Speaking tips blog
Communication matters. What are you saying?
Start small
Been reading other blogs on communications over the past few weeks. Found an interesting article at Communication Nation today: Do you suffer from analysis paralysis?The point could be made for practicing communication skills as well. You'll never know enough to be...
…that’s all folks
Joked with a presenter today who ended a class with "well, I guess that's all we have". His defense was the topic was a rough one with some unpleasant facts/discoveries, and was best abandoned. While I might agree with the topic and conclusions that this interactive...
End on time. Or else…
Had a faithful reader submit today's nugget. He was on a conference call where the first stated objective was to end on time. And then they didn't. It went on and on. And on.I've been in similar situations. Problem with this situation is you haven't been given...
buzz words
Had a conversation with a lawyer today. I'll refrain from the gratuitous joke. During our discussion, he used a word I did not know. And used it again. I think his buzzword count ended somewhere about 8 uses of the word.I suppose I could/should have stopped him on the...
Check in…
Was in the middle of an email correspondance today about 3 transitions deep. Response comes back:"Can you check your vm?" Independent of the fact that we just got a new voice mail system and I did the required steps but did not bother to learn the intricacies and...
Crisis!
Had a moment of inconsolable crisis tonite. Our kids got helium baloons at lunch today, and despite repeated warnings, our daughter let hers go upon coming home and it rose out of reach to our cathedral ceiling in the living room. For the next ten minutes, we heard...
The air up there
I'm a pilot and love aviation and just about everything about it (except the cost). Today I finally got to go up on a pristine clean day after a long hiatus. Took The Boy and let him have some stick time (as far as he knows) for the first time in his life. Great time...
In the loop
Some odd items were displayed very publicly in our office building. Being curious folk, questions were asked. First in private, then increasingly more public. I personally was asked a half dozen times before the electronic message boards lit up. Those that knew or had...
No, really – it doesn’t matter
Worked with a speaker again today. Having seen marked improvement in so many areas, I pushed a little today on some things that are habitual and ingrained. For this particular speaker, it was voice inflection. For others it could be gestures, movement, eye contact, or...
I want one!
Baby sister found some new flip flops (summer sale item) in the closet. HAD to have them. Now. Parents relented, saying these were new flip flops for next summer and the pool. Sister parades around the house all night in them (pink, orange, green!) and was distraught...
Signal to noise
I recently turned on the Outlook (yeah, I know, I know) desktop alert for new email. I've discovered that over half of the emails I receive can be read and deleted with just the little preview it provides. Which leads me to believe:I get far too many emails that are...
Department of redundancy department
Caught a little of the Weather Channel's "coverage" of Hurricane Wilma this morning (since it's headed sorta towards my hometown, there is more than a passing interest). In the span of two commercial breaks, I became completely uninterested in anything they had to...
