What you allow, you encourage July 30, 2006
Most of my work is helping in changing behaviour. Only sometimes do I help in understanding the behaviour to be changed. The behaviour you engage in is directly related to the results you get. By extension of that, the behaviour of the people around you is related to your own.
I have discussed this before. Another example is when you allow bad behaviour, you increase the chances of it happening again.
Last year, as part of of my own personal development, I worked in an outbound call centre. As an outbound call centre, they were very focused on getting sales. As long as you get sales, the managers don’t particularly care what else you do. This lead to all kinds of hi-jinx. Some of these included:
- Coming into the morning shift direct from a night club
- Signing into the phone then going shopping
- Going to a long lunch at a nearby bar and returning too drunk to walk
- Direct lies to customers to ensure a sale
Several times the team was told to stop infringements and bad behaviour, yet there was little or no other action taken. This lead to an increase in both the severity and frequency. These events didn’t happen by accident. They built up little by little over time. And with each little incident that was ignored it gave everyone else an behavioural example of what is permissible.
Technorati Tags: Brain, Business, Change, Learning, Management, Persuasion, Productivity, Psychology
Tips for remembering names July 12, 2006
43 folders has a few methods on how to remember names. Here is another…
This one involves engaging all of your main representational systems (visual, auditory and kinaesthetic) to ensure that if you forget one part, the other 2 will help you remember.
The method is very simple to describe, yet challenging to get right consistently at the start. This is mainly due to being a conscious habit in the beginning, and takes some effort to remember to perform it.
The technique is this: When you meet someone new, write their name on their forehead. Yeah, that sounds a little strange, and may offend some people when you pull out your permanent marker and start signing their name on their forehead.
But there are a few points. No need to pull out a pen, the important kinaesthetic part of the process is to, using small muscle movement, write out their name. This can be done with your hand in your pocket, or as you reach to shake their hand.
As you make those subtle movements, imagine the writing you make with your hand appear on the forehead. At the same time, either state their name to yourself again, or even better hear them saying their name.
This links everything together quite nicely. It links their face to their name, their voice to their name, their written name to their face, and various other combinations. Use it - let me know your results!
Technorati Tags: Business, Communication, Learning, Persuasion, Presenting, Psychology
What stories are you not telling? July 6, 2006
Stories have been a staple in society for as long as humans can remember. We were raised at stories at bed time, Dan Brown’s “The Di Vinci Code” has sold over 60 million copies and Hollywood makes billions of dollars a year by telling us stories. At about the age of 2 we start telling our own stories.
The stories we tell send a very strong message to the listeners. The unfortunate thing is that most people don’t always get the full potential from their stories, and some work against their best interests.
A financial report tells a story.
A corporate brochure tells a story.
A business card tells a story.
The story each of these tell will be different and get different results. For example a hand written business card tells a different story about the owner compared to an expensive, high gloss, graphic designer card. What is the story that yours tells?
A common story
Stories allow us to understand the world around us. Some stories empower us, others hamper us. Sometimes these stories are so much a part of the environment, we don’t even notice them. One of the most common is the story about how Business is war. You’ll not always hear that story explained directly, usually just through comments like: “we need to roll out the big guns”, “motivate the troops”, “understand the enemy”, “prepare a defence”.
I will never forget a conversation I had about this topic some time ago. I was talking with a business executive that was stressed, angry and having difficulty coping. His description of his work environment, and the story he was telling, was entirely in terms of war. He was, in his own words, fighting a losing battle.
So after some time establishing how difficult working in a war zone is, I directed him to consider, for just a moment, if he would think about his work as a basket of fruit. There are the rotten apples that need to be removed, seeds to be spat out, pits that will break your teeth if you bite into them, yet the work itself is sweet, healthy and revitalises.
He looked at me with a blank stare, confused and trying to understand how to do what I asked. After a few moments he claimed it was impossible, “I can’t do it. It’s just not real.”
“Neither is being in a war zone.” I replied.
Stories are Persuasion
One day, there was a blind man sitting on the steps of a building
with a hat by his feet and a sign that read:“I am blind, please help.”
A creative publicist was walking by and stopped to observe.
He saw that the blind man had only a few coins in his hat.
He dropped in more coins and, without asking for permission,
took the sign and rewrote it.He returned the sign to the blind man and left.
That afternoon the publicist returned to the blind man and noticed
that his hat was full of bills and coins.The blind man recognized his footsteps and asked
if it was he who had rewritten his sign
and wanted to know what he had written on it.The publicist responded: “Nothing that was not true. I just wrote the
message a little differently.” He smiled and went on his way.The new sign read: “Today is Spring and I cannot see it.”
- Taken from Kim Klaver’s blog
Stories are able to capture the listeners imagination and stimulate emotion. Stories have a profound ability to make you think in different ways. They have the ability to persuade when other methods fail. They can cut past beliefs, preconceptions, and conflicting ideas. Stories package information in a way that help the listener to understand that information. And for these reasons, and many more, stories persuade.
You are a story teller. What are your stories?
Technorati Tags: Business, CEO, Change, Communication, Management, Persuasion, Presenting, Storytelling