If you want to know how to negotiate well just observe a child who wants something. Even if they’ve been told ‘No’ they will try again … and again … and again. As they get more sophisticated they won’t just ask out right for it, they will find different ways to get their point across. They may even say something like “If I wash the car for a month can I have ….”. The main thing you will notice is that they DON’T GIVE UP.
In life everybody negotiates about almost everything. It’s just we don’t always realise it and that’s the problem. We often think that negotiating happens at specific times, such as between customers and suppliers, but that’s not the whole story. What happens when you and your friends want to go out for the evening? There is a lot of negotiating that goes on around when and where you are going and with whom.
Negotiations in practice are a messy, almost chaotic, experience. Human beings are given to wandering attention, digressions, circular arguments, repetition, interruptions, cross-talk, irrelevancies, and a whole range of emotional responses from the passive sulk to the violent outburst.
What’s the worst thing you can do to a negotiator? Be rude? No … accept his or her first offer. Why is that? Well if someone accepts your first offer you start to wonder how high they would have been willing to go. On the other side you start to wonder if you really got a bargain.
What’s the negotiator’s most useful question? If you put the words “What if…” in the front of every question.
Friday 24 October 2008
Wednesday 15 October 2008
Can you believe it?
I was at a networking lunch recently and one of the ladies is a mortgage advisor. We had the normal networking conversation around what we do and how we find business. The whole thing took an unexpected turn when I explained how I was finding more people asking me for help because they were being asked to do a presentation as part of the interview process.
She suddenly became excited and said “Oh I wish you’d been able to help my son because he had to do one for a part-time job last week”. Imagining that he was going to be speaking to groups of people on behalf of a charity or as part of a youth training scheme I was shocked when she told me what he had actually applied to do.
He’s a university student and he dropped his CV in to a local company on the off-chance that they might want some part-time staff. They called him a week later and asked him to go in to see them. As part of the interview he had to ‘sell them an ashtray’ and then do a formal presentation.
The job he was applying for…
… was at the checkout in Blockbuster!
So, if you know ANYONE who is going for an interview in the near future tell them to brush up on their presentation skills
She suddenly became excited and said “Oh I wish you’d been able to help my son because he had to do one for a part-time job last week”. Imagining that he was going to be speaking to groups of people on behalf of a charity or as part of a youth training scheme I was shocked when she told me what he had actually applied to do.
He’s a university student and he dropped his CV in to a local company on the off-chance that they might want some part-time staff. They called him a week later and asked him to go in to see them. As part of the interview he had to ‘sell them an ashtray’ and then do a formal presentation.
The job he was applying for…
… was at the checkout in Blockbuster!
So, if you know ANYONE who is going for an interview in the near future tell them to brush up on their presentation skills
Monday 13 October 2008
Getting Your Timing Right
Is your timing right?
Recently I've been contacted by people needing some urgent help with presentations. They've found themselves in a situation where their future prospects hinge on the success of a presentation.
It's bad enough having to make a presentation if it's not something you do regularly. When your whole future is riding on the outcome it puts you under additional pressure.
Fortunately they came to me with enough time to be able to do something about it. I was able to help by giving them some tools to control their nerves and tips on how to improve their performance.
The main key to their success was getting their timing right. We completely rewrote their presentations so that they were able to get their points across within the allotted time. This was crucial as one of them had not even made her main point before she ran out of time using her original script!
The trick is to decide what message you want to get across to your audience. You then structure your presentation so you have a clear beginning and ending with 3 key supporting points in the middle. You MUST practice saying it so that you can time how long it takes and if it is too long remove some of the material.
Someone told me recently that 200 words take about 5 minutes to deliver. This is probably a good rule of thumb, although it does depend on how quickly you speak!
Remember - good timing shows professionalism and courtesy towards your audience and other speakers, if there are any, so it is a critical part of your preparation. Don't leave anything to chance - rehearse it.
Friday 20 June 2008
Your voice says a lot
When people find out that I help with presentation skills I often get the comment "You couldn't help our diector/chairman/boss could you? He speaks in such a monotone it's boring". This is a common problem. Our voices rise and fall naturally when we speak with passion but something seems to happen when we have to make a presentation.
I don't know if it’s nerves or the formality of the occasion that causes the stilted style of a lot of speakers. Admittedly there are some people who do have a limited range to their vocal variety, even in everyday conversation, but even these people are able to enrich their vocal abilities with a bit of practice.
I think that some people believe that serious topics require a serious voice and that they will lose credibility if they put a bit of emotion into it. This is not the case - your audience wants to know you feel strongly about the topic you’re presenting. It helps them form an emotional bond with you that makes them more likely to listen to what you’re saying even if they don’t necessarily agree with it. They also want to be informed, stimulated and, yes let’s admit it, entertained!
So what can you do about your vocal style?
You obviously need to practice, but your colleagues would find it a bit strange if you suddenly started putting on silly voices or speaking like Laurence Olivier, particularly if that's the complete opposite to your normal style. I’ve found that children make a good audience to choose for practice as they expect to be entertained and they love anything that is silly and makes them laugh.
An ideal time to try out new ways of speaking is the bedtime story for your children or grandchildren. You can afford to be as wild and whacky as possible with the different voices you use for the characters. There is usually a variety of emotions involved in a story so you can also practice how these will sound. This helps you to expand your vocal comfort zone and you get instant feedback!
If you don’t have access to any children you could perhaps find a ‘speaking buddy’. This is someone who also wants to improve their vocal skills. When there are two or more of you in the same boat it is easier to be supportive and to get feedback. You need to agree to support each other in being as outrageous and silly as you can so that you can expand your comfort zone.
A good exercise when working with other adults is ‘emotional expression’. Take a couple of words such as “I’m fine” and take it in turns to say them. Before each person speaks the other one must state the emotion that the speaker is attempting to use and then feed back if they achieved the goal after the words have been spoken. The aim is to use as many different emotions as possible and to work towards fine graduations of emotion so that you can differentiate between angry and annoyed for example.
Another exercise is to stand at opposite ends of a long room and practice shouting at each other and then whispering so that you can still be heard. The trick here is to use your breath control. You actually speak on the out breath so you will need to take in a lot of air to increase volume. Remember to use your stomach to produce volume not your vocal chords.
If you can do all this in a ‘safe’ environment it will seem a lot easier to do more toned down versions when you are in a ‘scary’ environment making a speech.
I don't know if it’s nerves or the formality of the occasion that causes the stilted style of a lot of speakers. Admittedly there are some people who do have a limited range to their vocal variety, even in everyday conversation, but even these people are able to enrich their vocal abilities with a bit of practice.
I think that some people believe that serious topics require a serious voice and that they will lose credibility if they put a bit of emotion into it. This is not the case - your audience wants to know you feel strongly about the topic you’re presenting. It helps them form an emotional bond with you that makes them more likely to listen to what you’re saying even if they don’t necessarily agree with it. They also want to be informed, stimulated and, yes let’s admit it, entertained!
So what can you do about your vocal style?
You obviously need to practice, but your colleagues would find it a bit strange if you suddenly started putting on silly voices or speaking like Laurence Olivier, particularly if that's the complete opposite to your normal style. I’ve found that children make a good audience to choose for practice as they expect to be entertained and they love anything that is silly and makes them laugh.
An ideal time to try out new ways of speaking is the bedtime story for your children or grandchildren. You can afford to be as wild and whacky as possible with the different voices you use for the characters. There is usually a variety of emotions involved in a story so you can also practice how these will sound. This helps you to expand your vocal comfort zone and you get instant feedback!
If you don’t have access to any children you could perhaps find a ‘speaking buddy’. This is someone who also wants to improve their vocal skills. When there are two or more of you in the same boat it is easier to be supportive and to get feedback. You need to agree to support each other in being as outrageous and silly as you can so that you can expand your comfort zone.
A good exercise when working with other adults is ‘emotional expression’. Take a couple of words such as “I’m fine” and take it in turns to say them. Before each person speaks the other one must state the emotion that the speaker is attempting to use and then feed back if they achieved the goal after the words have been spoken. The aim is to use as many different emotions as possible and to work towards fine graduations of emotion so that you can differentiate between angry and annoyed for example.
Another exercise is to stand at opposite ends of a long room and practice shouting at each other and then whispering so that you can still be heard. The trick here is to use your breath control. You actually speak on the out breath so you will need to take in a lot of air to increase volume. Remember to use your stomach to produce volume not your vocal chords.
If you can do all this in a ‘safe’ environment it will seem a lot easier to do more toned down versions when you are in a ‘scary’ environment making a speech.
Wednesday 23 April 2008
The Art of Persuasion
How often have you wished you could persuade anyone to do anything? There are some people who seem to be able to do this naturally and they seem super-human to the rest of us mere mortals. How can they do it and we can't?
The simple answer is that you can if you know what motivates someone. My brother recently sent pictures of his one year-old daughter having her hair cut for the first time. The first picture showed her throwing a major crying tantrum because she didn't want to sit still. The second picture showed the hairdresser holding a chocolate biscuit in front of the toddler who had a surprised and interested look on her face. The final picture showed a happy baby with a chocolate-covered face smiling and showing off her new haircut. The hairdresser obviously knew what would motivate a one year-old to sit still quietly.
Obviously that's a simple example of motivation at work and it's much more complicated than that, particularly with adults. Although everyone reacts differently to specific information there are patterns to the way they choose to react. These are called meta-programs and there are six of them that involve motivational traits. For each trait there are specific words that will influence someone's reaction to what you say because the words hold an emotional charge for that person. We often call these their 'hot buttons'. If you can work out a person's motivational traits then you can use words that will have the most impact on them.
The six motivational traits are:
The simple answer is that you can if you know what motivates someone. My brother recently sent pictures of his one year-old daughter having her hair cut for the first time. The first picture showed her throwing a major crying tantrum because she didn't want to sit still. The second picture showed the hairdresser holding a chocolate biscuit in front of the toddler who had a surprised and interested look on her face. The final picture showed a happy baby with a chocolate-covered face smiling and showing off her new haircut. The hairdresser obviously knew what would motivate a one year-old to sit still quietly.
Obviously that's a simple example of motivation at work and it's much more complicated than that, particularly with adults. Although everyone reacts differently to specific information there are patterns to the way they choose to react. These are called meta-programs and there are six of them that involve motivational traits. For each trait there are specific words that will influence someone's reaction to what you say because the words hold an emotional charge for that person. We often call these their 'hot buttons'. If you can work out a person's motivational traits then you can use words that will have the most impact on them.
The six motivational traits are:
- Level - whether a person is proactive or reactive
- Criteria - the things that are important to the person so they can judge whether they have got what they want
- Direction - whether a person moves away from pain or towards gain
- Source - how someone knows when they've done a good job (internal or external)
- Reason - why they do something (lots of options or follow procedures)
- Decision factors - this is basically how they handle change
If you told someone whose decision factor was 'sameness' that what you had to offer was 'new and cutting-edge' they would feel very uncomfortable because they like things to stay the same.
How does this help you with a presentation? Well, you need to use language that will influence the majority of the audience. So if we continue to use the decision factor example you would say it is something 'new and improved'.
Think about how you react to certain words and you will begin to understand how powerful this can be if you want to influence someone.
Wednesday 16 April 2008
How to get the most out of networking
Theresa Truscott wrote:
Getting the most from face to face contact
What do you say when someone asks you what you do? When you answer that question do they instantly want to know more or do their eyes glaze over as they change the subject rapidly?
In this time of economic uncertainty it is even more important than ever that you are able to engage the attention of the people you interact with in business. So many people miss out on opportunities because they haven’t prepared well enough, make sure you aren’t one of them.
Design and learn an interesting response to the question “what do you do?” so that people really want to know more. Make sure that it’s easy for them to ask you some follow-up questions. Think about the questions they are likely to ask and prepare for those too.
Show an active interest in the other person. Think about how you can help them, they are then more likely to help you in return.
Saturday 29 March 2008
Answering Difficult Questions
People often ask me how they should handle difficult questions. This is probably one of the areas that creates the greatest fear around making presentations. If you know your subject well you can probably make a presentation quite confidently. However, your confidence can be undermind by the fear that someone may ask you something you can't answer and you think that it will make you look stupid or unprofessional. The good news is that there a few things you can do to make the situation easier to handle.
- Take a deep breath.
- Repeat the question to verify you have understood it. This also gives you thinking time.
- If you don't know how to respond say "That's a good question, I haven't hear that one before" or "I hadn't really thought about it until you asked that question" and then respond with an initial reaction. People will realise that you are thinking on your feet and won't expect an 'expert' answer. It is even permissable to ask them what they think the answer might be.
- Explain that your answer may be your opinion rather than fact.
- Be prepared for the fact that you can’t please everybody and that your answer may not be well received.
- Stall – I can’t answer that at this time because…. I don’t have all the facts/It is confidential/The final decision hasn’t been made/It’s subject to legal constraints/I don’t know, I’ll get back to you on that.
- Be careful that you don’t appear weak if you stall, maybe give a time and date when you can answer it or a way you can get the answer to them (such as via email).
- Answer it using positive language.
- If it is difficult or unpalatable then explain why the decision was made or what the different options are and what their implications are.
If you respond with conviction and aplomb you will appear to be professional and people will respect you - even if your answer is "I don't know". They would rather that you were honest with them than feel you are hiding something.
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