If I only had time to teach my executive coaching clients one delivery skill, it would be to maximize their eye contact. Properly done, engaging your eyes produces several positive results for your audience … and for you. Nothing says more about your credibility, power and confidence than what you do – and don’t do – with your eyes. Everything else is a ‘B’ priority.
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Break More Rules!
Let’s begin the New Year by continuing to look at contemporary grammar as it affects what you write or what you say in the workplace. Here are two more Best Practices for your Workplace Communicator Tool Kits … and we can have some fun discussing them.
Reality Check Your Grammar
How many of you liked learning grammar rules in high school English class and follow those rules consistently today? Not seeing a lot of hands going up … and not surprised. Lots of us still bare those painful scars of Sister Mary Apostrophe wielding that yardstick whenever we even thought of ending a sentence in a preposition.
So, let’s briefly discuss contemporary grammar as it affects what you write in the workplace. To provide that grammar reality check, consider these seven points to help you continue harnessing the power of words … grammatically correct words in this case.
Speak Up to Energize Your Listeners
Your Vocal Power – volume, inflection and rate of speaking combined – can significantly impact your audience’s attention, interest in your message … and positive impression of you.
In our culture, we tend to interpret a soft-spoken voice as coming from a speaker lacking in confidence or credibility. Not good reactions for your audience to have about you. Even on a microphone, the soft-spoken voice delivers that weak impression loud and clear. It doesn’t matter if these reactions are valid or not – remember the Perception is Reality demon. If you sound weak to the audience – you are!
Where do you network?
‘Where are some good places to network?’ As the COSE MindSpring ‘Networking Strategies’ Expert, I get that question a lot. It’s very difficult to answer, especially briefly. The long answer involves a lot of work answering several other questions first.
Networking is simply a process for ‘sharing information, ideas and resources’, as John Naisbitt defined it in ‘Megatrends’ back in 1982. Networking is all about information you need to find or can share with others. So, to those other questions:
Choose Your Words Wisely!
The words you use in routine workplace writing, interactions and presentations do make a difference. They can impact your results, professionalism and image as a receiver-centric communicator. Or, your words can detract from those results. So, choose your words wisely!
To help you on this journey, enjoy this summary of 12 Best Practices or ‘Recurring Themes’ I typically share in my training or coaching engagements. I don’t ask participants to change any of their word use or style habits. But, I often ask them to challenge those habits themselves in light of what we discuss. If they decide to change any of them, that’s fine. If not, that’s fine, too.
Harness the The Power of the Pro Bono
The last two months, we’ve discussed strategies for maximizing the impact of your ‘No Budget Marketing’ campaign – harnessing the ‘Power of the Pen’ and the ‘Power of the Platform’. Now, let’s turn our attention to a third – and much less obvious – set of strategies: Harnessing the ‘Power of the Pro Bono’. Said another way – Strategic Volunteering.
Why Volunteer at all?
Whether you’re marketing the products or services of your employer or your own business or just simply enhancing your image and value to the people you work for and with, the Power of the Pro Bono can be a simple, quick and no-cost self-marketing strategy. Effectively done, it can help accomplish several important goals for you:
I’ve Given my Elevator Speech … Now What?
Has this ever happened to you? You’re networking at a COSE or other professional association event and you’ve just delivered a concise, engaging and listener-centric Elevator Speech to Maria. Good for you! Now, what do you do?
You have several options to continue the conversation, enhance a potentially beneficial new business relationship and learn more about Maria. Here are a few Best Practices I’ve learned from some colleagues or clients who are on the Varsity Networking Team:
Start Strong
I recently engaged in a LinkedIn discussion group about using jokes in the introduction of a presentation to gain audience interest. Here’s a summary of my rant on that topic.
I totally agree that the first few minutes of any presentation are most important. Start strong, powerfully and engaging – immediately. But, I totally disagree with telling a joke unless you were hired to be an entertainer, it’s an after dinner speech and the only goal is to be humorous. Jokes rarely work in a typical workplace presentation and can create a very ineffective impression from the beginning. It’s often hard to recover from such a weak start.
The Power of the Platform
Why Speak?
Whether you’re marketing your employer’s products or services, your own business or just enhancing your image in the marketplace, the “Power of the Platform” can be a simple, quick and no-cost strategy. It is very parallel to the “Power of the Pen” previously discussed. Delivering workshops and presentations can help you accomplish several important self-marketing goals: