Leadership & Communication
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Imagine a sales representative for a medical device company. She is used to meeting with potential buyers at their offices or hospitals. She can easily establish rapport as they settle into their seats, finding common ground to chat about as everyone prepares for the meeting. By the time she fires up her PowerPoint deck, everyone ... Continue Reading
My colleague Anne Thibault reminded me in a meeting recently that “you’re trying too hard” can be quite an insult for many people. “Trying too hard” can connote earnestness, nerdiness, and caring deeply about something. Just reading the title of this post puts a knot in my stomach. As a person who has had ... Continue Reading
In the time I was planning to use to write this blog post, I had to trap and free a big bee that had gotten into my office. It was bumping and scrabbling against the window, trying to get out. There’s the agenda, and then there’s the priority. Often we can pursue the agenda—there’s ... Continue Reading
Last week I wrote about all the reasons why you shouldn’t wing it. Preparing for your remarks or presentation shows respect for the audience. But what about improvising? Where does that fit in? The big difference between winging it and improvising is this: there are rules for improvising. If you Google “improvisational ... Continue Reading
A few years ago, Ignite CSP was hired to coach an executive at an ad agency. Her boss told us, “Her accent is hard to understand. She’s from India, and sometimes her team just can’t make out what she’s saying.” Vivian Smith went to meet with this client. Interestingly, Vivian had no trouble understanding ... Continue Reading
It’s easy to see when people aren’t doing a good job leading a webinar or video meeting. They seem ill-prepared, they aren’t engaging, they read their slides, they don’t interact. But what can we do to be better audience members? How can we hold up our end of the social contract? 1) Pay ... Continue Reading
When people come to us for communication skills coaching, they start by telling us how bad they are at it. “I’m not a confident public speaker.” “I can’t seem to get my voice in the room.” “I know I use a lot of filler words.” “My boss told me I talk too fast.” “My ... Continue Reading
Please don’t. When you decide to wing it, you’re deciding that your time and comfort are more important than the experience your audience will have. “Winging it” usually leads to stream-of-consciousness remarks that are unstructured. There may well be moments of brilliance, but they’re hard to find in the rambling river of words. ... Continue Reading
People say terrible things to, and about, each other. It happens for lots of reasons. But never fool yourself that the people in power who say terrible things about people who have less power don’t mean what they say. They’re not joking. The brutal, crude language is the point. It is a ... Continue Reading
Imagination is what lets us see beyond our own experiences and circumstances, and to put ourselves in the situation someone else finds themselves in. Imagination is what helps actors embody their characters, writers transport us to places far away from our homes, and painters depict worlds that have never existed. I’d like to share ... Continue Reading
Angie Flynn-McIver
Leadership & Communication
(Previously Ignite CSP)
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