Quick Tips for Improving Your Public Speaking Skills

Quick Tips for Improving Your Public Speaking Skills Quick Tips for Improving Your Public Speaking Skills Some people are natural-born orators, while others feel more comfortable listening. Regardless of where you fall on the spectrum, its likely that youve have to give a presentation or two during your professional career. At the very least, youll probably have to speak in front of a groupat some point.While the thought of public speaking may be daunting, there are certain things you can do to improve your skills. If you watch enough TED Talks, youll realize that successful presentations and speakers tend to have a few things in common1. They Are RelatableThe speaker will oftenstart by sharing a personal story that puts the topic in a context with which most, if not all, members of the audience can identify. The more your audience sees themselves in your presentation, the more engaged they will be.2. They Speak to the IndividualHave you ever tried speaking to a large group? With s o many people, it can be hard to focus on individuals. As a result, you may end up speaking in a general direction instead.An effective presenter, however, will speak directly to the people in the crowd, making eye contact as they go. You dont need to spend more than a moment on any one person. Youll feel more connected to your content and audience if youre actually talking to someone.3. They Ask QuestionsThis is the best way to draw your audience in and turn them into active participants. Even if youre asking a rhetorical question, listeners are still actively engaging in the discussion as they think it over.4. They Offer Case StudiesWhenever possible, use case studies or specific stories to exemplify your point. After a presentationhas ended, audience members often have an easier time recalling specific examples and stories.If youre serious about improving your public speaking skills, watch a lot of speeches. Learning by observation is valuable and effective. The more talks you wa tch, the more youll naturally start to incorporate the rhythms and styles of successful speakers into your own presentations.A version of this article originally appeared on theAtrium Staffing blog.Michele Mavi isAtrium Staffings resident career expert.

12 Quick Tips for Finding a Job This Fall

12 Quick Tips for Finding a Job This Fall 12 Quick Tips for Finding a Job This Fall Whether you call it autumn or fall, the years third season has nearly arrived. This is a time of harvest- the time to reap the benefits of what was so carefully sowed back in the spring. But if youre a job seeker, it can be hard to stay motivated as the sunlight leaves us again. Use thislist of quick tips for finding a job and re-invigorate your searchparte One Research1. The financial services and technology sectors continue to lead in the numbers of new jobs created. More specifically, Amazon and JPMorgan Chasecurrently rank 1 and 2 respectively for companies that have added the most new positions.2. The Muse publishes a monthly list called Companies that are Hiring Like Crazy, so go read Septembers edition and then keep your eyes open for future articles3. If you want a new position but arent set on a particular field, use the Industries at a Glance overviews from the Bureau of Labor Statistics. Th is comprehensive statistical database can help you figure out which industries might offer the best opportunities. There are pages for more than 100 industries.4. A companys quarterly financial reports can give you great insight into whether or not to pursue a position there. Look for trends not only in overall profits, but also how the company is spending its money- such as increases in administrative expenses.Part Two Housekeeping5. Take the abflug of fall as an opportunity to clean up your resume incorporatea career summary, add pertinent accomplishments, and make koranvers youre using the right format.6.Review your job references as well. Competition for jobs is high, and theres no quicker way to irritate a potential employer than to point them towards referencesthat cant actually be contacted. A few quick check-ins is all it takes to get this squared away.7. Get in the habit of running your resume through Jobscan before submitting applications. Tailoring a resume for each indiv idual job description is crucial- and Jobscans analysis tool helps you instantly see how well youve incorporated a job postings keywords.8. LinkedIn is your friend in countless ways when it comes to job hunting. Make sure your LinkedIn profile is up to date (includingcontact information thats easy to find), join discussion groups in your chosen industry, and follow news from companies youve applied to.Part Three Action9. Take some of the control back in your job search and reach out to companies for informational interviews. This is a low-pressure situation that can yield great results for you as a candidate industry insight, the ability to demonstrate your interest, and perhaps even a new mentor.10. Dont wait until Thanksgivingto apply for seasonal work Many employers will start posting temporary jobs this month in anticipation of the comingholiday rush.11. Try outa resume template. Jobscans free collection of20 resume templatesdesigned to get past applicant tracking systemsis sure to have one youll like.12. Whens the last time you checked in with a mentor? Send an email to a previous supervisor, teacher, or colleague youre close with and update that person on your job search. Ask for help with networking or find out how they managed their own career transitions.Think of these tips for finding a job as a big, glorious leaf pile just jump in and have some fun

Selling to Small Businesses

Selling to Small BusinessesSelling to Small BusinessesFor certain products and services, the sweet spot prospect is small businesses. That kind of B2B schlussverkauf requires a very different approach from selling to big corporations or, for that matter, from selling to consumers. Small businesses have their needs and limitations, and if you can identify and address these, you can have considerable success with this market. What Is a Small Business? The Small Business Administration (SBA) defines a small business as one that is for-profit, privately owned, and not dominant in its field. Small businesses generally have revenues under $20 million a year and employ fewer than 500 employees (sometimes much fewer). Businesses of this size usually dont have the need or the funds to keep a purchasing expert on staff. So if you sell to small businesses and your product is something more expensive than office supplies, odds are youll be selling to the business owner or owners. The good ne ws is that selling to small businesses generally means a shorter sales cycle as opposed to large business customers because you wont have to go through a long and involved approval process. In fact, you have a good chance of closing the sale at the first meeting. When youre dealing directly with the business owner, he doesnt exactly have to wait for approval from upstairs. The Decision Maker Before you meet with the decision maker, do some research and uncover at least the basics about his company. Just looking at your prospects website will usually tell you who the owners are, how long theyve been in business, whether the current owners founded the company or bought it from someone else, what their major successes have been, and so on. Some companies even list their significant customers, which can be hugely useful for your sales presentation. If you mention during your appointment how useful your product would be in future sales to Company X and back it up with an example or t wo, your prospect will be highly impressed. Small business owners are well aware of the dismal statistics surrounding the failure rate of small businesses. No matter how successful they are individually, they know that there is no safety net and that one really bad year can wipe them out. As a result, presenting your product as a way to increase the business owners peace of mind is often an effective approach. Saving money is also a highly useful benefit since many small businesses have very little margin for error financially. These owners are generally looking to advance their business in one of two ways to grow it until its a major player in the industry, or to attract a bigger company that will buy their company. Early on in the presentation, find out which way your prospect is leaning, and then position your product as a tool to help him achieve that end. For example, if you are selling accounting software, the ability to quickly produce reports going back several years would b e very helpful during a company sale or merger. Such reports would also help a growing company identify areas of strength or weakness and guide the business owners strategic planning. The beauty of tying your product or service into his long-term goals is that it will make him much less likely to switch providers later on. You are making yourself and your company, a strategic partner, to help him get his company where he wants it to go. As a result, youre armoring him against your competitors wiles.

Tell me what you say yes to, and Ill tell you who you are

Tell me what you say 'yes' to, and I’ll tell you who you are Tell me what you say 'yes' to, and I’ll tell you who you are “The difference between successful people and very successful people is that very successful people say no to almost everything.” ?- ?  Warren BuffettAccording to Aristotle, “We are what we repeatedly do.” More directly, we are what we say “yes” to.Every second of every day, you’re saying “yes” to something. Every time you do something, you say “yes” to that thing. Every time you hop on Facebook and begin scrolling you’re saying “yes.” Every piece of food you put in your body you’re saying “yes.” Right now, as you read this article, you’re saying “yes.” When you say yes to anything, you say no to almost everything else. Every choice has embedded opportunity cost. Every choice is very costly. Saying yes isn’t free.Self-signaling: The science of identityAccording to research by Dr. Ronit Bodner and Dr. Drazen Prelec, “Actions provide a signal to ourselves, that is, actions are self-signaling.” In other words, your actions provide a signal to you of the type of person you are.If you wake up early and go running, you’ll think to yourself, “I’M THE KIND OF PERSON  â€¦ that wakes up early and goes running.”Whatever decisions you’ve made, you’ll conclude “I’M THE TYPE OF PERSON  â€¦ that does X, Y, OR Z … ” (Luckily, as will be shown in a moment, your past is actually highly fluid, and can be changed by future actions.)In the recent book, Skin in the Game, Dr. Nassim Nicholas Taleb explains that WHAT YOU DO is the purest definition of your value system. In Start with Why, Simon Sinek said the same thing. Your acti ons demonstrate what you really believe.Gandhi said, “Action expresses priorities.” He also said, “To believe in something, and not to live it, is dishonest,” which is what psychologists call “Cognitive dissonance” - the state of internal conflict. You can’t be confident if you don’t trust yourself. Confidence is a byproduct of congruent and successful behavior.Confidence is the emotional state of someone whose PRIOR action was intentional and accurate of the person they planned on being.Past, present, and future identities“It’s a conscious decision to choose your priorities every day.” - Elisabeth Hasselbeck Your present identity is based on what you said “yes” to yesterday. Who are you today is a product of your previous decisions. Your future identity is what you say “yes” to today. Who you’ll be tomorrow is a product of your current decisions. Your past identity is what you’ll say “yes” to tomorrow. Who you were in the past is a product of future decisions. Because memories are highly fluid and change based on current and future experiences. No matter how dark or conflicted your past, it can absolutely be transformed. As you change, the meaning of your past changes - as does the memory of it. Your past can be redeemed by positive future decisions. Your present can make sense when you say “yes” to only that which you aspire to be like. And your future is as bright as your faith. As Napoleon Hill said, “Whatever the mind can conceive and believe, the mind can achieve.”But only if you act in accordance with that future vision …Hence, Zig Ziglar was famous for saying, “You’ve got to be before you can do and do before you can have.” You decide WHO you want to be, and act accordingly. If you don’t act accordingly, you’ll signal to yourself that you’re someone else. Because you are what you DO. More directly, you are what you say “YES” to.You DECIDE who you want to be. But that decision is only a real decision if you DO what that decision entails. Otherwise, it wasn’t really a decision. The decision is only a decision if ACTION aligns with it.Conclusion“If you have more than three priorities, you don’t have any.” -  Jim Collins, Good to GreatIn the book, ESSENTIALISM: The Disciplined Pursuit of Less, Greg McKeown states, “You cannot overestimate the unimportance of practically everything.”Most things should swiftly be said, “NO” to.To repeat the quote from billionaire Warren Buffett: “The difference between successful people and very successful people is that very successful people say no to almost everything.”Similarly, Jim Rohn said, “A lot of people don’t do well simply because they major in minor things.”Most people say “YES” to minor things. Hence, most people live minor, not major lives.Who will you be tomorrow? That depends on what you DO today.Ready to upgrade?I’ve created a cheat sheet for putting yourself into a PEAK-STATE, immediately. You follow this daily, your life will change very quickly.Get the cheat sheet here!This  post  first appeared on Medium.

The new rules for interoffice communication tools

The new rules for interoffice communication tools The new rules for interoffice communication tools Here’s an excerpt from my upcoming book,  Wait, How Do I Lead My Team?  (available on Amazon in April 2019).Follow Ladders on Flipboard!Follow Ladders’ magazines on Flipboard covering Happiness, Productivity, Job Satisfaction, Neuroscience, and more! Start sentences with capital letters and capitalize proper nouns until the co-worker on the other end proves he/she prefers lowercase words at all times. For example: “Do you have the report for the Nicholson account yet?” â€"     Once the other person shows a preference for lowercase words, you may choose to go with, “do you have the report for the Nicholson account yet? â€"     If you type with the case the other person prefers, you are always in the right. In the same vein, stay away from emojis until the other person drops one first. Even though the chatter through instant messages can be rapid fire, watch every word you type. Many communication tools act as archives so anyone with access can find past conversations in the program. â€"     Plus, a two or three-person dialogue can, the next day, include several more people. Maybe one of the new people wasn’t supposed to read a message that appeared a day before? Uh oh. When the message thread includes clients, my opinion is to maintain proper rules of capitalization at all times - even if the other person is into lowercase writing and abbreviations. â€"     The client pays you for a service, and you should maintain a high level of professionalism. This article first appeared on Danny Rubin.You might also enjoy… New neuroscience reveals 4 rituals that will make you happy Strangers know your social class in the first seven words you say, study finds 10 lessons from Benjamin Franklin’s daily schedule that will double your productivity The worst mistakes you can make in an interview, according to 12 CEOs 10 habits of mentally strong people

How to Deal with a Terrible Boss

How to Deal with a Terrible Boss How to Deal with a Terrible Boss I had a friend whose manager was so unprofessional and made each work day so unbearable that my friend ended up quitting. Even though she enjoyed her position and made a decent amount of money, the thought of having to continue working under her bosss leadership was unbearable and just not worth it. Yet, in today’s job market, not everyone can afford to make this type of decision. So, you’re stuck at the job with a barely tolerable boss. What do you do? Below are two different types of annoying bosses and how to deal with each one: 1. The Ghost This is the boss who’s never there, or at least never there when you need the person. You pull your eight-hour shift and then some, putting the files in order or the store back together. You know your boss is somewhere in the building, doing something vaguely related to his/her job, but isn’t there something more helpful this individual could do? The fact is, quite a few of these bosses fall into two subcategories. One is the boss who doesn’t want to be there. This is the boss who likely hates coming to work as much as you and avoids responsibility like the plague because he or she simply doesn’t want to do it. With this type of boss, your best bet is to ask for help. If none is available, and you really feel this person is shirking his/her duty, perhaps a call to the person above your immediate boss is in order. If you have the rare boss who is actually doing work behind the scenes and you feel you and your needs are being ignored, simply asking for help is usually the answer. Maybe when things have slowed down, ask to have a day where your boss shows you what his or her position entails. It will show that you are interested in promotion while also helping you understand all his/her required duties (and whether or not the person is actually fulfilling them). 2. The Micro-Manager Maybe you have the opposite of the ghost- the micro-manager boss. It seems like this persons entire mission in life is to sit over your shoulder and remind you of things you already know. Maybe he or she reminds you via emails or in passing conversation of work that is due hours from now. These kinds of bosses can be especially grating because they can make you feel like a child who needs extra special, around-the-clock surveillance. Dealing with a micro-manager is oftentimes very difficult if he or she has a short fuse. If these types of bosses fly off the handle easily, the best way to deal with them is to over compensate for a while. Turn in things early, make sure your job is done and your station is clean well ahead of time. It might mean a few weeks of tough work, but after a while, you will notice you are no longer the target. If the person is more pragmatic, you can usually prove your point by just ignoring your manager when he or she bugs you but still turning in your work on time. As long as you are on time, rarely is there a reason for your boss to bother you, and eventually, he or she will leave you alone.

The Best Talent Management Practices

The Best Talent Management Practices The Best Talent Management Practices Think of talent management as a business strategy that will help you retain exceptional employees. For effective talent management, every aspect of recruiting, hiring, and developing employees is affected positively. The goal of talent management is a superior workforce. What Talent Management Involves Talent management, when handled strategically, flows from the organizations mission, vision, values, and goals. This enables every employee to see where they fit within the organization. This, in turn, enables employees to participate in the overall direction of the company. From a strategic perspective, an effective talent management system helps crucial employees feel as if they are part of something bigger than their current job. Talent management includes the following activities and work processes: Develop clear job descriptions, so you know the skills, abilities, and experience needed from a new employee.Select appropriate employees who have superior potential and fit your organizations culture, with an appropriate selection process.Negotiate requirements and accomplishment-based performance standards, outcomes, and measures within a performance development planning system.Provide effective employee onboarding and ongoing training and development opportunities that reflect both the employees and the organizations needs. Provide on-going coaching, mentoring, and feedback, so the employee feels valued and important.Conduct quarterly performance development planning discussions that focus on the employees interests for career development.Design effective compensation and recognition systems that reward people for their contributions. Even if all of the rest of your employment processes are employee-oriented, people still work for money. Employers of choice aim to pay above market for talented employees.Provide promotional and career development opportunities for employees within a system that includes career paths, succession planning, and on-the-job training opportunities. Hold exit interviews to understand why a valued employee decided to leave the organization. If the reasons provide information about company systems that you can improve, make the changes that will better retain talented employees. Research Supports Using Talent Management Strategies In a study by the American Society for Training and Development (ASTD) in partnership with The Institute for Corporate Productivity (i4cp), the following practices were identified for their positive impact on successful talent management: Obtaining support for talent management from top management.Standardizing talent review and feedback processes.Appointing a single functional owner of talent management internally.Developing an organizational culture that supports talent management.Assuring consistency among the talent management activities.Increase the visibility of talent management initiatives. The ASTD study identified these findings (verbatim): High performing organizations tend to integrate talent management components more than low performing organizations.Learning executives play critical roles in major integrated talent management components.Many of the most effective integrated talent management practices are not widely used.Impediments to effective integrated talent management efforts include conflicting priorities, limited resources, non-supportive corporate cultures, incompatible organizational processes, and senior leaders who undervalue integrated talent management. Summary of Talent Management Best Practices The workplace processes and systems that must effectively work together to produce a talent management strategy that will provide results for an organization have been highlighted. Further, an ASTD/i4cp study identified factors that are present more of the time in organizations that have a successful talent management strategy operating. The most intriguing idea that emerged in the review of talent management was the success of implementing talent management review meetings. By talking about talented employees and making their knowledge, skills, and potential known to other managers in different parts of the organization, the potential use, and development of internal talent are magnified for both the organization and the talented employees.