phone with a stopwatch. Using this, I could time who had spoken in the group and for how long.

In the room were the CEO and his seven closest associates. Peter, the sales manager, was really Yellow and he had only had one point of the nineteen on the agenda. Take a good look at the ratio 1:19. This represents around 5.3 percent of the agenda.

The CEO opened the meeting, but pretty soon a clear pattern emerged. Peter had opinions about every single item on the agenda. I used my stopwatch and was fascinated by what I saw. He spoke 69 percent of the time. Yes. It’s true. Thirty-one percent went to the other seven, including the CEO himself.

If you’re Yellow, you may have already charged on ahead in this book, because you possibly recognized yourself and thought that this was a very unfair example. Everyone else is wondering how that’s even possible. How can one person dominate the conversation so fully? It’s possible because Yellows have no problems delivering opinions, views, and advice regardless of whether they know anything about the subject or not. A Yellow has a generous approach to his own ability—when an idea pops up in his head, he simply opens his mouth.

People say that for Reds thought and action are the same thing. For Yellows, I would suggest the idea that thought and speech are interrelated. What Yellows share is often completely unprocessed material that just tumbles out of the big opening on their faces. Sure, it might be well thought out, but it’s usually not. What’s most deceptive is that, almost without exception, it sounds very good. Yellows know a thing or two about presenting an idea so that it always sounds fantastic. If you’re unfamiliar with this particular person, you may very well take everything he says as true—a serious mistake.

Very often a Yellow is both entertaining and inspiring, and as I said, they can inspire people to new ideas. But should you get into a conversation with a Yellow, you need to be observant so that when he catches his breath you can quickly insert a comment. Or simply close the meeting.