Creating and maintaining the right personal image for you and your company

Making eye contact is important in establishing a good image. In North America, not making eye contact is considered rude. And if one is caught avoiding eye contact, the message of the person is sneaky, hiding something, or for some reason cannot face a person.

Most people think eye contact is an easy: just look into the person's eyes. Well, there is actually a lot more than just looking at someone's eyes. Consider these: duration and intensity.

Duration of an eye contact is how long one is looking at another's eyes. A person who looks at another for a long time may be considered:
* attractive, if both parties are attracted to each other;
* rude, as it becomes as stare; or
* intimidating, when it is a stare.

In business, it's best to keep the duration not too long, yet not too short. How do you consider that? It is extremely hard to time the duration when one is in a converation. But if you feel drained, you know you may be staring at another person for quite sometime (although it's funny how when it is from being attracted to another person, it is not tiring at all!)

Intensity - it is best not to look into another's eyes as if to pin them down. A soft look is preferred. And what is that? A soft look enables you not only look at the person, but being aware of what is surrounding the person as well. Your peripherals are working. You are taking in the whole big picture, not focusing 100% on the person's eyes. This softens the look of your eyes, and the person with whom you are talking to will feel more comfortable too.

Next time I will write in more details about eye contact - the different messages of the eyes.