Lately I’ve been doing other training, seminars, reading, etc.  and the same theme comes up often, about telling stories.

I think about the presentations I have to make all the time to customers, employers, employees, partners, user groups, etc. and how those were all opportunities for telling a story (and in fact the presentations recently I did where the main goals was story telling, how much positive feedback I received).

I started to think back throughout my history about mentors and teachers that I’ve latched on to (and still do), and I have to believe the one thing they all had in common was that they were great story tellers. They could paint a picture in your mind…

I’m looking to continued to hone my skills in telling stories, and build up the continued practice.

I have some ideas on how to do that, including things like:

1. More work on this blog

2. Reading more biographies of famous people / Studying history

3. Books and course on copywriting and marketing

4. Look for opportunities to present more and more

What other resources has anyone else found  for being a better story teller?

Perception becomes reality…..

Been doing a lot of interviews lately.  Some good and some not so much.

That has reminded me of someone, a few jobs ago,  early in my management experience.  I had always considered one of the team members to be one of my most dependable and top people. Their work was usually bullet proof in terms of quality and the customer was usually quite happy. The challenge came however, in  the way in which they interacted with me and when I noticed, with clients.  This person had a way of timidly approaching me when there were issues, questions, or things they needed help with.  It was as if the expectations they had on themselves was that they needed to know everything and couldn’t show any weakness or flaws.

Over time, I have to admit, my perception of this person changed.  While the quality of the work remained high, their own insecurity and timidness in dealing with me began to convince my own thinking.  After some period of time I had myself thinking that my initial impressions were not that correct. That they were in fact not one of my top people, even though other evidence indicated as such. Eventually we were able to address this perception issue and this person went on to enjoy a profitable career but it got me to thinking about my own past. How many times did I timidly approach a situation when there was no need to do so? What were the results? And better yet, how much business / career advancement time was lost as a result of my own lack of confidence? In fact as I write this I can recall one interview in particular where, I guarantee you that I didn’t get the job (and I knew it immediately when I saw my interviewer’s facial expression) because I entered his office with slumped shoulders and an insecure expression. Even though the rest of that hour went reasonably well in my eyes, I know now that he immediately reached a conclusion on that first impression.

The power of how you deal with someone distinctly influences how you are perceived, subtly and often without notice.

Share on Facebook ]]> http://joelstanesa.com/questions-to-think-about/timid-at-work-perception-is-reality/feed/ 0 http://joelstanesa.com/questions-to-think-about/scared-away-by-too-much-knowledge/ http://joelstanesa.com/questions-to-think-about/scared-away-by-too-much-knowledge/#comments Thu, 18 Jun 2009 15:18:54 +0000 Joel Stanesa http://joelstanesa.com/?p=33

Complexity of decisions…

I was sitting through an online demo of a software tool this morning when I was struck by some powerful emotions.  You see I was looking to purchase the software as a means to better run a start up business I’ve been dreaming about for some time. The software was quite impressive and did a lot of things that a small business owner could really take advantage of.  Half way through the demo however I was struck however by this wave of emotion. It was a combination of excitment, dread, and fear, all at the same time.  I’ll explain…

The excitement was obviously because I could see the potential in what this tool could do. Leveraging technology to get a ton more done? That’s what I’ve helped clients do for almost 2 decades now. As the customer now, I get it. Great concept! With this new gadget, tool, gizmo, etc.  my mind was racing with all the possibilities.

That’s when reality comes creeping back in…..  The realization and self doubt, that holds many of us back from trying new things and new opportunties, etc.  The “doubter” in me started to come up with all the reasons why this purchase would be “bad”. Here’s a few, I bet you could come up with more:

1. You don’t the time or resources to figure all this out…

2. I don’t really have the business plan solidified enough to know what I need so how do I know what features are really importan (this is really about knowing what you need vs. what you want).

3. Most days I can’t even get a decent sales letter written, how would I take advantage of such a complex tool and process?

4. Its a waste of money right now because I’m not ready to implement.

AND SO ON….

I had to take a step back and say WOAH! What’s happening here?  It clicked for me on two levels.

First, and maybe most obvious,  I have some more planning and thinking to do on the business side about what I really want to do with this endeavor. (That’s probably pretty common).

But more relevant to this blog was the 2nd revelation. “I wonder how many times I do this to my clients?“…..

How many times have I or the team been in front of a client and working with them on a solution or consulting engagement that, from the outside point of view, was blatantly clear they needed (and of course I had the abilty to really help)?  How many times have I say demoed software features, or talked about all the great things they could do and how exciting it was and I potentially failed to realize the fear I might be creating in my customers?

How many sales or engagements have we lost because of that? Because of my over excitement and optimism in helping customers, how many times did I miss the signals?

So I share this same thought with you and ask you the consultant, the  same question….

Are you aware of what conversation is going on in your clients heads?

Are you ‘overselling’ your position because you think they are interested in steps 9, 10, and 11, when really they are focused and stuck on step 2 or 3?  As a consultant, we are hired in as “experts” who have worked with many customers across many industries and “have seen this before” experience.  How many times however, does that knowledge and experience get in the way because the same client that hires us for that experience, gets easily overwhelmed by that volume of knowledge?

I look forward to your comments and experience on this topic…  Hope you have a great and productive day.

Thanks Mark and thank you Tim for this fine video.