Some people have jobs that require them to say the same things, over and over. Actors are an obvious one, but also people running for office, and teachers, and coaches, and folks at the IT help desk…

How can they keep it fresh? How can an actor do the same play, say the same lines, eight shows a week, and not have it turn into something that’s just routine?

They think about what it’s for. They remember that for the people in the seats, it’s the first time, the only time they’ll have this experience. Maybe it’s the final show of the week, the Sunday matinee, and the house is half full, but the half that is there went through something to get there. 

The words, the experience, the focus, the intention—it’s all for the audience.

When I had my first child, a family friend told me, “Your baby is learning about the world by looking at your face. Make sure you’re smiling when you look at her.”

This has stayed with me all these years, partly because it is such a wonderful and true tip, and also because it’s true not just of our children but also of the other people around us. Others are looking at us to see how we’re reacting, what we’re doing, how we’re feeling. 

“Read the room” is common advice. What are you contributing to the room other people are reading?

We’re people. We have feelings. One topic that comes up frequently in our communication coaching work is: “What should I do if I feel emotional?” This really means, “I might cry. I don’t want to cry. What can I do to control it?” (Note: I am not saying in this post that it is never acceptable to have some tears. I am showing how this situation can be managed if you do not want to cry.)

A good friend of mine was asked to give a talk on behalf of a local group raising money for and awareness of autism. Her son is autistic, and she knew that aspects of the topic may bring her to tears. She wanted to avoid crying, not because she was embarrassed, but because she thought it might distract from her talk. She wanted a game plan because the prospect of crying was really worrying her.

We talked about why the organization she was speaking for is important to her. We talked about her son and what it was like when he was first diagnosed. Then, I asked her to tell me how she wanted the audience to be different after her talk. What did she want to shift, or change?

She said that she wanted the audience to identify with her son as a person. She wanted them to appreciate that this group is doing profoundly helpful work in our community to support families just like theirs. 

As this sense of purpose became clearer, her eyes brightened. She started to rehearse her talk, and even when she got to the part that had make her tear up in the past, she understood that those words were a vehicle to reach her audience. The talk was about connecting with other people, not about showing her feelings. 

Her intention, to help the group understand why this work is important, allowed her to channel her emotion into her talk. Of course, she still had feelings, and it was clear as she spoke that she is passionate about the subject. Her emotion came through in her pace, her vocal tone, and her instinctive understanding of when to pause and let the audience take in what she had said.

She did not cry. And the work she put in before the talk to clarify her intention, align her delivery, and practice, alleviated any worry that she might.  Instead, she was a powerful and passionate advocate for her son and her family, and others like them.

I’ve written here before about my husband Charlie. Recently Charlie got a truck, and it’s a manual transmission.

I can’t drive a stick shift.

But we both agreed that it’s a good idea for me to be able to drive the truck, so last weekend, we headed out to a big high school parking lot for me to start learning.
For Charlie, driving a stick shift is muscle memory. He learned a long time ago, and his feet and hands respond instinctively to what the truck needs. He doesn’t have to think about when to put in the clutch, or how to shift from third to fourth gear, or how to get around a slower car on an uphill stretch.

When I get behind the wheel, it’s like I’m fifteen again and just got my learner’s permit. Driving, which I’ve done for decades with relative success, suddenly feels like new territory. And I don’t really like feeling like I don’t know how to do something, or that I might fail. As adults, most of us spend our time doing things we already know how to do.

But more than just the new skill, there is so much to be learned from being a beginner again. How do I respond when I stall out the car? How does it feel to struggle? What kind of learner am I—can I hear the instructions and implement them, or do I need to think through it, or do I need to try it and mess up and try again?
All of this is beneficial on a human level. It’s great to be a beginner, to stretch our brains and capacity. And it’s a real gift as a coach to remember that I am often asking clients to do things they haven’t done before, to stretch in ways that are new and can be frustrating. 

What are you learning that’s new? What are you learning about yourself that’s new?

Hi there, people who are planning meetings. Here’s a thing you need to know.

When you say, “Take 1 minute to introduce yourself, answering the following questions,” and you give a long prompt that requires reflection and sharing, you are implicitly asking for people to speak for longer than one minute.

This happens 1) because no one knows how long a minute is, and 2) they want to do what was asked. They look at your prompt and think, “I need to answer the questions. I bet that should take about a minute.”

There are a couple of ways to address this, depending on what outcome you’re trying to achieve. If you really want to hear everyone speak to the whole prompt, let go of the time limit. Instead set the activity up with the expectation that everyone will listen until the introductions are over. 

If you want quicker introductions, be explicit about the agenda. “We’re going to have more time to get to know each other later, but to get started, I would like for you to introduce yourself using the part of the prompt that really resonates with you, and keep it short, no more than a minute.” Then be prepared to model that introduction so people understand what you’re looking for. 

Anything you frequently do leads to habits. You probably brush your teeth, wash your hands, and get in to your car the same way every time. You take the same path through the grocery store. Habits–you don’t have to spend time thinking about how to so them every time they come up, which is a good thing.

Your gait feels completely natural to you. The way your weight is distributed, whether your feet point in or out or straight ahead, the speed you comfortably fall into; it all feels “like the way this is done,” but it’s unique to you, and it is all habit. 

You can probably guess where I’m going with this. The way you communicate is also a habit. The words and phrases you use often, the cadence and speed, where you pause, when you interrupt…all these and a hundred other things feel, again, totally natural to you but they are actually a learned and practiced set of behaviors you have created over time.

So what?

The way you walk doesn’t matter until you start to have pain in your hips or back or knees, and the physical therapist points out that your habits are causing you pain. 

The way you communicate doesn’t matter until you can’t get your message across to your team, or you keep having the same disagreements, or you don’t have the skill to give a speech. Some of your communication habits are in your way, and just like physical habits, you need insight, feedback, and practice to adjust them.

For those of us, like me, who spend a lot of our workday on videoconferencing platforms, it can be hard to fathom that the people in your workshops and meetings aren’t as familiar with the ins and outs of the platform as you are.

But in the last week, I’ve been on several calls that illuminated this point for me. On one, a call with a group of people I would have expected to have spent a lot of time on video, there were several people who didn’t realize you could change the way you view the other people on your screen in Zoom (toggle from speaker view to gallery, to be able to see all the faces at once).

So I want to encourage you to address these questions from a housekeeping standpoint. At the top of the call, walk through the basic capabilities of the platform you’re on and which tools will work best on the type of call you’re on. If you know there will be screensharing, for example, it could be worth letting people know if they can adjust how much of their screen is the slides and how much is the speaker. Build in time for people to try out the different functions and ask questions.

And if you’re a person who is new to these platforms, take a little time to play with them. The companies that create these technologies have a lot of resources available to get you familiar with what they can do. 

When we’re in person, I tell people, “Make the room work for you. Adjust your chair to the right height. Angle yourself so you can see the speaker and the slides, as well as the people at your table.”  This is the same idea. The platform is there to support you. Use it to its best advantage!

Angie Flynn-McIver, Ignite CSP’s president, has a few thoughts to share about intentional preparation for even that sixth meeting of a long day.

“Fear is when your attention is on yourself. When you can think of yourself as being in service of others, the fear vanishes.” —Shirzad Chamine, author of Positive Intelligence

This quote jumped out at me because it beautifully describes the experience of conquering stage fright.

When I’m giving a speech and I’m thinking about myself, what I want to get out of it, nervousness and anxiety often kick in. I find myself wondering why I ever said yes, why this even matters, couldn’t I have just stayed home? The need I feel to “get something” puts pressure on me and makes me nervous.

When I turn that intention around and think about how I can serve the audience, what someone there may need to hear from me, it transforms the experience. Now it’s not about getting something for myself, it’s about giving to others. And the fear vanishes.