Your message and other things you say

On a day where we are supposed to stop, ponder, and give cognizant acknowledgment to the many good things in our lives (but here in America, judging from the size of my newspaper this morning, it is apparently about planning our shopping day for tomorrow), let be the voice crying in the wilderness begging you NOT to give thanks.  Or at least not in the method that seems to be increasing in favor, as well as uselessness.
I’m talking about a one-word email: “Thanks.“  I get many of these every week.

You send me an email asking for a review of your PPT slides (God forbid!).  I give you three pages of notes.  You respond: “Thanks“.  Yuck.

I get an invoice for services rendered.  I respond with an apology that the billing had slipped my crack-pot accounting staff and the check will be in the mail FedEx in the morning.  I get a one-word reply: “Thanks“.  Heartfelt.

There are probably places for one-word emails: “Buy“, “Sell“, “No“, “I’ll-agree-when-the-depths-of-Hades-freezes-into-a-solid-mass“.  Trying to convey appreciation is not one of them.

Many of us were taught by our parents to be polite: “Please” and “Thank you“.  And that’s a good thing.  IN PERSON.  Where emotion can be carried with non-verbal cues.  Where an explanation of why can be tacked on.  Where a relationship can be forged.  None of that is done in a one-word TY. Best I can figure, it’s either (a bad) habit or it’s a way to appease one’s conscience at supposedly being grateful, when they’re actually too lazy to pick up the phone and call or draft a heartfelt reply that explains their gratitude.  Most of the time the message really is “I got your email“.  And I didn’t need a response from you to tell me that.

I have vowed to not send any such emails.  It wastes my time and yours.

BTW, I got your email.

Resist the urge to respond to an email with a one-word “Thanks”. Instead, craft a meaningful expression of gratitude or just — gasp — let it go.

It’s often amazing to me how much is said and how little is communicated.  Many people seem intent on making sure they are heard — not that their message is heard.

It’s Toastmasters contest season again, and due to another obligation I was unable to attend or participate in my club’s contest.  It was a well-publicized event — I received at least three blanket emails and two direct personal ones inviting me to participate.  I know they had contestants — an email said they did and I saw a fellow member outside the club meeting and was told there were folks competing but they needed/wanted more people.

The contest was scheduled for 90 minutes across lunch, ending at 130pm.  At 255pm, I received an email to our entire club saying that someone had been overlooked in the Thank You fest that ended the contest (I’ve posted before about how useless thank yous are at Toastmasters — and anywhere else).  He worked hard (it’s a thankless task) and deserved some recognition.  But after that initial email, six (6) others replied to all to say “Hey yeah, thanks bud! Ditto!“  One person — who, like me, missed the contest — did chime in to ask who actually won the contest, since that was omitted from any of the emails.  Two more people replied to that query, apparently ignoring the request to add “Me, too.  Thanks!” messages to the growing thread.  I still do not know who won — it hasn’t been posted to the web site, and no email has gone out to acknowledge the contest ants (sic), who apparently are just an afterthought.

So what’s the purpose of this string of communications?  One person thanked someone else publicly (and deservedly so).  Five others felt the need to echo that sentiment publicly (when privately would have been FAR more appropriate).  No one felt the need to acknowledge the result of what supposedly was the stated purpose of the whole meeting.  What’s wrong with this picture?

Never hit send unless there is a purpose to the message, and match that message purpose to the (entire) audience you are sending it to.

I heard this quote (no attribution) the other week:

“We spend far too much time on our jobs, and far too little on ourselves.”

I spent a little time improving myself this week at the ASTD ICE conference.  It was quite amazing, and I come back with gobs of notes, ideas, and inspiration.  Now for the time to assimilate it all.  Look for some of those nuggets to appear on these pages in days to come.
I have several ideas I will submit for conference sessions for next year, and picked up a new idea for a book (currently 5th in queue).  In the meantime, I’m excited to let you know I’ve had a session entitled “Getting the Geeks to Speak (and speak well)” accepted at Sharing@LearnShare in August.

Spend some time on yourself.

Sitting in a hotel reading the instructions for “complimentary high-speed wireless internet service”.

Seven steps, easy enough.  Then there’s another step listed after an asterisk (even though there is no asterisk anywhere else on the page).  The step says: “If you do not have a wireless card built in to your computer, we provide External Wireless Bridge Packs at no cost which can be rented for the full length of your stay.”

My dictionary uses the word ‘payment’ in every one of its definitions.  I wonder how much this no cost solution will run me?

Don’t use double meanings.  Oh, and proofread.

After some sickness putting us out of commission a bit, we’re back in business. Sickness makes the well times seem so much more weller.

Had a faithful reader give this tip, and I can’t believe I didn’t know it or discover it before. You should know by now I’m a HUGE fan of video as the ultimate objective observer, and I watch lots of videos of other presenters and online training. My only problem is the lack of time to watch more. With Windows Media player, we can do it a bit more expeditiously.

Right mouse click on the video you are watching standalone or embedded in a web page and select Play Speed -> Fast (Ctrl - Shift G for us keyboard junkies). This ups the speed some 40%, which means your one hour video plays in 40-some-odd minutes.

Worried about understanding? I routinely show in my classes that you can hear twice as fast as most people can talk, so speed is not the issue (unless language translation is thrown in). Since most folks watch video as background anyway, this is a way to be more efficient in our viewing.

I have not found a way to speed up YouTube videos yet.

Speed up viewing videos and audio to save time.

Like 100 million other Americans, I made a commitment heading in to the New Year to eat better and lose some weight.  After a visit to the nutritionist, some very basic (common sense) action items turned into a quick difference on the scales.  While I’m told that quick weight on is easier to take off (and I had gained a bunch in fourth quarter 2006), I was nearly shocked at how quickly the weight has come off.  In the 17 days of 2006, I’ve lost 11 pounds.  That’s the equivalent of a gallon of paint and my body is thrilled not to be lugging that around.

Had I changed my diet to the sub-2000 calorie diet I’ve adopted and seen no results, I’d probably head back to the sugar-laden constant grazing I ended 2006 on.  But the quick results have spurred me on to even greater ambitions.  I don’t plan to stop at 11 pounds, and I’m thrilled to tell anyone who will listen how easy it has been for me.  My nutritionist called me a “Shepherd”, because I’ve turned several friends on to my methods and the free website I use to track my intake.
I had a similar experience with my communication skills.  As someone who has spent the majority of their career in some offshoot of communicating (primarily as a teacher in one form or another), I thought I had a pretty good handle on getting a message across.  Ratings from my students were generally positive, and I had no reason to believe there was a huge gap between what was and what could be.  Until That Day.

I was faced with a video of myself communicating and a person with enough knowledge and skill to identify the gaps in my ability.  It was shocking.  Much like looking in the mirror on Christmas Day just 3 weeks ago.  And the result was similar.  Simple changes in my behavior resulted in an amazing change in ability and form.  The positive changes spurred me on to still greater things, and that was the birthplace of my passion for helping others communicate better.

And just like the extra weight I carry around, there are still things I must improve.  But it’s easier to make those commitments and goals when there is success from the get-go.  And the most surprising thing has been — in both cases — how easy the changes have been to implement.  Makes one wonder why he couldn’t do it himself.  But I couldn’t, and most of us can’t.

Make small changes that will render great results to spur yourself to great changes that have astonishing results.  Aim to be the BEST you can possibly be.

Maybe it’s just me.  But I’m sick of hearing that phrase from customer service when they have no intention (or ability) of doing it.

Tonite it’s the cell phone.  First, the phone I bought is NOT as it was advertised (understand I have little cell phone need other than to make phone calls and get messages).  While it talks about web access this and that, a basic functionality is missing, namely, one cannot upload phone numbers to the phone without paying the company (which I shall not name, but it rhymes with ‘lint’ and is another word for running really fast) or jumping through enough hoops to make you not want to call anyone.  Ever.

So tonite I find the lovely open source community has a way for me to get the pictures out of my phone, which I was able to do.  Pressing my luck, I tried to sync my calendar.  CRASH.  Phone is non-functional, and gives the phone number to call.  Which I do.

Only to get a computer woman who aplogizes profusely, but ultimately has me say “receptionist” to get a very nice sounding woman — after I enter my 10-digit phone number.  Lovely lady #1 then asks for the SAME phone number, talks for over a minute sounding very interested in my plight, only to… transfer me to tech support.  Guess the first thing James wants to know.  Just guess.  I’ll wait a second…

My phone number.  And security code, which I’ve already given a computer and a human.   When I tell James what happened, he says, “You can’t do that.”  Well, thank you.  Can you get my phone working?   Turns out I’m instructed to take the battery out, which is what I would have done had I not been instructed to call for assistance that I didn’t think I needed and apparently wasn’t able to be provided for me anyway.  Power the phone up and all is well with the world.

But you have to wonder who at ‘intspray’ (Pig-Latin) designs the flow of information.  Did they envision this as the best way to guide me through the bowels of their overnight phone support?  Or the lovel engineers who designed the phone, and instead of putting an error message of “take out the battery and wait two minutes”, instead chose to send me to this maze of incompetance.

Remember Rule #1.  Especially if you sell a product or provide a service.  Communicate and provide said service on their terms, not yours.

Make things easy for your customers/listeners.

Just sat down to pay my property taxes, which is seldom a pleasant experience.  As I filled in the little form, wrote the check, and stuffed it all back into the envelope with the little window, I noted that the three-fold sheet they sent me was folded in a size such that it did not fit back into the envelope.  And while I’m ranting, since they send out 10 gazillion envelopes all coming back to the same place, why use those with windows that align poorly and have the prospect of putting a check in front of the delivery address?  Just give me an envelope with the address on it already.  It’s safer, easier, and ultimately better for the tax folk.

Rule of thumb: make it easy for your customer, client, audience, whoever.  If it’s hard to buy, the public won’t (I guess I have to persevere with my taxes, but that doesn’t excuse them from good customer service).  We do the same things with communication, making it hard to hear, hard to understand, and hard to remember.

I listened to a sermon recently that had three points that were easy to remember, but the content (why I should remember them) was so all over the map I had trouble in real time trying to figure out why they were even being made.  By the end of the message, I was convinced it had no application to me, so my mind wandered and my scratch pad filled with notes of other things.  I noted from the speaker only that he failed to connect with his audience.  He made it hard to listen, and as I visually polled the audience, it was clear that many weren’t (hint on speaker evals — watch the audience to determine if the speaker is engaging).

Make your interactions easy on the other person.