IWCC Training - Blog - IWCC Blog

Do you play the e-mail guessing game that no one ever wins?

When you send an e-mail, do you get the response you need the first time? Or, do you play the e-mail guessing game? You know the game…you give your reader just enough information for them to write back and ask questions to clarify what you mean.

We have all played the e-mail guessing game as a reader, a writer, or both. No one seems to like the game, so why do we keep playing it? Every day in our writing skills workshops, participants declare that they have to keep e-mails SHORT! IWCC wants to remind everyone that good e-mails are not defined by length. A good e-mail is one that gives the reader everything they need to know to do what you want them to do, feel the way you want them to feel, or learn, know or understand what you want them to.

Think about the e-mails you receive every day. Does short necessarily mean helpful? Short e-mails that don’t contain the right information cause unnecessary pain for both you and your readers. Do you recognize any of these three pain points?

Frustration as a reader - can’t respond without sending another e-mail to clarify
Frustration as a writer - your reader doesn’t do what you want
Wasted time while both of you write so called “short” e-mails back and forth continuously sharing bits and pieces of information

How many times have you said something like: "I don’t understand why they didn’t do it right – I sent them an e-mail". Or how often do you get frustrated, thinking: “Why haven’t they responded – I said it was urgent?” We would ask you to reflect before you blame your readers. Re-read your e-mail and make sure it wasn’t one of those “short” e-mails that didn’t give your reader what they needed – just bits and pieces of information.

Our participants often tell us that short e-mails save time. Do they? Are you saving time when you and your reader send countless e-mails back and forth about the same topic or situation? And then finally one of you picks up the phone and calls because the frustration level has reached a peak and you don’t want to play the e-mail guessing game any longer.

Stop frustrating yourself and others. Put all the necessary information in the first e-mail you send and stop playing a guessing game with your readers. In our writing workshops, we give our participants the Five Cs Writing Template, to ensure they always give their readers everything they need, in the order they need it. To help you craft your next e-mail, download our Five Cs Writing Template.

Use these Five Cs and stop playing games with your readers…stop the frustration now!

Do phrases like woulda, coulda, shoulda sound professional?

As communication skills consultants, we work consistently with people to improve their professional image through their communication. Recently, we have noticed that more and more people are sabotaging their professional image when delivering presentations, by using “informal contractions”.

We are not talking about contractions like “don’t” for do not or “we’ll” for we will. When you use a few of these contractions in your speech or your writing, you sound quite personable. However, some contractions can make you sound sloppy and unprofessional. Here are six common examples:

Gonna for going to
Shoulda for should have
Woulda for would have
Coulda for could have
Wanna for want to
Dunno for don’t know

Although these informal contractions may be acceptable in informal settings with your friends and your colleagues, they may damage your professional image in business settings. Say the words out loud: woulda, shoulda, coulda, gonna, wanna, dunno. How do they sound – professional or a bit sloppy? What image do you present if you regularly use these informal contractions during a presentation, meeting or business interview?

Almost everyone let’s these informal contractions slip into their speech sometimes. We never use these informal contractions in our writing, so why do we use them in a presentation? That’s easy to answer! We use them because they slide off our tongue so easily. Enunciating the full phrase takes much more focus, concentration and work – especially if we have allowed these informal contractions to become a speech habit.

Listen to yourself and see how many times you are using these poorly enunciated phrases. Listen to your colleagues too and see how often they use them. You be the judge – sound professional?

If you want to sound professional when you deliver a business presentation, we recommend you minimize these informal contractions and make a conscious choice to enunciate!

PowerPoint Magic

What is Presenter View?

Our participants are asking us if you can set up a slide show so that you can see the slide sorter view and your notes while the audience sees only the slide. And who can blame them…what a great idea! Does such a feature exist? You bet…it’s called Presenter View in PowerPoint and it works like magic. Want to know how to run Presenter View for your next presentation? Then this is the BLOG for you.

Here is a picture representing what you will see on your laptop screen when you run a PowerPoint slide show in Presenter View:

Note: In order to test presenter view, you must be connected to a projector or a second monitor

Not only does Presenter View allow you to see your slides, your notes, slide progression and timing on your laptop; it also allows you to blacken the screen for the audience while maintaining your view of the slides and your notes. Presenter view works on an operating system that supports multiple displays, including Windows and Mac environments. Most new laptops have the capability to run Presenter View.

In this BLOG, we will step you through the setup for a Windows environment. You can easily set your laptop to run in Presenter View by following the key steps below. You will notice that the steps vary slightly depending on the version of PowerPoint you have on your system.

Presenter View Setup for PPT 2007 or 2010

Laptop Settings
First you need to take five steps to prepare your laptop to run Presenter View:

Connect your laptop to an LCD Projector or second monitor (i.e. LCD Screen or TV)
From your start menu, select “Control Panel”.
Choose “Appearance and Personalization”.
Under “Display”, choose “Connect to a Projector”.
Choose “Extend” from the choices. (This extends your display to the second projector.)

PowerPoint Slide Show Settings
You will need to open PowerPoint and then select these settings:

Open your PowerPoint slide deck.
Click on “Slide Show” menu item (across top of your screen).
Go to “Show Presentation On:” click on arrow in box to right & choose Secondary Monitor or Monitor 2.
Select “Use Presenter View” (just below “Show Presentation On:”).
Press F5 to start Slide Show.

Presenter View Setup for PPT 2003

To run Presenter View in PowerPoint 2003, simply follow these six steps:

Connect your laptop to an LCD Projector or second monitor (i.e. LCD Screen or TV)
Open your PowerPoint presentation.
Select "Slide Show" | "Set Up Show...“ menu item (across top of your screen)
Click on the "Show Presenter view" box option to select it.
Click OK.
Start slide show.

Communication Skills Training: Critical Need?

My name is Alan De Back and I am thrilled to once again be a guest writer on IWCC’s BLOG. Since joining IWCC as an Associate Consultant in 2001, I have facilitated IWCC writing skills training, presentation skills training and meeting skills training workshops to hundreds of business professionals across North America.

I’d like to talk with you about why you should strive to develop and maintain good communication skills. I decided to conduct some research and found a very interesting survey that I believe provides outstanding credence to the value of good communication skills. The American Management Association (AMA) conducted this "Critical Skills Survey" in 2010. They focused the survey on skills they felt were of huge importance in today’s business world and in preparing for tomorrow’s challenges. Among others, these skills included: communication, critical thinking and problem solving.

AMA surveyed 2,115 managers and executives in member and client companies. I’d like to share three interesting statistics from the survey::

Priorities in employee development, talent management and succession planning are communication skills (80.4%), critical thinking (72.4%), collaboration (71.2%), and creativity (57.3%)
Over 3/4 of the respondents (75.7%) said that they believe these skills will become more important to their organizations in the next three to five years.
Over 1/2 of the respondents (51.4%) said that their employees were only average in effective communication skills.

That final bullet has the most impact for me. How about you? Do you want to be only average in your ability to communicate effectively? If communication skills are at the top of the list in terms of importance for your organization, and you believe they will become more important, don’t you want to be an exceptional communicator?

Are your communication skills going to take you and your organization to the next level?

Handling Executive Pushback

We all know that executives/senior leaders don’t listen to presentations passively - they often interrupt with questions, challenge your data and begin separate conversations. In our Executive-Ready Presentation Skills workshops, we call these executive behaviors “pushback”. Do you handle “pushback” confidently? Let us share a simple strategy to help you.

Try using IWCC’s 3-D technique. When executives challenge your presentation:

Detach
Drill Down
Defuse

Detach…
Panic never exudes confidence. You must detach yourself. In other words, keep your ego out of your reaction and stay calm. The executives are not challenging “you” - they are asking questions about your proposed plan and supporting data. Stay focused on the issue at hand rather than your emotional reaction to their pushback.

Drill Down…
Misinterpretation leads to disaster. With your emotional reaction under control, you must then drill down by asking good questions to understand the basis for this pushback. Is it merely an objection? Has he or she simply misunderstood or miscalculated something? If so, alleviate the executive’s concern by clarifying or adding supporting data. You can probably overcome the pushback, squelch the executive’s concern and get on with your presentation confidently ─ executives on board.

If however the pushback comes from a deeper issue, you are likely facing a roadblock. You cannot squelch a roadblock on-the-spot. A roadblock surfaces when an executive sees a major problem that you did not see – or are not privy to. You must respond to a roadblock through three steps:

uncover the source by asking good questions
demonstrate that you understand the roadblock and the potential consequences
offer to work with the executive to develop a solution

Defuse…
You can only defuse what you understand. Once you understand what is causing the executive to disagree or voice the concern, then you can choose how to defuse the pushback. Without understanding, you risk responding to the pushback inappropriately…a recipe for disaster with an executive audience!

IWCC hopes the 3-D technique gives you some insight and confidence to deal with pushback from your executive/senior leader audiences.

What Clear Writing Looks Like - Part Three

In our first blog of this three-part series, we invited you to assess 10 sentences and decide which sentences were clear and easy to read and which ones you would ask the writer to rewrite. In the second blog of this series, we provided you with some tips and techniques to help you write in a High Impact sentence style. We also invited you to use these techniques to rewrite seven of the original sentences - the Low Impact ones.

In blog 2, we explained the difference between a High Impact sentence and a Low Impact sentence. We showed you how to create High Impact sentences by using a simple sentence structure that we call Actor, Action, Acted-upon.

To start you down the right path, we provided these two rewrites for the first of the seven sentences.

1. The implementation of the program for employee development will be carried out in three stages.

We will implement the employee development program in three stages.
Human Resources will implement the employee development program in three stages.

We gave you a Tip: Low Impact sentences often have no “actor”. Feel free to invent an actor for your High Impact rewrites - like we did above.

Then we challenged YOU to rewrite the remaining six sentences that you see below. How did you do? Did you follow the “Actor, Action, Acted-upon” format? Compare your rewrites to our rewrites below. You will find two possible rewrites for each sentence. And, you probably came up with some other High Impact versions. In each example, we underlined the sentence core that contains an actor, an action and most times an acted-upon.

2. It is apparent that evidence existing in the financial report indicates that a $1,000 shortage has gone unnoticed each week for the past month.

Obviously according to the monthly financial report, the analyst did not notice that we were short $1,000 for four weeks.
The financial report provides evidence that we did not see a $1,000 shortage that existed every week for the past month.

3. The wishes of management concerning the types of courses that should be included in the program were determined by means of personal interviews.

By interviewing the managers personally, we determined the types of courses they want in the program.
We interviewed the managers to determine what courses they want us to include in the program.

4. The single most pressing and consistent need expressed by a significant majority of the managers was that an upgrading of the technical skills of their subordinates was required.

Most managers indicated that they have one pressing need. Their subordinates must upgrade their technical skills.
According to 85% of the managers, they urgently need us to upgrade their team’s technical skills.

5. It is anticipated that an annual training rate of 100 employees will be achieved by the time the program is fully operational.

We anticipate a training rate of 100 employees per year by the time the program is fully operational.
When the program is fully operational, we expect 100 employees to attend every year.

6. The total effectiveness of the program will be dependent upon the promptness with which managers submit their replies.

To be effective, the program requires managers to submit their replies promptly.
If managers submit their replies promptly, the program will be more effective.

7. Because of the way the housing is designed, the whole unit would have to be replaced if the shaft wore out.

Because of the housing design, we would have to replace the whole unit if the shaft wore out.
If the shaft wore out, the mechanic would have to replace the whole unit because of the way the supplier designed the housing.

If you followed IWCC’s “Actor, Action, Acted-upon” format, your rewrites probably look similar to ours. You will notice that all our actors in the sentence rewrites above are concrete nouns that name people or things. And, all our verbs are active rather than passive.

As long as you used an actor and avoided passive verbs, you created a High Impact rewrite. Congratulations!

What Clear Writing Looks Like - Part Two

In our business writing workshops, we teach people to write in a High Impact sentence style. In part one of this three-part series, we asked you to assess ten sentences and identify the sentences you would ask the writer to rewrite. Three of those sentences met our criteria for a High Impact sentence style: 1, 3 and 8.

In part two of this series, we invite you to re-write the other seven sentences. First though, let’s define High Impact sentence style.

What’s the difference?
As the term implies, High Impact sentences are clearer and easier to read than Low Impact sentences. You create a High Impact sentence by following a simple sentence structure we call the Actor, Action, Acted-upon format. Here is an example:

The accountant submitted the forms to the government.
(accountant is the actor, submitted is the action, forms is the acted-upon)

Any of you who have taken an IWCC writing workshop know that High Impact does not mean simplistic. Look how we can make our sentence more complex, while we maintain the clear core above.

To meet the deadline, the seasoned accountant electronically submitted the tax forms to the government last week.

At the heart of every sentence is a core. In school you may have learned that a sentence core contains a subject, a verb and usually an object. IWCC uses the terms actor, action, acted-upon because they create a visual image. They can also help you include the most important information where it helps your reader the most – in the sentence core.

Below are three versions of a sentence. Watch what happens to the relationship between the actor, the action and the acted-upon as we move from a clear High Impact version to a passive version and finally to a Low Impact version. Let’s use the sentence we looked at earlier. In each version, you will see that we bolded and underlined the core.

To meet the deadline, the seasoned accountant electronically submitted the tax forms to the government last week.
To meet the deadline, the tax forms were submitted electronically by the seasoned accountant to the government last week.
To meet the deadline, submission of the tax forms to the government was completed electronically last week by the seasoned accountant.

Here are the cores separated from the rest of their sentence:

accountant submitted forms
forms were submitted
submission was completed

Sentence #1 is the High Impact version. This writer followed the Actor, Action, Acted-upon format in the core. Would you agree that it conveys the clearest picture for us as readers? You can visualize the accountant submitting the forms, can’t you?

Sentence #2 is the passive version. This writer used a passive verb in the core and exiled our “actor” to a prepositional phrase hidden within the sentence.

Sentence #3 is the Low Impact version. This writer used a passive verb in the core, exiled our “actor” even further away to the end of the sentence and turned our perfectly clear action into a vague noun – “submission”.

Are all three sentences grammatically correct? You bet they are! However correct grammar does not guarantee a sentence structure that is clear, easy to read and uses plain language. Our High Impact sentence #1 created a clear relationship between the actor, action and acted-upon. The passive sentence #2 dented that relationship a little. And then, the Low Impact sentence #3 destroyed that relationship.

Your turn now…

Of the ten sentences you assessed in the first blog of this series, we invite you to rewrite the seven Low Impact ones below. Use the Actor, Action, Acted-upon format to write High Impact versions. We have underlined the core of each sentence to highlight the Low Impact style.

To start you down the right path, we have provided two rewrites for the first sentence.

1. The implementation of the program for employee development will be carried out in three stages.

We will implement the employee development program in three stages.
Human Resources will implement the employee development program in three stages.

Tip: Low Impact sentences often have no “actor”. Feel free to invent an actor for your High Impact rewrite - like we did.

You do the rest…

2. It is apparent that evidence existing in the financial report indicates that a $1,000 shortage has gone unnoticed each week for the past month.

3. The wishes of management concerning the types of courses that should be included in the program were determined by means of personal interviews.

4.   The single most pressing and consistent need expressed by a significant majority of the managers was that an upgrading of the technical skills of their subordinates was required.

5.   It is anticipated that an annual training rate of 100 employees will be achieved by the time the program is fully operational.

6.   The total effectiveness of the program will be dependent upon the promptness with which managers submit their replies.

7.   Because of the way the housing is designed, the whole unit would have to be replaced if the shaft wore out.

In our final blog of this three-part series, we will share our High Impact rewrites. Don’t follow the yellow brick road to meet us on March 7, follow the “Actor, Action Acted-upon” format! See you there.

What Clear Writing Looks Like - Part One

Do you know what clear writing looks like? Do you know when a sentence needs to be rewritten in plain language? In this three-part series on “what clear writing looks like”, we want to give you an opportunity to test your editing skills.

At IWCC, clients and writing-workshop participants often ask us to assess writing style. We teach participants that style falls into two categories:

High Impact style – concise, to-the-point, plain language that is easy-to- understand
Low Impact style – vague, puzzling language that is confusing and difficult to understand

We thought you might like a chance to assess some sentences. Complete the task below to give it a try.

Your Task – Demonstrate your ability to perceive and evaluate style differences – what’s clear High Impact style and what’s Low Impact style.

Your Instructions – You are giving feedback to business writers in your organization. Follow the link to our survey "Giving Feedback to Business Writers". Read each sentence in the survey and indicate whether you think the sentence needs work or whether you think it is written in a clear, plain-language style.

Giving Feedback to Business Writers Survey

In our next blog, we will review your choices. Join us on February 21 for part two of this series.

Do you know when to e-mail, Facebook, Tweet and text? by Phyllis Schwager

Communication is the basis of every relationship. Face-to-face conversations build relationships through visual senses, personal closeness and a combination of words, voice/tone and body language. Electronic communications build relationships through words and the ability to connect anywhere, anytime. We continue to communicate more and more through electronic options. We thought you might like to revisit a blog we posted a few years ago to remind you when to use each option.

My name is Phyllis Schwager and I have worked with IWCC as an Associate Consultant for the past 9 years. I have been a freelance writer for more than 20 years and I am delighted to share my passion for writing with IWCC’s followers in this week’s BLOG.

When Marshall McLuhan wrote, ‘the medium is the message’, he was saying the way we communicate influences how that message is perceived. Interestingly, his words are as true – if not truer – today than they were when he wrote them over 40 years ago. Back then, options for written communication were limited. Today, we text, tweet, e-mail and use a host of social media. Such choice makes communication incredibly flexible and accessible. At the same time, it makes for a noisy, busy planet.

As a writer, I love that we are communicating more than any other time in human history. As a specialist in business communication, I am keenly aware of the importance of choosing the right medium for my message. A basic principle of all IWCC writing skills training workshops is to consider the contents of the message and your relationship with the reader. Beyond that, the following will help you decide when to use social media, tap out a text or send an e-mail.

Social media

As the name implies, social media is your most interactive option. Users want to and will reply to postings. For most of us, social media informs and entertains. Remember though, it also can be a powerful, transformative tool. We have only to look at the political arena to see how social media is literally changing the world.

Social media such as Twitter and Facebook are good for quick blasts of information, such as product launches, organizational updates and upcoming events. It gets your brand ‘out there’ quickly and inexpensively. Twitter has a limit of 140 characters per tweet, so be concise. (Not the place for deep philosophical thoughts!)

Facebook messages can go deeper than a tweet but not much. Remember people graze on Facebook…they look to nibble not gorge. Facebook offers the added benefit of visual support such as photos and video clips.

Text messages

While text messages will get the attention of anyone under 25, don’t text if you need a paper trail. These messages can be tracked and retrieved (to many a celebrity’s chagrin!), but mostly they just go away. Text messages should convey simple, informal messages, e.g., finalizing lunch details with a client, informing a colleague that you will be late for a meeting.

Be very cautious with text spelling! So long as you know the reader will understand, you may take poetic license and use what has become standard text spelling, such as c u ltr, btw, b4 and gr8 (see you later, by the way, before and great.)

E-mail

E-mail is now the most formal of all electronic media. When first introduced, it was the least formal way to communicate in business and as such was used only internally. Today e-mail has replaced most paper documents. When you need a paper trail, when you need to disseminate information to a large audience, or when time zones/geography separate you from your reader, e-mail is the way to go.

E-mail is not your best choice for round table discussions, sensitive messages or for delivering ‘bad news’. Remember there is no ‘body language’ in an e-mail so pay attention to tone.

My two personal warnings about e-mail?

Never write an e-mail that you wouldn’t be comfortable saying to someone face to face.
Never write an e-mail that you would not want to see on the front page of tomorrow’s newspaper.

Remember: always consider the purpose of your message before sending an e-mail, text or social media message. Is the message appropriate for those communication methods? Sometimes, the only appropriate way to deliver your message is over the phone or face-to-face.

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No excuses about your communication skills – not this year!

We make New Year’s resolutions about things we feel are important…losing weight, exercising, saving money, planning effectively, etc. What about communication? In order to accomplish anything, we have to be good communicators. Have you made resolutions about that? Maybe you should. Here are some ideas to get you started. First, an overriding vow:

”I vow to stop taking communication for granted and give it the respect it deserves. I will no longer make excuses that I don’t have time to apply the techniques that I know will help my readers, my listeners and me – no matter how busy I am.”

“I will stop” Resolutions…
Here are three habits you might want to stop in 2013:

I will stop frivolously sending e-mail without thought or planning.
I will stop thinking about what I want to tell my readers/listeners and consider what they need.
I will stop using “Any Questions?” as a close for my presentations.

“I will start” Resolutions…
You may resolve to establish some good communication habits in 2013. Below are some ideas for writing e-mail, delivering presentations and leading meetings.

Goals for Improving Your E-mail Communications
Here are some good habits for writing e-mail that you might consider adopting:

Taking a few moments to plan each e-mail before sending
Thinking about what your readers need to know (not what you want to tell them)
Using more descriptive subject lines
Including a statement telling your reader about the topic and how urgently you need a response
Checking that you have used a professional and constructive tone

Goals for Improving Your Presentations
Presentations give you opportunities to demonstrate your knowledge and establish your credibility. To polish your presentation skills, you might consider:

Taking care to keep your words, voice and tone and body language in sync so they are all sending the same message
Planning questions ahead of time to ensure you involve your audience
Listening respectfully and actively to others - even when you don’t agree with them

Goals for Better Meetings
As meetings are such time-consuming events, you might also consider sprucing up some of your meeting habits. As a good leader, make an agreement with yourself to:

Only have meetings when a meeting is the best way to accomplish the task at hand
Send out an agenda ahead of the meeting and ensure all attendees are clear about the objective
Stick to the agenda and pre-announced meeting start and stop times

Let’s make 2013 the year of clear communication. You know what you need to do to improve your communications at work. So stop procrastinating and do it! Or stop doing it!

Trip Through Time - Describe YOU

You can have brilliant ideas, but if you can't get them across, your ideas won't get you anywhere.
— Lee Iacocca

Lee Iacocca definitely knew what he was talking about. In business, people develop an impression of you through your communication skills – your ability to impart what you know and what you can do.

In IWCC’s communication skills workshops, we often ask our participants to travel through time with us to learn about the image they reflect through their communications. Here’s your chance to take the trip…

Let’s say that it is December 7, 2013. You happen to be sitting in a room filled with people who have been receiving communications from you all year. Some of them have never met you face-to-face. They have been reading your e-mails and reports, and some of them have attended your presentations. As luck would have it, they are all talking about you and your work. The intriguing part of this trip is that you are invisible. You can see and hear what everyone is saying about you, but they cannot see or hear you.

What words or phrases would you like to hear them use to describe “YOU” and your work?

Now you need to get busy! It’s time for you to brainstorm all the words and phrases you would like to hear these folks using to describe you. I will give you a few minutes to brainstorm. And, don’t be afraid to be a little outrageous!

Now look through your list of words and highlight your top three … the three words or phrases you would like to hear people use over and over to describe you and your work. Now, review those top three. Can you reflect those images in your written documents and/or through your presentation skills?

Of course you can!

The sobering side of this exercise is that you can also reflect the exact opposite of these images. If you want people to view you in a particular way, you have to represent that image or brand through everything you do, everything you write and everything you say.

Now, let’s return to today, 2012. Here is our challenge to you:

Gather a variety of samples of your writing – e-mail, reports, proposals, texts – anything you write. Read them as if you are seeing them for the first time. If you were the reader, would you use your three favourite words or phrases to describe you?
Look at a video of a presentation you have delivered…or video your next presentation. If you were a listener in the audience, would you leave that presentation using your three favourite words or phrases to describe you?

Are you reflecting the image you want through your communication skills? If not, now is the time to start.

“Any questions?” is not a powerful close for a presentation

Over and over again in our presentation skills workshops we listen to participants deliver really good presentations and then damage their impact by ending with: “Any questions?”. “Any questions?” sounds like an afterthought…not a strong closing statement to a presentation.

Picture this situation...
You are delivering a presentation to your manager with the purpose of getting his or her approval to implement a new process. You clearly state your purpose in the opening. Then, you provide your manager with all the benefits of your new process – you are very persuasive. You address a few questions throughout your presentation. Finally, you have the perfect close. You summarize the key points and ask for approval to implement this new process – reinforcing the benefit that excites your manager the most. Your manager – totally in agreement and impressed with your ideas – says “Yes, let’s do it!”

Now would be the time to say something like: “Thank you, I will begin implementation next week and you won’t be disappointed with the results.” However, what slips out of your mouth almost like an involuntary muscle contraction - “Okay, thanks. Any questions?” Why would you do that? What purpose does that phrase serve?

Is “any questions?” the last thing you want your audience to hear from you? Or even worse, what if someone raises a concern or asks a question that you can’t answer? Everyone leaves the room focused on the concern or that unanswered question. They have forgotten your key points and that powerful close you delivered so well…before you said “Any questions?”

Polished presenters ask for final questions before they close…
To deliver a powerful closing, give your audience a last chance for questions just before you close. You can then manage your time and you get to have the last word. Try phrases like these:

Before I close, what other questions can I answer?
I am just about to wrap-up my presentation. Before I do, what can I clarify?
What would you like to talk about before I bring my presentation to a close?

Then, if your audience has a lot of questions you are still in control of when you close. For instance, you can say that you have time for one more question and then will have to close. If you like, offer to be available for further discussion after your presentation. People will thank you for respecting their time. Now you can deliver that fantastic close you worked so hard to craft and your key points are what people remember - not “Any questions?”

"Less is more" quiz - the answers

Have you been more judicious about using lengthy phrases over the last two weeks? Read below to see if your responses to the “less is more quiz” are similar to ours.

First, here is the answer to the definition question…

This is the definition for what word: “the use of more words than necessary to express something”?

The answer is “circumlocution”. Yes, that’s right, when you use lengthy phrases ~~along the lines of~~ like the ones below, you are guilty of “circumlocution”. Now there’s a simple word for you!

Here are some possible ways to shorten the phrases in our “less is more quiz”

with the exception of except

afforded an opportunity to allowed

until such time as when

provide an introduction introduce

on a regular basis regularly

the majority of most

furnish an explanation for explain

as a consequence of because

at an early date soon (or say the date)

at the present time now, currently

despite the fact that though, although

due to the fact that because, as

during which time while

for the duration of during, while

for the purpose of to, for

for the reason that because

on numerous occasions often, frequently

on receipt of when we/you get

on the grounds that because

along the lines of similarly, like

on the occasion that when, if

until such time until

with reference to about

with respect to about, for

you are requested please

In the near future soon

let me draw your attention to please see, please notice, look at

had to place a restriction on restricted

are in concurrence with concur, agree

came to the realization that realized

conducted a review of reviewed

Thanks for sharing your wordy phrases with us. And as you write, think about your readers – they want clear and concise – not circumlocution!

Do you use more words than you need to express ideas?

Here is a fun BLOG to test how succinct you can be. Many business writers today often use more words than necessary to express an idea. Sometimes they may be trying not to sound too direct…other times they just don’t realize they are doing it. Let me give you an example:

a) In the event that you need to carry out an analysis of the department’s processes in the near future, I will be the representative for the sales team.
b) If you need to analyze the department’s processes soon, I will represent the sales team.

Sentence “a” above uses 28 words to say what sentence “b” says in 15 words.

“So what” you ask? Put your reader’s hat on for a moment and think about all the messages you receive every day. Does it matter to you if the e-mails you receive are almost twice as long as they need to be? You don’t need to answer that…we know the answer. YES, it matters!

Readers today want clear and concise. And when reading messages on Smartphones and tablets, readers want mega-clear and mega-concise. They definitely think it matters!

Our job as good writers is to give our readers what they need and want. Take the “less is more” quiz below and start conserving words to help your readers.

First question on your quiz:

This is the definition for what word: “the use of more words than necessary to express something”? _______________________________

Okay, now down to the business of shortening wordy phrases. Below we have listed a few of the drawn-out phrases that we often see from participants in our writing workshops. How would you shorten these phrases? Try to replace each phrase with one word, if you can. Tune in to our next BLOG, November 8, to see IWCC’s answers to the quiz.

with the exception of ______________________

afforded an opportunity to ____________________

until such time as __________________________

provide an introduction _____________________

on a regular basis _________________________

the majority of ____________________________

for the purpose of __________________________

furnish an explanation for ____________________

as a consequence of ________________________

at an early date ____________________________

at the present time _________________________

despite the fact that ________________________

due to the fact that _________________________

during which time ___________________________

for the duration of ___________________________

for the purpose of __________________________

for the reason that ________________________

on numerous occasions _____________________

on receipt of ______________________________

on the grounds that _______________________

along the lines of ___________________________

on the occasion that ________________________

until such time _____________________________

with reference to __________________________

with respect to _____________________________

you are requested __________________________

In the near future _________________________

let me draw your attention to _________________

had to place a restriction on __________________

are in concurrence with ______________________

came to the realization that __________________

conducted a review of ______________________

Do you have any examples of “using a bunch of words” when one or two will do? Respond to our BLOG and send in your words. Remember, we will include our answers to the quiz in our next BLOG.

Do you know what works to get ahead where you work?

Have you ever wondered why some colleagues tend to get the best projects or even the best jobs? Why do some people get accolades while other good workers go unnoticed? You might even feel people are not treated equally … and that seems unfair doesn’t it?

Can you define the culture in your organization? If asked, could you list a set of values and beliefs that permeate your workplace? If you answer “no” to these questions, you need to do some serious homework – if you want to be successful that is.

Here’s a fundamental truth: we convey much of our value through communication, i.e. how we write, how we interact, how we present. What you need to know is if the way you communicate aligns with the prevailing culture in your workplace. Organizations, departments and teams have a prevailing culture that dictates what it takes to be “valued”…and they may each value different characteristics or communication styles.

You need to understand two things about your workplace: what works around here and how must I communicate in order to be seen, heard and valued. You don’t need to be a business guru to figure out the culture where you work. You need to be a good detective. Look for the clues!

Here’s a recommended approach to get noticed:

First gather clues to what is valued where you work:

Who gets noticed, and why?
Who does everyone respect, and why?
Who does everyone, including management, listen to? Why?

Then gather clues about what is not valued where you work:

Who is a great contributor but goes unnoticed, and why?
Who has great insight but is ignored, and why?
Who has great ideas to share that no one listens to? Why?

Watch and listen over the next week to spot these people. Remember, good detectives search out all the clues. Record the specifics of how these people communicate - the language they use, their writing style, their voice/tone/body language. Even take note of how they dress.

Only after you have gathered the evidence and reached defendable conclusions can you determine where you fit. Are most of your communication behaviours and approaches falling into the “valued” or “not valued” category? Once you know what works around your organization, then you can plan what you need to change or accept.

IWCC believes that communication skills give you the “edge” you need to be noticed and appreciated where you work. How you communicate dictates how people perceive you. We’d like to share a short assessment to help you take the first step to uncover the truth about “what works around your work place”. Download and print IWCC’s “Environmental Assessment” questionnaire. Good luck with your detective work!

Punctuation and Quotation marks

In our writing skills workshops, and sometimes following a BLOG, we get questions about how to use punctuation with quotation marks. So, we decided to BLOG about it. Punctuation rules for English have shifted over the years. And to make things more difficult, these rules vary from nation to nation and writer to writer. Let’s see if we can simplify this mystery for you.

Two schools of thought exist: American and British. American standards are based on rules and logic, while British standards are based mainly on logic. First, we will look at “similarities.” Then we will look at “differences”.

If you didn’t notice immediately, re-read the last two sentences in the previous paragraph and look closely at the periods. The period is inside the quotation marks in the first sentence but outside the quotation marks in the second – yet neither is incorrect! The simple explanation is that American writers tend to use the first pattern while British writers use the second. And, as usual with writing style, Canadian writers are caught in the middle.

Where American & British standards are aligned…
Both American and British writers place question marks and exclamation points by following this logical approach:

If the question mark or exclamation point is part of the quotation, then put it inside the quotation marks.
If the question mark or exclamation point is part of the whole sentence, not just the quotation, then put it outside the quotation marks.

Look where this writer placed the question marks in the first two sentences and the exclamation point in the third sentence:

I still have to finish the appendices, but I have completed the troubleshooting section, “What Went Wrong?” (question mark is part of the quote)
Have you completed the report section, “Keeping Our Employees Safe”? (question mark is part of the whole sentence)
He got my attention with this statement, “We will surpass our competitors within 6 months!” (exclamation point is part of the quote)

Where American and British standards differ…
American and British writers approach the placement of commas and periods differently. Let’s take a closer look.

American writers follow a strict rule, with few exceptions. Here is the rule they follow.

Place commas and periods inside quotation marks, even when you place the quotations around a single word.

See how this writer follows the rule in these two sentences:

You can find the detailed analysis in “Attachment B.”
You will have to complete an “application form,” then hit “Save.”

British writers, on the other hand, place commas and periods based on where they logically belong. Here is the logic they use:

If the comma or period belongs to the quotation, then place it inside the quotation mark.
If the comma or period belongs to the sentence as a whole, then place it outside the final quotation mark.

Take a look at these two sentences:

He opened his presentation by quoting Albert Einstein: “A person who never made a mistake never tried anything new.” (The quotation owns the period.)
Any furniture that must remain in the old office is marked with a tag that says “STAY”. (The sentence owns the period.)

Note: As demonstrated in sentence #1 above, when you use a period or other punctuation within the quotation marks at the end of a sentence, you do not need to add a period after the quotation marks – British and American writers agree on this one.

Remember, punctuation usage is not always about right and wrong - it’s often about the nationality of the writer. And once you choose to follow the British standards or the American standards, be consistent! Now you can answer an age-old question: “What should come first, the quotation mark or the punctuation?”

The Five Cs for Presenting to Executives - Part 2

Two weeks ago, we blogged about the first three Cs of our Five Cs for Presenting to Executives. Have you had a chance to practice them? Did they give you new ideas for what to include in your opening and how to capture your audience’s attention? This week, we are focusing on the last two Cs (Convince & Confirm) to help you prepare the right content and close powerfully.

We all know that executives don’t listen to presentations passively - they often interrupt with questions, challenge your data and begin separate conversations. So to maintain attention in the C-suite, you must give executives what they want, in the order they want it. IWCC`s Five Cs can help you develop concise content:

Capture, Connect and Clarify in your opening (Didn’t have a chance to read our last BLOG about openings? Click here for our advice)
Convince in your body
Confirm in your closing

The fourth “C” is Convince and it helps you choose the content for the body of your presentation. You can’t convince executives by inundating them with facts and figures. You convince them by selling your ideas - by matching them to your executives’ goals or targets. For instance, take them on a mental journey to the future and paint a picture of what success will look like when they adopt your recommendations. Then provide the details – but only those details they need to see it clearly. Keep in mind that every audience is different, so you will need to tailor your details accordingly.

Make them believe that you believe – use confident, enthusiastic words that prove you are convinced about your solutions. If executives don’t trust you, no amount of supporting data and complicated slides will convince them your idea has merit.

Once you have sold your ideas, you need to close your presentation as strongly as you opened it. For a powerful closing, use our final “C” - Confirm. Begin your closing by reminding your executives about your objective. Then, quickly summarize your key points and reasons for them to agree with your ideas.

Finally, and most importantly, ask your executives for their approval. Never walk away from your executive presentation saying “I think they liked it”, or “I hope they’ll give me the money”. You will likely never get another chance to pitch your ideas on this topic. So, ask and be sure you achieved the goal you stated in your opening.

You may find this fact scary, but the impact of a good presentation in the C-suite is much bigger than simply reaching your presentation objective. When executives later comment on your presentation, you can be sure they won’t be talking about your nifty slides or colourful handouts! They’ll be talking about your ability to keep cool under pressure and to persuade them with a clear, concise, compelling argument that focused on your organization’s key strategies. Having used all five Cs to develop your content, you will feel confident that your executives will use those types of words to describe you and your presentations.

The Five Cs for Presenting to Executives - Part 1

We would like to take some of the fear out of presenting to senior executives – the people who make critical decisions about your organization and your career. Why is presenting to these executives in the C-Suite scary for many of us? Because…

1.   The rules are different.
2.   The expectations are greater.
3.   The stakes are higher.

The C-suite is the room where all the power of the company resides. Executives in that room are intent on getting their “part” of the company to exceed its objectives. When you present to your team or even your manager, you are the one in charge of the presentation. However in the C-suite, executives:

•   Interrupt and start their own conversations
•   Ask questions whenever they want
•   Dictate your speed
•   Frequently challenge your opinions and your data

To shine in front of an executive audience, give them what they want, in the order they want it. And use IWCC’s Five Cs for Presenting to Executives:

1.   Capture
2.   Connect
3.   Clarify
4.   Convince
5.   Confirm

This week, we’ll focus on using the first three Cs to develop a distinctive opening - Capture, Connect and Clarify. Your opening should take no more than 1-3 minutes and you need to be credible, compelling, clear and fast. These first few minutes can propel your career forward or bog it down.

Let’s face facts, you make a first impression whether you think about it or not, so think about it and plan carefully. Be on time, be prepared and look ready – don’t fumble with your technology or notes. Focus on your executives with eye contact and confident body language. Capture their attention with a relevant story, a compelling fact or a carefully crafted question that leads them into your topic.

Now that you have their attention, Connect with your executives by briefly explaining the context. How does your topic further their goals and fit into their corporate strategies?

Finally, Clarify what you want from them. State your main point of view, your recommendation or your action request - make it clear and honest. If you are asking for financial support for a project, tell them exactly how much you need. Get to your point quickly so you’re not interrupted within the first few minutes with “What’s your point?”

So Capture, Connect and Clarify with confidence in your opening. Tune in to our next BLOG on September 13 for the last two Cs - Convince and Confirm. See you then.

Do you talk the "text talk"?

Save as many keystrokes as possible…that seems to be the motto when writing these days. And, you can blame the small keyboards that come with today’s devices (Smartphones, tablets etc.). “Text talk” is here to stay! Here’s what is happening with writing on handheld devices…the new norms for 2012.

First of all, two general guidelines:

Don’t assume the message has typos because the writer didn’t use any capital letters – it’s faster to use all lower case letters.
Use punctuation or not…it’s up to you. Whatever helps you text faster seems to be acceptable these days.

Add to the lack of typical grammar rules those peculiar expressions people are using and you have the new millennial jargon or text talk. Text talk uses short forms – call them expressions or acronyms. These short forms would be similar to the shorthand or speedwriting of previous generations. These acronyms are merely “short forms”, for instance; thank you is simply “ty” and “yw” stands for you’re welcome.

When people send messages on handheld devices today, acronyms abound. Even messages from laptops are falling prey to abbreviations and text talk. For previous generations, shorthand or speedwriting was only used by trained individuals to take notes quickly and then translate later – like a court reporter might do. Therefore, the only person who had to read and understand the short forms was the writer. However today, we use these abbreviated words or acronyms to communicate with colleagues, clients, executives and friends.

So what? Are these acronyms and text talk wrong? Well now that depends on who you ask. Text talk certainly does not follow the rules of grammar that we learned in school; so English teachers would scream; “YES, this style of writing is wrong!” But IWCC believes the more important question for business writers is not about right and wrong. The question that really matters is: “Does text talk with all its acronyms help your reader?” Acronyms, lower case letters and no punctuation are real time savers for us as writers, but they can make life painstakingly difficult for many readers.

We believe your motto when writing should always be: “HELP your reader”. If you know that all your readers will understand your text talk, by all means abbreviate away! If you aren’t sure that they ALL will understand, you had better spell those words out in full and use capital letters and punctuation where appropriate. If you don’t, you risk not getting your message across…and even worse…you risk your professional reputation. And remember, you never know who might eventually see your e-mail … beware!

Communication and its rules have to keep up with the times, but not at the expense of our readers, our message and our reputation.

What’s your text talk intelligence quotient? Here are 30 text talk acronyms that IWCC staff and participants tell us they see regularly. How many can you decipher? Survey the list and then follow the link at the end of the list for the definitions.

1.   ROFL
2.   TTFN
3.   BRB
4.   G2G
5.   CU
6.   LOL
7.   TTYL
8.   OMW
9.   WFH
10.   BTW
11.   BFF
12.   THX
13.   NP
14.   Sup?
15.   NVM
16.   IDK
17.   BBS
18.   JK
19.   FTW
20.   WTG
21.   IMHO
22.   WUT
23.   KK
24.   GJ
25.   L8R
26.   PLZ
27.   TYVM
28.   WDYMBT
29.   TBH
30.   UOK

Text talk Acronym Definitions

Are you confused by confusing words? Part 3

Here you are…at the third and final BLOG of our three-part series on confusing words. In BLOG #1, we talked about homonyms and in BLOG #2, we reviewed words that sound similar, but have completely different meanings. You also learned how to write some confusing phrases properly. Now is your chance to prove to yourself you are no longer confused by confusing words and phrases. Follow the link below to an exercise on confusing words. Once you have finished your trip and tested your knowledge come on back here to say goodbye. Good luck!

Take IWCC's "Confusing Words" Quiz

Welcome back! How did you do? If you chose the incorrect version of any of the sentences, don’t be too hard on yourself. Confusing words are called confusing because they are “confusing” for most of us. You can always refresh yourself by revisiting our last two blogs at: www.iwcctraining.com/blog.

Are you confused by confusing words? Part 2

In our last BLOG, you looked at the first category of confusing words – homonyms. If you are just tuning in and you are not sure what a homonym is, visit IWCC’s last BLOG entitled “Are you confused by confusing words?” You can find it on our website at: www.iwcctraining.com/blog.

In this second BLOG of our three-part confusing words series, we will look at words that sound similar but have completely different meanings, like: assure/ensure/insure. We will also explore some common phrases that can be confusing, such as: supposed to.

In our writing communications skills workshops, people often ask us to help them take the confusion out of words that sound similar. Here are a few words and phrases people often find confusing.

Assure/Ensure/Insure
Why are these three words so difficult? They all have the same meaning: “to make sure or certain or to guarantee”. However, you will look less professional if you don’t use them in the right context. Here is some help:

Use assure when you refer to people. Use ensure when you want to guarantee something happens. Use insure when you want to protect something (usually financial). Here is a sentence to show the difference between these three words.

“I will assure our Director that our printing department can ensure we receive the pamphlets next week to help our new Customer Reps explain to clients all investments that can insure them from income loss in retirement.”

Good/Well
People often use good when they should use well and vice versa. So what is the difference? The grammatical explanation is that “well” is an adverb and therefore works with a verb. Good on the other hand, is an adjective and therefore works with a noun. As helpful as that may be to some folks who know their grammar, what about the rest of us!

Look at it this way…both words are describer words that provide detail. Use “well” when you want to describe how someone or something did what ever they are doing; use “good” when you want to describe someone or something. Here is an example of how to use both words in a sentence.

“Noah is a good auditor and therefore he performs audits well.”

Affect/Effect
Are you guilty of misusing these two words? Well, we want to keep you out of grammar jail…so here’s how to use these words properly. The grammatical explanation is to say that “affect” is a verb and “effect” is a noun. If that doesn’t help, here is a simpler explanation. Use “affect” when you are talking about action. In other words, when you want to produce a change, or influence something. On the other hand, use “effect “when you want to refer to a result or consequence. Here is a handy trick to help you remember: a is for action = affect and e is for end result = effect . To understand the difference in meaning, read the following sentence that uses both words.

"Extreme temperatures affect the quality of the drug and sometimes the overall effect results in lost product."

“Supposed to” versus Suppose
Do you get confused about “supposed to”, a phrase that confuses many writers? Well, be confused no more! When writing about something that is said/believed to be or is arranged, intended or expected, use “supposed to” in your sentence. And use “not supposed to” to suggest that something is not allowed or is prohibited. When you mean think, believe or imagine, use “suppose”. When we say the phrase “supposed to”, it often sounds like “suppose to”. You might be able to fool your listeners by slurring these phrases, but you can’t fool your readers. You either spell the phrase correctly…or not. Here is an example of how to use both words in a sentence.

"Suppose he does attend the training workshop and learns to operate the heavy equipment safely – the way he is supposed to operate it.
Here is one more…just for fun!"

Moot point OR Mute point
Is a “moot point” mute…not necessarily. Use this phrase when you want to say that a piece of information or an idea is of little or no practical value, has no meaning or is irrelevant. Some people use “moot point” to mean an argument that fades away and is never heard - hence the incorrect spelling “mute point”. But remember although a moot point has no meaning, it does have a voice…moot not mute. Let’s put these words in a sentence and see what happens.

"Following a successful demonstration of how the software works on our system, the IT Managers remained mute as they felt their concern about compatibility was now a moot point."

Are you confused by confusing words?

Confusing words and phrases make writing tough sometimes. Some words are confusing because they sound the same when you say them, but are spelled differently when you write them. These confusing words are called “homonyms”. For example, the words “to, two, too” sound identical, but each spelling has a different meaning. Other confusing words sound similar, but have completely different meanings: assure/ensure/insure. And lastly, you have to write those common phrases that can be confusing, such as: supposed to. When we say this phrase, it often sounds like “suppose to”. You can often sneak by your listeners by slurring these phrases, but you can’t fool your readers. You either spell the phrase correctly…or not.

By knowing which word to use or how to write a phrase correctly, you can help your readers understand your message easily and avoid misunderstandings. And, when you use words correctly, you present a more professional image. IWCC’s next three BLOGs will be a series on confusing words. We would like to confuse you in order to take the confusion out of some commonly misused words and phrases. In the first two BLOGS, we will explain the proper use of some commonly misused and confused words. In the third BLOG, we will give you an exercise so you can see what you have learned.

Below you will find four sets of homonyms…words that sound identical but are spelled differently and have different meanings. We have chosen examples that we see people regularly misuse during IWCC’s business writing workshops.

Allot/a lot…
Use allot as a verb – it means to assign, allocate or distribute. Use a lot when talking about a piece of land, or as describer words to indicate a large quantity. Here is an example of how to use both words in a sentence:

“Kami asked me to allot more administrative responsibilities to the sales reps because we have added a lot of new customers to our database.”

Principle/Principal
Use principal as a noun when you mean a person, or as an adjective when you mean main or chief. When you are talking about a belief, moral standard of a governing law; use principle. Here is a quick tip – think of the principal - the person - as your “pal”. Here are some examples:

“The school principal led the meeting to discuss the principles of supply and demand with our principal shareholders.”

Stationary/Stationery
If you are trying to explain that something remained still or motionless, choose “ary” for stationary. Think about no “air” movement to remember the “a”. If you are talking about paper, choose “ery” for stationery. Here are both words used in a sentence:

“The employees remained stationary, not moving a muscle, as the President explained how the new company stationery supports their brand.”

Its/It’s
When you want to show ownership or possession, use its. When you mean it is, then add the apostrophe - it’s. Remember, only use an apostrophe when you mean “it is”, it’s that simple. Here is a sentence using these words:

“The control panel is malfunctioning again. Its warning light continues to flash and it’s a definite hazard.”

Homonyms are easy when you speak, but confusing when you write. Remember in our third BLOG of this series, we’ll give you a review test…so until then; practice, practice, practice! Tune in on July 21 when we’ll throw more confusing words at you.

Punctuate Perfectly or Pragmatically?

If you want the academic “rules” for punctuation, then google “punctuation”. If you want some practical tips to help you make quick punctuation decisions, read on…

Effective writers punctuate pragmatically! In IWCC’s effective business writing workshops, we teach a style of writing that minimizes the need for punctuation. Is punctuation important? Of course it is! But the punctuation rules we learned in school are not as important as helping our reader get our message…the right message! Here are some practical tips.

The Comma

Think of a comma as a merge sign on a highway, you want your reader to slow down and take a brief pause. A quick test to see if you need a comma is to read your sentence out loud. If you need to pause so the sentence sounds right/makes sense, add a comma. Try it on the two versions below:

“When working in the control room in an emergency situation you must wait for the light to turn green before turning on the processor.”

“When working in the control room in an emergency situation, you must wait for the light to turn green before turning on the processor.”

Now be honest…when you read these sentences out loud, the first version does not sound right. You naturally want to pause briefly after the word situation – so will your reader.

The Semicolon

A semicolon asks your reader to pause just a little longer. Readers respond to a semicolon like they would to a flashing yellow light at an intersection. “Slow down and ponder this situation”, is what a semicolon says to your reader. “Consider this one thought before you continue on to read the next.” By using semicolons you can add variety and depth to your writing. For instance, a semicolon works well when you want to link two sentences that are closely related but could stand alone, like in this example:

“We focused on safety as our primary design goal; we viewed cost as secondary.”

The Colon

Then we have a colon - the light-hearted period. A colon asks your reader to slow down and come to a temporary stop, like a yellow stop light at an intersection. You probably already use a colon before you list items or bullet points, as in the first example below. But here is a second use for a colon that can add real impact to your writing. Use it to separate an explanation, rule or example from a preceding independent clause as in the second example below.

“You will need three tools: a hammer, a Philips screwdriver and a wrench.”

“Writing is not just something you do to paper: it is a way to communicate with people.”

When you read these sentences out loud you stop, take a breath and then read on until the period says STOP you are at the end of the sentence.

You choose where you want to put your focus. Academics will insist you punctuate perfectly. IWCC recommends that you punctuate correctly…but pragmatically. Punctuate perfectly - you focus on rules. Punctuate pragmatically - you focus on your reader.

"Wisuals" work wonders with a virtual audience

When presenting or facilitating in front of a live audience, effective speakers use visuals to create interest, improve understanding and increase retention. You can even use your body language as a visual to enhance your message.

But what about when you present or facilitate with a virtual audience? What visuals can you use? How about “wisuals”? No, it is not a spelling error…wisuals are visuals you paint with your words. You can paint wisuals through stories, examples, analogies, anecdotes, and contrast, just to name a few.

Wisuals are not a nice to do…they are a must do. If you don’t provide your listeners with wisuals, they either tune out or create their own visual to understand and remember what you say. However, if they misunderstand or misinterpret the facts and data that you are sending them, they will create the wrong wisual and walk away with the wrong message.

If we know that the human brain uses stories and pictures to make sense of information, doesn’t it make sense to give our listeners what they need? Like any fine art form, wisuals need to be well thought out and then well articulated. Here are three tips to help you start painting worthwhile wisuals.

Be picky - Identify your key points

What specifically do you want your listeners to take with them? You can’t paint a wisual for every fact or piece of data in a virtual presentation. First, identify your key messages. Then paint wisuals to sear these key messages into your listeners’ brains.

Plan ahead – then practice

If you don’t want to be embarrassed by bungling your story or analogy, take the time to prepare. First, effective wisuals take thought. Ensure your wisual is appropriate for the topic, the listeners and your message. And second, a terrific wisual can be destroyed by a poor delivery. Write your visual out on an index card. Read it out loud and practice, practice, practice until you have it just right. Record yourself on a tape recorder and listen to your wisual. Are your voice and tone supporting your wisual? Remember, your virtual audience can only “listen” too.

Choose words that create pictures

If your wisual is going to work, it has to paint a clear picture. Choose words that carry their own image rather than words that name concepts or vague ideas. A picture word names something that has mass and occupies space. You could take a picture of it! Here’s a small example of the difference between picture words and idea words:

“When I say the word St. Bernard, what do you see? Right…a big brown & white dog, drooling profusely and carrying a keg of brandy around its neck as it gallops through the Swiss Alps to rescue someone from an avalanche. Pretty clear picture? Now, when I say the word aspect, what do you see? Right…nothing at all.”

Fill your wisuals with picture words and action words so your listeners can see the story unfold. They will see it and take it with them as a memory.

The Choice is yours…

You can paint a wisual that accurately portrays your key message, or you can rely on your listeners to conjure up a wisual from their perspective. You choose!

Our workshop teachings in action

One of IWCC Training’s Regional Government clients recently published an article about the training we did for them and we’d like to share it with you.

“Environmental Health Team Polishes their Writing Skills”

As submitted to IWCC Training

The situation:

The Environmental Health team writes hundreds of letters and reports that directly affect the health of our residents. To be effective, these must be concise and easy-to-understand. After performance assessments identified documents that didn’t meet these standards, the Environmental Health management team asked Learning and Development to conduct a comprehensive needs assessment that would include communication skills. When Learning and Development agreed that workshop training would help develop and strengthen our skills, we asked them to find a writing expert to help us improve.

What did we learn?

In September 2011, IWCC Training designed and delivered a customized two-day workshop to 75 of our employees, supervisors and managers. As a team, we learned to:

State the purpose and desired outcome in the first paragraph.
Plan and organize content by anticipating and then answering Reader Questions.
Use descriptive headings (even in letters!) to guide readers through the document.
Write clear, concise sentences using the active voice.

We used samples from our work to assess our writing strengths, and then applied the new techniques we learned in the workshop to plan and create a new document with one-on-one feedback from our workshop leader.

What outcomes have we seen so far?

The reaction to our workshops was terrific! Participants began using their new skills immediately. Supervisors and managers have noticed marked improvements in content choice, structure, sentence style and tone. The result? The Environmental Health team is sending clearer letters and reports to our partners, local residents and colleagues – documents that demonstrate that our team is efficient, professional, effective and approachable.

Feedback from participants:

Participant #1
The leaders were engaging and encouraging. They made it safe to make mistakes, so people were more open to participate. Three things I learned that have helped me are:
1.   To think about the specific reader I’m writing to so I can answer their questions.
2.   To put the message at the beginning, and
3.   To put the action at the end.

The workshop leaders called it “High Impact” writing: getting to the point of what you want to say.

Participant #2
A big plus was that the leaders embedded the training in our world, using samples from our own day-to-day work to demonstrate effective writing strategies and skills. Because we all received the same training, we now have a common language for discussing written communication and working to make it better. We’re more open about our writing and we can all serve as peer reviewers for each other. Writing is something we’ll need to continue to work on, but the investment in better writing skills is paying off.