How much does team conflict cost your business?

Trying to control teams rather than managing them in a way that recognises the enormous personalities and talents of team members is a recipe for intra-team conflict, backbiting and tension. Ingredients for a disaster!

Team building to convert anger and feuds into positive energy for team success is often helped when teams are allowed to discuss issues and share views, when the leader understands the personalities of team members and demonstrates leadership skills by bonding a team that shares common values and goals and demonstrates this by playing from the same score.

Read: Hamilton gives us all feud for thought, article by Sathnam Sanghera in the Business Life section of in the October 6, 2007 edition of The Times

Communicating about The Rock –Northern Rock

Recent statements and interviews by officials associated with the crisis in the financial sector in the UK did little to reassure customers all was well with their deposits. Statements made by officials and actions taken by customers was a classic case of ACTION speaking louder than words.

Customers voted with their feet –they did not accept what they heard. So, initially, official statements aimed at reassuring them had the opposite effect as depositors rushed frantically to get their hands on their funds/investments –hard earned. It was only after more than 96 hours and a commitment given by The Chancellor himself AND –and aimed at depositors- that there began to emerge a return to what customers considered to be business as usual.

What went wrong? The message! In the first 24 hours everyone received the same message, all’s well with Northern Bank, despite the fact they approached the Bank of England to borrow directly from them, should the need arise. While that message may be reassuring to financial analysts and investors of major funds who understand the workings of financial markets, to depositors, small investors and ordinary members of the public, the message was ‘company in trouble’.

Not surprisingly, depositors in their hundreds acted swiftly on the message they received –something was wrong. Both online and off, they rushed to get their hands on their funds. A message about ‘the bank being open for business as usual’ seemed rather inappropriate and misleading to customers. Customers knew that the scenes at their local banks and on their TV screens were anything but close to what they would consider normal. Highly inappropriate choice of words for what was anything but a normal situation!

Many of you reading this living in the UK may have been like me and first heard about the recent turmoil in the financial market and implications for the mortgage market towards the week end –seemingly about the same time that customers did. One message about the institution’s position was sent to the public, investors, mortgage holders, deposit account holders –all of whom needed to specific messages aimed at their concerns.

One message could not target the concerns of all interest groups –one size did not fit all.

So when deposit holders received the same message as the financial analysts –the result is panic. The opposite reaction to what was intended.

Three key principles of effective communication and customer care were ignored:

- WHO are the intended recipients of your message?

- WHY this message (purpose), i.e., is it to inform, reassure or persuade?

-What information will be relevant to them?

Hopefully vital lessons about communication principles were learnt by the official spokespersons and those with similar businesses.

Veronica

Speaking with Confidence

http://www.executive-solutions.co.uk/

Not my words Mr Speaker……

In an earlier blog, I highlighted the importance of choosing words appropriate for the presentation and audience. I was reminded of this while listening last evening to ‘Not my words Mr Speaker’, a programme on BBC Radio 4. Although the programme was about activities on the other side of town, at Westminster, rather than Canary Wharf, it lived up to its billing of being “A caustic and hilarious indictment of the way many politicians descent into cliché whenever they make a speech in the Commons.”

If you too had listened to the programme and would like to share your view, just add your comment to this blog. For those who would like to hear what Matthew Parris said in the Sunday Supplement feature (9th September 2007), just log on to the BBC website and make use of the listen again feature at: http://www.bbc.co.uk/radio4/progs/listenagain.shtml

Hopefully, after listening you’ll be even more aware of any ‘canned language’, jargon or empty fillers that creep into your presentation.

Veronica

Seen any 'lectern wrenchers' recently?

Below are some don'ts or do's for anyone prone to lectern wrenching.

Feel free to share with others who may find it useful -and they don't have to be working or living at or near to Canary Wharf.


Don’ts
Don’t press your palms on the lectern or gripping the edge of the lectern.

Don’t become glued to the lectern
Don’t slough your upper body over the lectern –it’s not a body rest.


Do’s
Do stand upright behind the lectern and maintain eye contact with all sections of your listeners.

If using a microphone fixed to the lectern, maintain a suitable distance between your face and the mic. Too close will muffle your words, too far will reduce your audibility.

Another PowerPointless presentation –well, not all of it

A presentation aimed at a room of 25 business owners and managers that filled many slides with 8 to 12 numbered/bulleted points. That means the text was not evident to those beyond the first three rows –provided they had 20:20 or corrected vision.

While the practical sessions helped to make the workshop more meaningful for the participants, a golden opportunity was lost by limiting the extent of the learning outcomes. Promises to send the slides later may seem ideal –but could in fact be just another promise. As one delegate, who had attended an earlier workshop by the same team said in an aside, "well, sending the slides didn't work on the last training workshop, so I doubt they will arrive this time around”.

Maybe the facilitators preferred to achieve a 50% rather than 95% success rate of learning outcomes –actions that delegates take later.

Here are a few suggestions to avoid embarrassment to yourself and irritation to your listeners:

• Use visual aids appropriate to your presentation. Choose from photographs, flip-charts, sample materials, PowerPoint slides.

• Despite research showing that an audience cannot read the slides and listen to the speaker saying the same words simultaneously, too many presenters continue to use PowerPoint slides as notes to be read to the audience.

• When used skilfully, PowerPoint slides can take an average presentation up several notches and make it truly memorable. –for the right reason.

• Do not spend the time apologising for not being skilled in using your visual aides. Instead, prepare beforehand how to use the equipment or have a skilled operator do these tasks for you.

• If your visual aids irritate, confuse or bore your audience, you won’t succeed in giving a stunning presentation, gain the attention of your audience or create a desire in then for your message.

Murphy’s Law about if anything can go wrong, it will, often seems applicable to using visual aids in presentations. So, always check and recheck your visual aids before your presentation. Ensure you have an alternative/ backup way of delivering your presentation in the event Murphy’s Law kicks in and the equipment malfunctions.

Beat Murphy at his own game....

Veronica

Subject line and content at odds with each other?

Have you had the experience of receiving an email message in which the content of the message had no bearing on the subject line? In speaking, some people share content that is very different from their subject line. The result is mixed messages -or none that brings clarity.

Just a few days ago, I listened to a sales presentation in which the presenter devoted much time to telling about what’s wrong with a competitor’s services rather than focusing on what was good about his. I was interested in hearing about advantages of using his service and any feedback he had received from satisfied customers -which would have confirmed the benefits of using his business.

What the presenter did not take on board is the fact that my reason for coming -and of the others in the room -was not to hear about competing businesses –for that we would have chosen a different venue. It is in fact, we wanted to find out more about his/her business and to consider how using his services would benefit our own businesses. He missed the opportunity to persuade, inform and educate his listeners.

Today’s GEM
Even before you decide what to say, consider: WHO will be listening to you and WHY.

Veronica
Speaking with confidence

Do you need a resident Wordsmith?

A recent discussion caused me to reflect again on the importance of choose words suitable to the occasion and listeners.

Quite irritating for me is listening to speakers who litter their presentations with ‘stuff’ and ‘ting/thing’. What this says to me is that the speaker is either too lazy to choose words that are specific and accurately describe the item or situation they are referring to or is being evasive and is reluctant to share information. Worse than using this in personal discussions, it’s a hundred times worse when these vague words –irritatingly so, are used in business conversations. On the other hand, I cannot help but be impressed when the speaker use words to paint a clear picture, even in the absence of any supporting visual aid. So here are my suggestions for making clear, easily understood and powerful presentations.

* Avoid using vague, non-specific and unimaginative words such as: thing, stuff, something, nobody/none.

* Apply ‘Word Power’. Choose simple yet powerful and persuasive words. For example, use horrendous instead of rather high to describe an extreme situation.

* Choose words that will not cause offence on grounds of religion, gender, culture, ethnicity
or disability. Unless it’s a specific request from your audience – do not use bad language during your presentation.

* Always choose words and give examples that will aid your listeners’ understanding of your messages.

Veronica