Delivering humorous speeches involves a lot more than simply having good material. Take some time to incorporate these tips into your presentations and watch the fun and laughter factors rise.
In Fun
Sigmund Freud wrote: “The most favorable condition for comic pleasure is a generally happy disposition in which one is in the mood for laughter.”
This concept is called “in fun.” If you want your audience to laugh, they must be in fun. You, the speaker, must be in fun. The emcee or program coordinator must be in fun. The whole program should be designed in fun. Do anything you can to be sure your audience knows that it’s OK to laugh.
Time Of Day
The first speaker of the day for an early morning program should not expect hearty laughter. People are not conditioned to laugh a great deal in the early morning. Many won’t even be awake yet. Use more information and less humor. It’s important for you to know when not to expect hearty laughter. It would be a waste of time to use your best material at a time when laughter normally wouldn’t be expected. The poor response also brings your energy level down. Many consider brunch and lunch to be the best times of day to expect a responsive audience. In the afternoon people are starting to get tired so don’t expect laughter to be as intense.
Male/Female Makeup of Audience
All-female audiences tend to laugh more easily and louder than all-male audiences. Audiences that consist of more than 50 percent women are good too. The presence of the females provides a good buffer and makes it OK for the “big-ego” men to laugh.
Size
No, I’m not talking about how much you weigh today. I’m saying that the size of your audience has a direct effect on the types of humor which are most appropriate. Members of small business groups tend to be too self-conscious to laugh much. Use short one-liners. Don’t use any long stories or jokes. In larger groups it’s OK to stretch to jokes and short stories.
Pre-Program Research
The more you know about your audience, the better able you will be to pick the humor that will get the greatest response. Your research before the program will also allow you to uncover the group’s inside humor.
Seating
The best seating arrangement for laughter is semicircular theater style. When audience members are seated close together on a curve, they can look to their left or right and see the faces of each person in the row. This togetherness allows laughter to pass immediately from one person to the other. Contact NSA member and seating expert Paul Radde for advanced seating information.
Choose Funnier Words
Your word choice can be the key to creating a successful witty line or a dud. In particular, words with the “K” sound in them are funny. Cucumber is funnier than mushroom. Cupcake is funnier than pastry. Turkey is a funnier word than loser.
Deliver The Punch
Some humorists will disagree, but I say deliver your punch line to one person and make sure that person is going to laugh. You must punch the line out a little harder and with a slightly different voice than the rest of the joke. Lean into the microphone and say it louder and more clearly than you said the setup lines. If the audience does not hear the punch line, they aren’t going to laugh.
Deliver the punch line to a person you know will laugh, so that others will be positively influenced to laugh. How do you know if a person will laugh or not? Pay attention to those who have been laughing, those nodding their heads in agreement with you during the program, and those you identified before the program.
Pause
Pausing just before and just after your punch line gives the audience a chance to “get” the humor and laugh. Absolutely do not continue to talk when laughter is expected. If you do, you will “step on” your laughter and squelch it quickly.
Make It Relevant
If you make all your attempts at humor relevant to your presentation, you get an automatic excuse from your mother if your humor is not all that funny. If your humor is received as funny, so much the better; but if it isn’t, at least you made your point. Audiences will be much more tolerant if the humor ties into the subject at hand. Use this formula:
A. Make your point.
B. Illustrate your point with something funny.
C. Restate your point.
Vary The Types
The above formula would get boring and redundant rather quickly if you used the exact same type of humor every time for part B. By varying the type of humor in B, you can go on virtually forever, and no one will recognize that you are using a formula. I have identified more than 34 different types of humor to plug into the formula. You could use one liners, jokes, humorous props, funny stories, magic, cartoons or other funny visuals.
Rule Of Three
One of the most pervasive principles in the construction of humorous situations is the “Rule of Three.” You will see it used over and over because it’s simple, it’s powerful, and it works. (See, I just used it there in a non-funny situation.) Most of the time in humor the Rule of Three is used in the following fashion: The first comment names the topic, the second sets a pattern, and the third unexpectedly switches the pattern, making it funny. Here’s an example from a brochure advertising my seminars:
In the “How to Get There” section
From Washington, D.C., take Route 50.
From Baltimore, Md., take Route 95.
From Bangkok, Thailand, board Thai Airways.
Look Funnier
I have been accused of being too “corporate-looking to be funny. When I’m being funny, I use facial expressions, odd body angles and bizarre comments and props to make up for my “normal” look. Those of you that have obvious physical characteristics that can be used in teasing yourself have an advantage. People love characters who are not afraid of teasing themselves. You can enhance the funny look with fun patterns and colors on ties and dresses, hats and funny glasses.
Bombproof Your Talks
Are you afraid of bombing when you get up in front of a group? You don’t have to be. With proper material selection, a few prepared comments in case of unexpected problems and attention to time, worries about bombing can be virtually eliminated. As in tip above, make sure your material is relevant to your topic, and keep it short. The longer a piece of humor is, the funnier it better be.
A. Saver Lines
Saver Lines are what you say when your supposedly humorous statement does not get a laugh. You shouldn’t be ashamed to use saver lines. The top comedians in the world need them and some purposely make mistakes so they can get a laugh from the saver line. Johnny Carson was an expert at this. After a poor response to a joke, he would say a comically insulting line like, “This is the kind of crowd that would watch Bambi through a sniper scope.” Don’t overdo the saver lines. If you have to use too many, your material must be pretty bad.
B. Pre-Planned Ad-Libs
Another way to keep from bombing is to “expect the unexpected.” Canned or pre-planned ad-libs are pre-written responses to unexpected happenings or mistakes that occur during a presentation, i.e., the microphone squeals, the projection bulb burns out, you say the wrong thing, etc. Prepared ad-libs actually do more than just save you. They make you look tremendously polished. Here’s the continuum: A bad presenter will stammer around when a problem occurs. A ZZZZZs presenter will say nothing and try to ignore the problem. A great Wake ‘em Up presenter will make a witty comment that appears to be spontaneous. The audience believes you are originating humor on the spot. You are just quickly recalling pre-planned responses.
Microphone Squeals
This is the portion of my presentation where I do my elephant impression.
Projector Light Burns Out
This is the first time I have been brighter than my equipment.
Highlighter Runs Out Of Ink I’m out of ink. I’ll be back in a wink. (remember . . . “k” words are funny)
Think Diversity
Our audiences are more ethnically diverse than ever before, so it’s crucial to watch your political correctness and eliminate sexist language from your presentation. Not only is it easy to offend, which will turn your audience off completely, easily understandable word choice is more critical than ever to ensure that your audience members “get” the humor. When speaking across cultural lines, especially, visual humor such as magic, cartoons and comic strips are the most readily understood.
http://www.netaim.info/bios/tom.htm
Do you ever feel overwhelmed by e-mail? Have you ever spent more of your day wading through your e-mail than managing your work? Are you looking for ways to spend less time creating, managing and answering messages? Discover how to overcome e-mail overload and be more productive by writing more effective e-mail messages and reducing the volume of e-mail.
Write Effective E-Mail Messages
Start improving your e-mail effectiveness by creating and formatting easy to follow content, and by using pre-written responses.
Create Clear Content
Consider these strategies to upgrade your communications with understandable, e-mail messages:
• Help others prioritize how to act on your e-mail by including a clear, specific subject line and repeating important subject information in the body of the message.
• Define your expectations in the body of the message. Do you want your recipients to act, respond, read, or is the e-mail FYI only?
• Include only one topic per message. If that isn’t possible, then describe and number multiple topics as in 5 items to add to the Wednesday meeting agenda.
• When you type the addresses for your message, check who is getting your e-mail. Many programs attempt to auto-fill an e-mail address which may not be your intended recipient.
• Be careful with your tone and language. As with any other communication, match the message to your audience. Unless the reader understands your dry sense of humor, for instance, they may be confused or offended rather than amused.
• It may be tempting to use acronyms in the world of the Blackberry and IM (instant messaging), but only use extremely common abbreviations, such as FYI or ASAP, unless you are absolutely certain that the individual receiving your e-mail knows what they mean.
• Clearly identify yourself to strangers within your message and in the message signature.
Format Readable E-Mail Messages
Simplify the e-mail messages you send with clean, easy-to-read formatting:
• Get to the point. Shorten paragraphs to no more than five or six lines to reduce reading.
• Limit e-mail text to a single printed page. If you have more text, reduce the message or consider attaching a Word document. Delete previous responses that are no longer relevant to the current exchange.
• Use fonts between 10 and 12 points in size except for headlines and choose a font style that is easy to read. Apply colors sparingly.
• Add blank lines and white space to separate paragraphs and areas of detail.
• Run the spelling checker and re-read messages one last time for clarity and grammar before clicking Send.
Use Prewritten Responses
If you send a few basic messages over and over again, such as a reply to a request for product information, consider saving those responses as signatures that can be inserted into e-mail so that you don’t have to retype them.
For a majority of messages, create a default signature that includes your full name, position or title, phone, website, and other contact information.
Reduce the Volume of E-Mail
Some of the top ways to cut the amount of e-mail you receive is to manage the number of messages that you send, reduce unnecessary follow-up replies, and determine when person-to-person communication is a better choice.
Decrease the Number of Messages You Send
Before you write your next e-mail, seek to actively reduce how much e-mail you send:
• Read all replies on a topic before responding to the original message. Resist getting involved with e-mail threads that don’t impact your objectives.
• Don’t send, and discourage your staff from sending, “chime-in” messages that are simply unimportant responses such as “Thank you” and “You’re welcome.” Don’t respond to junk mail.
• Avoid Reply to All unless all recipients need to see your response. Otherwise you are contributing to their e-mail litter.
• Use the Cc (carbon copy) line only when the topic impacts the recipient’s work. Although it may seem easier to send a message to everyone in a department or your organization, first ask yourself, “Who needs to know? Why?” Most people who get a carbon copy assume there is something they are supposed to do.
• Use Bcc (blind carbon copy) to hide large distribution lists or to disguise the names of select recipients. All recipients can respond to a message but replies will not be received by anyone in the Bcc list which reduces the amount of e-mail they get.
Eliminate the Clutter in Your E-Mail
In addition to initiating fewer e-mail messages, look at other ways to reduce the messages in your Inbox:
• Publish frequently requested information on your company website and make sure that the website is quickly updated when changes occur.
• When you are sending out informational messages that do not require feedback, discourage unnecessary responses by using formal language and begin and end messages with No Reply Needed or FYI Only.
• Unsubscribe to electronic newsletters that you don’t read and move others out of your Inbox to folders for reading during travel or other down times. Don’t unsubscribe to mailings that you never initiated or you may further open the flow of junk mail.
• If it’s an available option, setup an out of office message that responds to incoming messages when you are not available to answer your e-mail. Clearly state your response time, when you will return, and who can be contacted during your absence.
Choose Voice Instead of E-Mail
There are often times when phone or face-to-face conversations are a superior choice to e-mail. Pick up the phone or arrange a meeting when:
• Building rapport is critical.
• The topic is emotionally charged.
• There are many intertwined issues to resolve or there is a need for lengthy interactive discussions.
Implementing these strategies for overcoming e-mail overload can help you become more productive and free you from your Inbox.
© 2005 by Dawn Bjork Buzbee
Dawn Bjork Buzbee is The Software Pro and a certified Microsoft Office Expert and Microsoft Office Specialist Master Instructor. Dawn shares smart and easy ways to effectively use software and technology through her work as a speaker, trainer, and consultant. Visit http://www.SoftwarePro.com for great Microsoft Office software tips and tricks or to contact Dawn.
The Critical Success Factors
Focusing on the things that make the biggest difference to your future prosperity.
(Note, although this article was written in early 2002, it is totally relevant. Right now.)
About three weeks ago I was surprised by this headline in the morning paper:
“Fed says September 11th hurt economy.”
Wow!
“What did I miss here?” Was this news? USA Today thought it was. I was shocked the Fed saw fit to announce it.
And this week, another one: “NBER Confirms Recession.”
Hey, Greenspan! Get out and talk to people. All over the country people tell me that if they break even this year, they’ll consider it a win. If that’s not a “recession”…
But have you ever wondered what it takes to end a recession? Not the textbook answer: two consecutive quarters of growth. Have you ever wondered what causes those consecutive growth quarters in the first place?
The economy turns up when enough people get tired of the economy being turned down.
Companies need things. They need new people or new services like marketing and sales. Some need new premises or new equipment. You might be saying something like “We really need this or that but we’re not spending another dime until the economy gets better.”
So we suffer from a cascade effect where you are waiting for someone else to make the first move — and the economy spirals downward — getting worse and worse — until…
Until people begin to say, “I’m tired of this,” or “I can’t wait anymore,” or “Let’s get going.” And as if by magic people start spending money again, and poof — the recession’s over.
I’m a growth strategist — I help people figure out the best way to build their businesses and make more money. I’d like to know when this recession will end, but I’m not an economist and that’s to difficult a question. Instead, I ask know how much longer can people sit on their duffs before they finally get so tired they have to act again.
I expect early next year people are going to reach that point. Although The Fed just made it official, many businesses turned down in the third quarter of 2000, and haven’t picked up since.
Aren’t you bored with all the do-nothing? Don’t you want to start building your business again? Of course you do. What do you think everybody else thinks?
(Side note: This forecast is right in line with the “professionals” who say the recession will end mid- to late 2002. That will only happen if entrepreneurs and consumers start spending early in the year.)
So what are you going to do about it? What are you personally going to do to end the recession?
What are you going to do to start making money again? (I agree with President Bush. You don’t have to put that flag away, but the most patriotic thing you can do right now is start spending money. If enough people take that leap of faith, the global economy will take off like a rocket.)
Are you going to be ready?
Now is a good time to prepare yourself for the next time when people decide to start “doing business” again.
Last month I outlined a way to polish and even rethink your business strategy. Here I will quickly review the critical factors which will insure your success.
A plan designed as a platform for growth and profits must consider each of the following critical success factors:
Money factors: positive cash flow, revenue growth, and profit margins.
Acquiring new customers and/or distributors — your future.
Customer satisfaction — how happy are they?
Quality — how good is your product and service?
Product / service development — what’s new that will increase business with existing customers and attract new ones?
Intellectual capital — increasing what you know that’s profitable.
Productivity — how efficient are you? How effective?
Strategic relationships — new sources of business, products and outside revenue.
Employee attraction and retention — your ability to do extend your reach.
Sustainability — your personal ability to keep it all going.
(To find out more about these critical factors, get a copy of my book, Faster Than the Speed of Change - bookblurb.html - it makes a great holiday gift for entrepreneurs as well.)
For each factor ask these three broad questions.
1. What can you learn from last year’s experience in this factor?
What did you do right? What worked? Always start with this question. Why? Because it’s positive. That’s why! It’s shocking how people naturally drift toward the negative. Even when I ask — verbatim — what did you do right, more than half the time people respond with something they did wrong.
How can you do more of those “right” things? How can you make them even better? How can you apply what you learned in this area to some other?
Only when you’ve exhausted this line of questioning ask, what did you do wrong? Not to beat yourself — to make sure you don’t repeat it and discover ways to repair or improve the process.
Next, ask what is missing. What could you add which will improve your effectiveness.
(Effectiveness can be stated as the ratio of OUTPUT to INPUT. Efficiency, on the other hand, is how many INPUT actions you take per unit of time. For instance, you can increase the number of calls you make per hour — that is an increased efficiency. You can increase the volume of sales for the same number of calls — that is increased effectiveness.)
Random examples of things that might be missing include consistency in marketing, new products or services, more sales people, a source of new leads, an employee (or a self-) development plan.
2. What are your goals related to this factor?
Setting new goals can, all by itself, transform your business. Your goals should be bold and dynamic — big enough to inspire you and everyone around you. Goals work best when they are objective and quantifiable. And you must believe they are achievable - regardless of how difficult or impossible they might seem.
Some examples of bold goals: dominate your market niche; double last year’s sales; top of the list in prospect mind- share; 100 percent customer repurchases; three new products developed and shipped by mid-year; customer problems solved in half the current time, a career path for each employee, sufficient cash to cover any business emergency.
3. How are you going to achieve these goals?
A successful plan to achieve your goals has several components:
Who will be accountable for each goal? Not you? then which executive? Which managers? What department?
Some factors map directly onto a specific department, like revenue is owned by sales and marketing. But factors like intellectual capital or customer satisfaction - they don’t fall clearly into one department.
Even so, someone still has to ‘own’ the factor. Figure out who. If no single person is accountable - guess what - it won’t happen.
Whoever accepts accountability for a specific goal should answer the remaining questions.
What strategies and tactics have a good chance to realize the goal?
If you’ve set bold objectives, you probably don’t yet know how to reach them. That’s what makes them bold in the first place. For now, you’re going to have to make up some answers and live with the uncertainty.
And while there are no guarantees of success, each target should have an identifiable path with a reasonable probability of getting you there. That path will define one or more initiatives and milestones you can put on a timeline.
What structural and procedural changes will you make relative to this factor?
Some examples are adding two salespeople, or a new assistant. Perhaps you will establish new reporting lines, eliminate paper memos, acquire a competitor, or having a monthly new business quota. Each structural and procedural change will spawn its own initiatives, which you will also time-line.
Does this initiative require new people? Do you need new job descriptions, or add managers? If you have to add people feed all the financial considerations back into your budget.
Taken together, all the factors, goals, accountable parties, initiatives, structural changes, timelines, measures and milestones add up to a strategic plan for the year.
Can you live without addressing every one of these factors?
Of course you can, but can you prosper?
Yes — you can do that too. But it will be harder.
Let’s face it: some companies sell the same product year after year without making any changes. Look at WD-40. They completely own the do-it-yourself lubricant niche –all they have to do is take orders and keep the shelves stocked. But their growth rate was negative 4.6% this past year. Obviously they are neglecting one or more critical factors.
So yes — you need to consider every critical success factor — even if you don’t do anything about it you have to think about it.
Increase sales but neglect service - what will happen to customer satisfaction? It will probably go down, which will affect repeat sales, your reputation in the market place, and ultimately new sales.
Improve product quality but neglect employee retention? What will happen to quality next year? Likely it will go down. And then what will happen to sales?
As you can see, each factor’s improvement synergistically contributes to your company’s survivability and prosperity.
Can you do everything at once?
Most businesses don’t have the resources for that, so something has to give — right…
Or you can create another breakthrough.
This time, create a breakthrough in planning — one which commits you to some level of advancement for every one of the critical factors.
This planning task is not as big as you might think from reading the above. Regardless, you may still think you can’t afford the time…
Look - any amateur can grow a business when the economy is going gangbusters, but it takes a purpose, inspiration, and attention to detail to increase profits while the rest of the world is in a recession. Having a strategic plan — one which considers all the critical success factors - is a sure way to improve the odds in your favor.
–PL
Paul Lemberg is the President of Quantum Growth Coaching, the world’s only business coaching franchise system built from the ground up to rapidly create more profits and more life for entrepreneurs. (http://qgcf.com) Paul is also Executive Director of the Stratamax Research Institute specializing in helping entrepreneurial companies quickly increase short term profits for sustainable long term growth. Of course, he is available for keynote speeches and workshops and can be reached via http://lemberg.com
Recently I saw an advertisement for a time management booklet: “Shorter deadlines, competing priorities, endless meetings, interruptions and even higher quality expectations are just some of today’s time challenges. And yet the number of hours in the day remains the same.”
As entrepreneurs we all struggle sometimes with managing our time effectively. I once heard an entrepreneur say that of the people he knows, his entrepreneur friends are the worst people when it comes to managing their time and priorities. Too often we fall prey to the misguided notion that being busy is the same as making progress.
There are many areas involved in effective time management:
• your attitude
• goal setting
• setting priorities
• planning
• scheduling
• analyzing your progress
• dealing with interruptions
• meetings
• paperwork
• delegation of tasks
• taming procrastination
• time teamwork
KEY PRINCIPLES
Here are some key principles I have found to help me manage my time more effectively:
1. Good habits are the key to good time management.
The essence of good time management is creating good habits. A good habit to develop is to focus on results. Setting goals and striving to reach them must become a habit. Before your next meeting, think to yourself-what is my goal in doing this or meeting with this person? What specific results would I like to see come from my time? You must learn to place a high value on your time. There are a million things, advertisements, books, media events and people vying for it. You must distinguish between what and who is important and what or who is not. This might sound a little harsh at first, but focusing on results in developing your habits will help you focus yourself and your time.
2. Good habits start with setting goals.
There are several points to remember when setting good goals.
First is to write your goals down. Studies have shown that you are much more likely to accomplish your goals if they are committed to paper. As someone once said, “A short pencil is better than a long memory.”
A second point is to break down your goals into three categories: short, intermediate and long term. I would advocate that you should have a separate list for your personal, professional and life goals. The personal goal list would cover areas like: personal relationships, use of free time, personal growth activities, reading up on a particular topic, taking continuing education classes or seminars, etc. Your professional goal list should be clearly focused on building your business, increasing revenues, cutting costs, strategic planning, marketing, employee management, creating partnerships and meeting beneficial business contacts. Your life goals would cover the broader picture of what you want to accomplish in life and what who you want to be remembered for.
3. Pursuing specific goals is the key to reaching success.
Setting good goals requires some planning and concentrated effort. Far too many entrepreneur have good intentions for their business, but lack goals that are specific enough to help them achieve success. Most entrepreneurs who fail to reach their goals do so because they fail to make specific, or S.M.A.R.T. goals.
S.M.A.R.T. goals are:
Specific. Your goal should be as detailed as possible. For example, “I will call all new prospective clients I met at the last networking event by this Wednesday at noon.” “I will take a vacation at least three weeks this next year.”
Measurable. Good goals allow you to quantify your efforts. “My company will increase top line sales to repeat customers by 2% this quarter by determining what their current needs are and developing a service to meet their needs before anyone else does. We will do this by surveying each of them and following up with a personalized phone call to clarify their answers.”
Achievable. It is good to set your goals high, but not impossibly high. “I will meet three new venture capitalists this month and begin building a relationship with them with the purpose of seeking funding from them in the next six months.” “I will re-write the three primary sections of my website by this next month to better reflect who my new targeted customer is and to help them find the solutions they are looking for more quickly on my site.”
Result-oriented. In order for your goals to be SMART, they must focus on what you DO want, not what you do NOT want. For example, a goal of “I do not want to fail in my business” focuses on what you do NOT want. An example of a SMART goal is, “I will increase my passive income by 15% this year by writing a “How To” manual on “10 Steps to Small Business Forward Financial Planning” and sell it on a website for $89.99.”
Time-limited. Put a specific time limit on your goals and have someone hold you accountable for reaching that goal. “I will finish researching my marketing strategy within the next six weeks and then spend two hours a day for three weeks until I finish developing my customized marketing plan.”
QUESTIONS TO ASK
Every one of us has 168 hours in a week. How we spend our time and prioritize our life says a lot about how successful we will be personally and professionally. There are many things that compete for our time: finances, future plans, family, fun, friends, present goals, pressing projects and pushy people. I heard someone once say, if you don’t control your time someone else will.
When thinking about how to successfully manage your time, here are a couple questions to ask yourself:
• Do I have specific things I want to accomplish each day?
• What percent of the time do I meet my daily goals?
• What specific things do I do to manage my time successfully?
• What are the priorities in my life?
• Does my schedule reflect those priorities?
• How successful do you feel in managing your time effectively?
Stephen Fairley, M.A., RCC is the President of Today’s Leadership Coaching, a premier executive coaching and training firm, and a Registered Corporate Coach (RCC). Today’s Leadership Coaching focuses on “Developing Leaders Who Deliver Results.” You can contact him at 630-588-0500 or at Stephen@TodaysLeadership.com
© 2001 by Stephen Fairley. All rights reserved. Please contact author for reprints.
During the past few months, I have had the opportunity to talk with many women about pricing and valuing - both themselves and their businesses - when delivering two of my popular seminars: profitable pricing and negotiation. The ability to value yourself, coupled with strong negotiation skills, are critical in terms of determining your own worth and value, and the value which others place upon you.
Society typically determines value through monetary measures - what you make in terms of salary if you work within the corporate realm, or revenue generated by your business if you are an entrepreneur. In a recent newsletter, I asked subscribers to respond to the question of whether or not there were disparities in the value that society places on work performed by women. Over 65% of them agreed that there were indeed disparities. Not surprising when you look at the differential in earnings between men and women.
Yet, I also find that women help to perpetrate some of the devaluation that occurs. Does this make me mad? You bet. So, how do we perpetrate the cycle? Let me give you some examples.
Think back to the last time you changed jobs, asked for a promotion or submitted a bid on job that you wanted and perhaps, desperately needed. When it came time to ask for the salary you wanted or the fee you deserved, what did you do?
Many women I talk to tell me that they are guilty of what I term the “psychological” one-down. Instead of asking for what they wanted, they had a conversation with themselves telling themselves why they wouldn’t get what they wanted. The outcome: they wound up asking for less than what they wanted or deserved, and in many cases, less than what they would have been able to receive. This sends a subtle message that we don’t value ourselves and therefore, society doesn’t need to either.
So what can we do to stop this cycle of devaluing women’s work and worth in society?
First, take inventory of yourself and determine your unique value proposition. Second, determine the skill sets that you need and make time to practice those skills regularly. Third, help other women by placing a high value on the contributions that they make. And finally, remember believe in your value and others will too!
Regina Barr is a business consultant with a passion for helping companies develop their full potential by focusing on their most valuable asset: their people. For more information on her programs and services, check out her website, http://www.RedLadder.com and sign up for her free email newsletter, Developing People…Inspiring Success.
Implementing an ISO 9001 system represents a major effort. However, all of that effort can represent a significant shift for a business - from quantity to quality. And this could make sure your business gets the desired results.
Shift Policy and Procedures Focus to Performance
Developing, implementing and maintaining your ISO 9001 program can be crucial to the core issues of a business. The focus is designed to help:
• Satisfy customer requirements for compliance
• Increase profits with more contracts
• Save money through efficiency
But to do this you need to put a framework in place that spotlights performance and performance improvement.
Get Management System Support
To effectively build a program and meet the requirements, your organization should carry out a strong process:
• Management Decision and Commitment
• Adequate Training and Evaluation
• Compliance with Appropriate Standards
• Audit and Registration
Once you’ve identified your company’s need for compliance, it is essential for top management to get on board. Management can ensure that quality is documented, demonstrable, effective and maintained.
Quality Systems and Procedures
The appropriate personnel should then review the standards for their industry and work to meet those requirements with organized documentation. Personnel can then develop, implement and maintain a set of quality systems and procedures to satisfy the ISO 9001 requirements.
Operations Training and Well-defined Processes
To build a program and meet the requirements, your organization should begin with effective training for how to create well-defined processes. You will first want to learn how to identify the objectives necessary to deliver top results. And then you will be ready to put those processes to work.
Internal Auditor Training
After you’ve implemented the ISO program, you should monitor and measure the processes against your own objectives. You can build an effective management system that objectively shows what you’re doing right and wrong. To learn how, you can take advantage of an Internal Auditor skills class and learn how to bridge the gap and move toward continual performance improvement.
Improve Business Process Performance
With ISO 9001 compliance you can improve the overall process performance of your business. And this can save money while satisfying your customers and increasing profit.
Chris Anderson is currently the managing director of Bizmanualz, Inc. and co-author of policies and procedures manuals, producing the layout, process design and implementation to increase performance.
To learn how to increase your business performance, visit: Bizmanualz, Inc.
What?
Speed-reading is a skill they should have taught you in school, but they didn’t.
So What?
Are you looking for a ridiculously easy way to find the time to get more done? Here’s a way you can easily gain over three weeks of productive time each year by simply using one finger.
When you were a child, you probably ran one finger along the lines of the book as you read a story. At some point in time, a grown-up told you this was not a good idea and encouraged you to learn to read without using your finger…like “big people” do. As it turns out, the “big people” were wrong. Using your finger as a guide and keeping your eyes slightly ahead of your finger as you read, can easily double your reading speed. Assuming you have at least an hour’s worth of reading material to tackle every working day, you will save 30 minutes a day by using this finger-reading method. A typical work year for most people is 260 days. Therefore, you save 130 hours a year by reading twice as fast. That’s over three weeks a year! Using this method paces your reading better and keeps you from backtracking so much. Try it right now…it works!
Most people think reading faster reduces their ability to concentrate and retain the information they are reading. As it turns out, this is also wrong. You actually improve your ability to comprehend and retain information when you read faster. This is just one example of how speed-reading can help you get more done with less effort.
Now What?
You can learn to speed-read by attending a course, taking a self-study course or reading a book on speed-reading. Here are two of my personal favorites:
- 10 Days to Faster Reading by Abby Marks-Beale
- Quantum Reading by Bobbi DePorter with Mike Hernacki
If you combine the two books mentioned above, they contain about 150 pages, including many blank pages and pictures. Even a slow reader could probably read them in two to four hours. In addition to the finger-reading technique, there are enough ideas in these books to help you easily double or quadruple your reading speed in a very short time.
Would you be willing to invest two to four hours in something tomorrow that could help you gain six or more weeks of productive time each year? It’s a better idea than complaining you don’t have the time to get it all done. Try it!
Chris Crouch, president and founder of DME Training and Consulting, is the developer of the GO System. The GO System is a structured training course designed to improve focus, organization and productivity in the workplace and is taught by corporate trainers and professional organizers all over the country. Chris is also author of Getting Organized: Learning How to Focus, Organize and Prioritize and other books that provide practical and easy-to-learn ideas on personal achievement, success and productivity.
Visit http://www.thegosystem.com to learn more about the GO System, to inquire about having Chris speak to your group or organization, to sign up for Chris’ free newsletter providing tips on having a more joyful and productive life, and for additional ideas on improving focus, organization and productive.
To learn about becoming a Certified GO System Trainer, visit http://www.gosystemcertification.com.
In his book, The Future of Success, former Clinton cabinet member Robert Reich rails about how everyone–and he means EVERYONE–can be found struggling today to do more, be more, cram more in. For workers this means embracing the belief they cannot stop for a moment’s rest at their jobs for fear of ending up getting downsized away. For parents this means a 17-year-plus commitment to make sure their kids all make it into college (and that said bills get paid), and for kids themselves it means squeezing in all those extras so vital to their future, like soccer, music lessons, 2nd and/or 3rd language classes, extra-credit homework.
The result of this, Reich asserts, has been that each one of us, no matter what our station in life, no longer has time to smell bagels, let alone coffee or the flowers. We have “no time, no poetry, no realizations in (our) lives.” What we do sniff, he adds, is the “smell of resignation.” Among young people, this means tuning out the whole scene and virtually bagging the idea of success. Among many adults, it makes for a mid-life crisis questioning whatever success has heretofore been achieved. .
Is Reich correct? Are we as a society in fact now so time-squeezed that our “vital” work/school pressures threaten to devour us whole? Worse, perhaps they’ve already devoured us… and we don’t even realize it!
Various studies of late have borne this out, of course: The typical number of hours worked on the job today compares unfavorably with the same time-measurement 20, 30 or 40 years ago. This finding seems to get borne out in survey after survey and industry after industry, again and again. The great long-voiced promise that technology will free us up for personal development, leisure, fun, etc., shortening our workweeks, and make work itself on the job so much easier, apparently had come to land with a deafening thud.
It’s an old adage that rings true particularly well here: Work expands to fill the time. We humans got a knack for filling up our hours, no matter how many laborsaving devices we whip off the drawing board to afford us time to do “fun” things. Yet we keep filling such liberated hours with more drudge.
In the face of such an onslaught, how can we bring poetry back? Is Reich’s lament our inevitable sad, unstoppable song?
Fortunately, the solution is simple, simpler than at first meets the eye. Reverse the tide now by looking up from this page (now!) and gazing out your window. Yes, we’re talking daydream here. Right now. Now! Lose yourself. Be idle. Do… gasp!… nothing.
(Pause while you do so.)
(Pause again while you REALLY do so.)
OK, for that briefest moment, you took ownership of your time and your life. You probably made up a poem of some kind right there in that moment, whether you realized it or not. You absorbed some beauty, grasped it, felt its core.
You made time for poetry.
Ken Lizotte CMC is Chief Imaginative Officer (CIO) of emerson consulting group inc. (Concord, MA), which transforms consultants, law firms, executives and companies into “thoughtleaders.” This article is an excerpt from his newest book “Beyond Reason: Questioning Assumptions of Everyday Life”.
Visit ==>www.thoughtleading.com for more info.
Be honest - are you one of those people who puts things off? It’s ok - we all do it.
It’s human nature. “Why do something today when you can do it tomorrow,” or so
the saying goes. But procrastination (to give it it’s “proper” name) can cost us more
than we can imagine.
Why do we procrastinate? In general, we procrastinate because the task we are
putting off is unpleasant in some way. Either we don’t like doing it (like calling a
bank), or there is some physical discomfort (like going to the dentist). The task may
even be boring and monotonous, or just plain difficult.
But the effects of procrastination can run deeper than just not doing the task. Other
problems it may cause are:
Being branded as lazy: When people notice that you haven’t completed
particular tasks, you can be branded as a lazy person. Not only can this affect your
job or personal life (promotions and the like), but it may mean the tasks you really
want to do are offered to someone else who is considered more reliable!
Creates clutter: Many unfinished tasks can leave a lot of clutter around -
books, papers or other items that are needed to perform the job.
Bad for morale: There is nothing worse than knowing you have a job you
need to do, and knowing at the end of the day that the job wasn’t done. It can make
you feel down, and even preoccupy your mind while you’re trying to concentrate on
other things.
You have no leeway: When you put something off, jobs accumulate. This
means if an urgent task suddenly comes in, you have no leeway to drop everything
and work on it - there are too many other outstanding things that need doing.
It becomes more unpleasant: The job itself may not change by putting it
off, but the feeling in our mind of how unpleasant we think the job will be grows.
We think about how we have to explain not doing the job to other people, and the
whole situation feeds on itself and becomes ugly.
Now to be fair, sometimes procrastinating isn’t a conscious action. Particular jobs
just never seem to get done, even though you never consciously decided not to do
them. But at other times you do make the decision not to do the job at the moment,
and just put it off.
But you can save yourself a lot of mental clutter, and perhaps even more discomfort
later on, if you just adopt a “do it now” attitude. Decide that you’re just going to get
the job out of the way when it comes it, no matter how uncomfortable it may be. By
doing the job straight away, often you will realise that the discomfort you associated
with the task was simply your mind feeding on itself as you were putting it off. And
the sense of relief you get from finishing the task is well worth it.
So, now you know about procrastination you have to ask yourself the question -
“what am I going to do about it?” Hopefully you will decide to banish procrastination
from your life, and reap the rewards of that decision!
Learn how you can take control of your life and get more done today than you ever
thought possible by visiting http://www.timemanagementmentor.com where Jason
Anderson passes on essential information about the art of time management and
personal organization.
95% of Workers Fail Because of This…But They Can Fix It
Did you know that your career success is based on your
mastery of one important skill?
Failure to apply your leadership power usually prevents you
from realizing success in the workplace.
The organizational chart may not show you as a leader but
you can act like a leader if you choose to do so.
Leadership power is the primary cause of successful
outcomes, great achievements and evolutionary progress.
Most people think only executives, presidents and generals
possess any leadership power but the facts reveal another
truth - power is held by those who know where to obtain it
and how to share it with others.
The problem with many of us is this - we need to learn how
to empower our skills, enhance our competence and energize
our leadership power.
Power Principle 1 - Invest in your Infrastructure!
Your infrastructure contains the elements that will make
leadership power available to you. You must invest the time
and effort needed to build a strong, capable infrastructure.
=> Element-1 - MODEL SUCCESS - study the leadership methods
of great leaders
=> Element-2 - BE EAGER TO LEARN NEW THINGS - purchase
leadership skills training courses, materials or books
=> Element-3 - APPRECIATE YOURSELF - start recording your
thoughts, feelings, desires and experiences in a journal or
diary
=> Element-4 - HARMONIZE YOUR MIND - meet with like-minded
people who want to improve their leadership skills, talents
and behaviors
=> Element-5 - BE WILLING TO SERVE - begin to act like a
leader by serving the needs of others through community
service, teaching or by taking responsibility for removing
someone else’s burdens
Power Principle-2 - See Hope in Visionary Ways!
You can inspire people to act out of their fears or hopes.
It is your choice - you can use worry or faith to make
people respond to your leadership.
However, I put it to you, which path do you think is more
effective, more likely to lead to good things? History has
shown us that the best course of action is always based on
hope, faith or love.
Leaders must craft a vision of what hope will look like when
it becomes a tangible reality. Your statement of hope should
include something tangible, specific, measurable,
attainable, realistic, hopeful, enthusiastic and empowering.
There are many examples of visionary leadership at its most
inspiring best. Your vision should strive to be positive and
vivid to others and worthy of pursuit by them, otherwise
they might not be moved to follow your lead.
Nobel Peace Laureate, Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.,
positively expressed his hope as being the time when,
“…we allow freedom to ring, when we let it ring from every tenement and every hamlet, from every state and every city, we will be able to speed up that day when all of God’s
children, black men and white men, Jews and Gentiles,
Protestants and Catholics, will be able to join hands and
sing in the words of the old Negro spiritual, “Free at last,
free at last. Thank God Almighty, we are free at last.”
Power Principle-3 - Strategies are for Drivers!
Strategy is for those leaders who yearn to get there! Your
vision may sound pretty and look nice but without a vehicle
you won’t be able to take your vision on that special date.
Your leadership power gets most of its energy from a
strategy that just begs to be driven. Your strategy can help
you sustain the momentum and force of your vision.
In my time, I’ve seen plenty of ugly cars, trucks and trains
but they all had one thing in common - they would take you
wherever you wanted to go and could make the journey of
getting there just as exciting, memorable and comfortable as
any roadway beauty.
You will need to drive your strategy
=> by steering towards your stretch goals,
=> by filling-up with the right resources,
=> by using a roadmap to navigate through the thorny areas
=> by measuring the effectiveness of its progress and
execution.
Power Principle-4 - Do You Speak The Language?
Are your words doing the job they need to do? Are your
thoughts reaching out to connect with their hearts and
minds? Do you appreciate their uniqueness, commitment and
contributions?
There is a certain magic which happens when our words
accomplish their purpose. To create the Universe, God said,
“Let there be light”, and there was light!
Our words have the power to create or destroy - we must
understand that the words we speak have the ability to bring
life or death to the situation.
Ideas, procedures, opinions, facts and dreams are
reflections of our thoughts. We think therefore we are who
we are. Leaders use the language of meanings, beliefs and
feelings to connect with and compliment the hearts and minds
of people.
Studies on motivation reveal humans are hungry for
recognition and acceptance. The easiest way to motivate a
person is based on your continual, sincere and realistic
show of appreciation for their talents, achievements,
good-faith efforts and positive attitude.
Power Principle-5 - Be Congruent, Consistent, Cooperative!
There is something off-beat, brittle and frail about a
building that is missing key parts of its structure - a
broken roof, steel bars sticking out of the walls, crumbling
foundation can make you wonder how or why the building is
still standing.
Congruency is the state effective leaders try to maintain in
their actions -
=> they line-up their actions with their words,
=> they link their values to their behaviors,
=> their attitudes are in-sync with their conversations
Consistency is judged by your performance over time -
=> Do you always apply the same standards to everyone?
=> Do you usually make your decisions based on all the
available facts?
=> Do you appear to act and behave in the same ways you do
when facing similar kinds of situations?
Cooperative people know that using honey captures more
flies! To win over people to your point of view, your
history of respecting, valuing and working with their
desires, differences and decisions goes a long way in
gaining their cooperation with your plans.
Great leaders have always cooperated with people by
=> Asking for their opinions, thoughts and experiences
=> Listening to them, showing understanding by summarizing
their statements
=> Incorporating their ideas, beliefs and meanings into the
leader’s statements [using the more powerful pronoun, “we”
to express those ideas and decisions]
————————————————————
Do you agree that these 5 principles can energize your
leadership power? Regardless of your job title or formal
authority, using all five will increase your power and
effectiveness in your workplace, home and community.
In my life, I have found that these principles do add
considerable influence to my ideas and dreams. People tell
others that
=> I can be trusted to do the right thing,
=> I always gather the right people together to get the job
done in an harmonious manner and
=> My ideas and feelings are exact reflections of their own
beliefs and meanings
You can put these principles to work because each one uses
your own unique talents, efforts and resources.
Take advantage of Internet research and educational
materials, visit other offices, volunteer your time to a
worthy cause, take an online training course or two,
practice the art of leadership on your friends, family and
colleagues at work.
You can become a more powerful leader starting right where
you are - you can start today.
“I am personally convinced that one person can be a change
catalyst, a “transformer” in any situation, any
organization. Such an individual is yeast that can leaven an
entire loaf. It requires vision, initiative, patience,
respect, persistence, courage, and faith to be a
transforming leader.”
Dr. Stephen R. Covey, author of, “The Seven Habits of Highly
Effective People” and other titles.
Can you see yourself acting as a powerful, transforming and
enriching leader? Can you use the Principles of Power to
increase your influence and effectiveness? Can you be all
that you can be and share that power with the world?
You can learn more about this subject by reading our ‘blog’: Leadership skills training & development for creating energy!
Leadership skills training & development for creating energy!
I know you can do it all and do it well and do it with your
own personal style - please let me know when you begin the
journey and I’ll send you a letter of congratulations.
Copyright © 2004, Mustard Seed Investments Inc.,
All rights reserved.
Bill Thomas publishes “The Leadership-Toolkit Collection!” - Affordable, Performance Improvement Programs for Employees, Executives & Entrepreneurs: featuring web-based Training, Books & Manuals, coaching & mentoring, & follow-up support GUARANTEED to energize, empower, enhance your leadership results.
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