Archive for the ‘Influencing’ Category
The “Color” person on TV — do you have one for your team?
Tuesday, January 3rd, 2012
“Color” — that’s the person who adds interesting stories, quips, quotes, and comments to make the ball game and the players interesting. When your team gives a presentation, wouldn’t it be more interesting if you had a color person, too? What if you were the color person? Keep it appropriate, though. Don’t make anyone look or sound bad in front of an audience. Enjoy.
Posted in Influencing, Presence, Presentation Skills | No Comments »
Par, Score, Home run, Touchdown, Hit it out of the park
Monday, January 2nd, 2012
http://www.google.com/search?client=safari&rls=en&q=NFL+video+highligh&ie=UTF-8&oe=UTF-8
I like sports analogies. But then again, I was quite a tomboy, and these analogies make sense to me as a result. But if you are speaking to a global group or others who didn’t play sports or aren’t interested in them, maybe you should think of analogies that relate to what others have in common — family, weather, vacations, and if not politically charged, current events. I’m glad you like sports, and you can go ahead and use some athletic analogies, but you’d better explain them. Then you’ll really score.
Posted in Cultural Differences, Influencing, Interviewing Skills | No Comments »
2 Key ways to ease into fierce, crucial and other types of confrontational, “real”conversations
Sunday, July 24th, 2011
Crucial Conversations and Fierce Conversations have been one of the many thought provoking ways of talking about communications. I like them, because they’re right when they say that conversations are at the heart of business and relationships. You’ve got to really get psyched up to face either of these in-depth approaches to dialogue, though. According to these authors and anyone’s experience of life, crucial and fierce conversations are what most of us want to avoid.
If we’re avoiding these conversations, then what are we doing instead? Nonsensical and superficial communications? Yup. So I’m writing to bridge the gap between superficial and crucial-fierce conversations, so that you can safely ease your way into the deeper waters of relationship communications. Here are two ways:
1. Start by talking about the other person or people’s point(s) of view first, before you voice yours. Why: You are starting with easier content AND demonstrating your excellent listening and caring. Example: “You seem to be saying that we need to do X for Y reason. Steve says that we need to do X but for another reason.” Then interview your compadres in the meeting and check if you expressed their points of view correctly.
2. To grow your confidence toward having crucial-fierce conversations, next offer your opinion not as a hard, fast critique but first as a topic to bring up. Why: You can ease into the conversation and re-direct it without frightening yourself. Example: “Whereas you and Steve see it this way, I see a need to focus on THIS topic instead.” You can then explain or you can turn the conversation back to the other person by saying, “What does that mean to YOU?”
You can cycle through this process several times and work your way up to a deeper, more genuine conversation and d–m-it!, maybe a crucial-fierce one. I can explain more. Just contact me. It’s a great topic and strategy.
Tags: connecting with people, criticism, difficult people, diplomacy, social skills, speech pattern, update methods
Posted in Dealing with difficult people and situations, Executive Communications, Influencing | 1 Comment »
When “Smart” Isn’t Good Enough
Wednesday, January 12th, 2011
College teaches technical professionals that being the smartest will take you far. They are finding that being smart is not good enough. The new rules of big business show two *social* requirements — be politically smart and be tough. Communications at even the glossiest Fortune 100 companies are brutally tough at almost all levels. Polite requests are replaced with terse email messages. Phone calls and face to face conversations have been replaced by instant messaging. Is it efficient? Of course, at least superficially. But does it make people feel attached to a company, manager, or team? Very very little. If you are a leader, don’t risk losing your “A” players due to failed communications. And you “A” players out there? Don’t depend on your high intelligence to guarantee an “A” (exceeds expectations) rating in your performance appraisal. Work your social intelligence as much as your technical intelligence. It’s not all that time-consuming or difficult. After all, haven’t you succeeded at everything you’ve tried?
Tags: beating competition for top spots, being smart, getting along at work, update methods
Posted in Career Advancement, Influencing, Speaking Style | No Comments »
An Inexpensive Gift to Give
Thursday, December 30th, 2010
I’m having a great time reading The Zen of Listening by Rebecca Shafir, a neurotherapist and speech pathologist. Her latest “gift” in the book is this quote: “Listening is a very inexpensive way to give to others.” She offers this statement after pages of quotes from people who recalled the moment in which they had felt truly listened to and understood, without interruptions by others to tell their own stories or “run their own agendas.” To receive full and complete listening by others seems so rare that people find it to be magical. I’m enjoying focusing on listening without barriers or an agenda. It’s not so hard. Here’s the link for her book: http://www.mindfulcommunication.com/
At our company, we’ve spent a lot of time helping people to hear implied meanings in questions and discern the intentions of others, but I think I will recommend this book for its approach to the fine points of focusing and listening. More later on this topic. Thanks for reading this blog, and let me know what you think.
Tags: inexpensive gift, listening, paying attention, Zen of Listening
Posted in Auditory Memory, Career Advancement, Dealing with difficult people and situations, Executive Communications, Generational Differences, Influencing, Interviewing Skills, Presence, self-direction and control | No Comments »
Cesar Millan: Dog Whisperer and People Whisperer: Leadership
Wednesday, December 29th, 2010
"Chuh!" says Cesar Millan, dog psychologist and pack leader
Cesar Millan coaches dog owners in leadership. We coach leaders in leadership. How could these be similar? In at least one key way: that both people and dogs trust a leader who assumes the role consistently and confidently. This combination builds attention and trust. Interestingly, Cesar Millan rarely uses words. Leaders of people rely heavily on words. But leaders can learn a lot about leadership, executive presence, and presentation skills by being nonverbal. Millan has his dog owners hold their heads high and be “calm assertive.” Old style CEOs thought the last thing they should be is calm assertive. Instead, they had to be highly charismatic and engaging. Well, Cesar is getting it right for CEOs as well as dog owners. Conveying calm and confidence, especially in these challenging economic times, does work.
Tags: calm assertiveness, Cesar Millan, confidence, dog whisperer
Posted in Career Advancement, Executive Communications, Influencing, Presence | No Comments »
What Ads Can Teach You about Influencing
Tuesday, December 28th, 2010
I’m inspired by a very successful ad on TV. It’s purpose is not apparent. Set outdoors on an exercise path, it starts by showing a great-looking guy watching a good-looking girl doing a fast walking exercise. When his eyes land on her sneakers (those thick-soled ones especially designed to build balance…and a well-shaped rear-end), he grimaces, and his glance transfers admiringly to ANOTHER girl doing exercise walking in…normal looking sneakers. Here’s the link: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UWPq6lZUKJU&NR=1 . His glance and the voice-over say, “Do you want him paying attention to your thick-soled, rocker sneakers or to you?” The handsome man smiles after the second woman, who smiles lingeringly and beautifully back, while walking in the more normal looking shoes.
Why did I go to the trouble of describing this ad in detail? Because it’s persuasive for a variety of reasons:
1. It contrasts their product with a whole category of previously acceptable sneaker competition as “weird”
2. It subtlely uses the message of achieving admiration — for wearing normal looking sneakers, and no words were used
3. The message is crystal clear — wear OUR normal looking sneakers, and get the improved rear-end AND the guy.
As you prepare your slides for a talk or your message for a meeting, remember to make a clear contrast between you and competing ideas, make your idea admirable, and be crystal clear.
See how much you can learn from one rear-end improving ad?
Tags: advertising, contrasting information, sneaker ad, visuals
Posted in Influencing, Presentation Skills | No Comments »
Well, Everyone else is doing it….
Monday, December 27th, 2010
We are always looking for ways to help people to be more persuasive, even compelling. Sometimes those ways show up in research on advertising that works or making messages that “stick.” Thank you, marketing consultants. At Rae Cook & Associates, we scan “data” for patterns and outliers, and one pattern that is showing up in advertising is the approach/mesage: “everyone else is doing it, so you should, too”. Surprisingly, this method doesn’t just work with kids and teenagers, but even with adults. One study looked at ways to convince hotel guests to use fewer towels to avoid unnecessary washing and environmental impact. Hotel managers put signs with dire warnings about climate and environment preservation. Those didn’t work. So they switched to a message that basically said, “OTHER hotel guests were being sensitive to the environment and replacing their towels on racks.” After changing to the “everyone is doing it” message, the cooperation rate for this environmentally sensitive behavior rose over 25%. Hmmm.
Energy utility companies tried a similar approach. USA Today recently printed a finding that 25 US utilities who provided their customers with reports that compare their energy usage to their neighbors’ usage encouraged up to a 3% reduction in energy consumption. We DO want to keep up with our neighbors and other “respectable” people. That fact makes us think that when we want to persuade, we need to consider the “everyone is doing it” approach. The old approach of making projects, products, or services stand out may not be as effective as making them fit in…to the norm. So, if you previously tried to sell by saying you would be the “only one that ….”, you might want to consider selling it as “we will be in the pack with the companies that everyone respects.” I know, it’s not nearly as exciting a message, but sometimes the inelegant “persuader” is the best!
Tags: Influencing, persuasion, research, selling
Posted in Influencing, Presentation Skills, Uncategorized | No Comments »
Sarah Palin and her Memorable Speech Pattern
Monday, November 1st, 2010
Sarah Palin uses voice and speech to make herself unforgettable. Her speaking style is about more than the words that she uses or the thoughts she expresses. (Check out her speech at the 2008 Republican National Convention on YouTube.) Let’s examine her voice and speech in detail:
1. Her voice: Palin speaks from her chest, giving her a strong, resonant voice that sounds confident. By speaking from her chest, I mean that her voice is vibrated not just from the front of her face, as many women speak, but from her chest. The complex voice quality this creates is unusually full of harmonics and projects well. Christine O’Donnell in my home state of Delaware would benefit from adding this voice quality to her speaking style.
2. Voice movement and duration: She keeps her voice on, with few breaks or long pauses, and uses a lot of intonation or up and down movement of her voice. This continuous sound makes listeners pay attention, and the up and down movement add emphasis and importance to what she says.
3. Speech patterns: She over-enunciates her consonants at the beginnings of words. This extra air pressure on initial consonants in words makes her speech sound more confident and insistent. It is an unusual pattern for females, including many female leaders. Hillary Clinton uses this pattern as well, but because her voice is often monotonous, it is not as engaging as Sarah Palin’s.
These are just a few speech patterns that add the sound of confidence and importance. Palin is quite consistent in using them. More on our politicians’ speech patterns in later posts.
See our course on speaking style to learn these patterns to influence others in your life. You can change your speaking style if it’s not working for you.
By the way, references made here to Sarah, Christine and Hillary are not intended to be positional statements for or against these people.
Tags: Sarah Palin, Speaking Style, speech pattern, voice
Posted in Executive Communications, Influencing, Presence, Speech and Voice, Uncategorized | No Comments »
Finally, a really good book on people problems
Friday, September 17th, 2010
I’m always reading, searching for *the* book on people problems. Not a psychology text or something that just makes readers angrier, but something that makes sense and that can have an immediate impact on interactions. Try this one: How to Solve Your People Problems by Dr. Alan Godwin. Check it out at http://peopleproblems.org/. Godwin writes succinctly about the difference between reasonable and unreasonable people, and the difference in how you interact with them is profound. You will love the strategies, especially if you are dealing with unreasonable people. Enjoy. Let me know what you think. (Note: I don’t know this author personally, nor has he approached me for endorsement.)
Tags: unreasonable or difficult people
Posted in Dealing with difficult people and situations, Influencing, Uncategorized | No Comments »