by Alan | Oct 28, 2006 | Communication skills, Delivery, Efficiency, public speaking
Sometimes, until we see someone else do something, we presume it must be done a certain way. Our assumptions are often wrong. My laptop’s power cord has always been a pain to deal with. In addition to the inevitable “Low Battery. Switch to AC power...
by Alan | Oct 3, 2006 | Communication skills, Content, Customer Service, Efficiency
One of the challenges of speakers trying to interact with their audience is giving clear directions. I was a participant in a class a few weeks back where we were supposed to put our names on the little name tents. The speaker/trainer had some specific way to do...
by Alan | Sep 17, 2006 | Communication skills, Efficiency, public speaking
In addition to providing the content your audience needs, it’s important to give them the physical things they need as well. If you expect people to take notes, have pencils/pens on hand, with paper or notepads. If you expect them to look at a web site or...
by Alan | Sep 10, 2006 | Communication skills, Content, Delivery, Efficiency, public speaking
I hear this one all the time. After an introduction or three, a speaker gets up and says something along the lines of “before we get started…” or “Now, as we’re getting started…” Trouble with this is, they’ve ALREADY...
by Alan | Aug 27, 2006 | Communication skills, Customer Service, Delivery, Efficiency, Leadership
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...
by Alan | Aug 8, 2006 | Communication skills, Content, Delivery, Efficiency, PowerPoint
Walked in to teach a class today to discover that the handouts I had requested were not present, two of the notebooks had the wrong cover sheet (and were thus not distributed correctly), and the printed roster was not accurate. A prop I had used the last time I...
