2006 August | Your message and other things you say

Communications is personal

Read today that Radio Shack laid off103 400 workers. Big deal. People get the pink slip every day. Well, if it’s you that got the pink slip, it’s a very big deal. And Radio Shack, in the interest of delivering the news “quicker” and in a way that “allowed more privacy”, delivered the news to these [...]

Not my job

As a follow-up to my post last week102 on passing the buck and not taking responsibility for problems, had a similar experience yesterday. I recently changed cell phone companies, and since I have pretty basic needs, took the driod’s recommendation on the phone to get (had the features I needed at a price I was willing [...]

Watch others

Our local Toastmasters Club tried something a little different yesterday. We called a special, voluntary meeting to watch a video of a presenter (about 20 minutes) and then spent the rest of an hour discussing what worked and what didn’t for that speaker. The speaker we chose for this particular session was a well-known speaker and [...]

How accessible are you?

Was helping some members of a large organization whose higher echelons call the shots pretty exclusively. One area manager remarked that other than some blanket directions, specific responses from the CEO were not a possibility, so his area had to assume, act, and hope they didn’t cross any boundaries. I heard several people echo the sentiment [...]

Repeat after me

Went to a niece’s softball game today and also watched a short part of the Little League World Series. A ball field is a funny place with regard to communication. I noticed long ago that just about everything that is said is repeated or stated in pairs. “Good job! Good job!“ “Play’s at second. Play’s at [...]

On their level

Accompanied The Boy to ‘Meet the Teacher’ day today. His first experience with public school. Realized just how far removed from Kindergarten I am. And I’m pretty sure I had nothing like what he’ll experience.

But a communications nugget was that everytime one of the teachers addressed any of the kids, they stooped to the kids’ level. [...]

Say again?

In my training classes, I teach a lot of people whose native language is not English. Save for a few years of High School German (nur ein bisschen!), I only speak English, however. While I LOVE listening to the accents I am exposed to, it does pose a problem in communication sometimes. Today I had an [...]

Graciousness

People say crazy things. Some are just odd; some are marginally offensive. Especially if there is no reason to assume ill will, a pause and a gracious response is always in order. Helps to avoid those ‘I wish I hand’t said that’ moments, since one of you is probably already having such a moment.
Ran across a [...]

Your message and other things you say