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Bart:   Hey guys, it is so great to be with you. And I'm so excited for you to meet our guests today. Now you all know that I love to share quotes. And when I think about this young woman, two quotes definitely come to my mind. The first one is this. If you believe in yourself and believe in your mission, People will believe in you and your mission and follow you.[00:02:07] And the second quote is if one, someone, once someone believes in you, you can not fail both of those quotes, really just highlight. Who Kara is and what Kara is all about, and what she does with the young people that she mentors and leads and works with at Virginia Tech, I met. Kara several years ago when I was working for a client in the outer banks of North Carolina.[00:02:42] And since then, she and I have walked a similar path. We've grown together. We've experienced the ups and downs that life has brought us. So it is with great joy and an absolute treat to have her with us today. If there's one thing that Kara and I have in common, it's the fact that we believe our youth are our future.[00:03:05] We would also believe that our youth are our future voice and that our youth are our future change. So as we spend our short amount of time together, what I'd like you to do is begin to see a share as Cara shares, how inner confidence in these young people change the complete trajectory of where their lives have come.[00:03:32] I want you to begin to see how, when they found their voice and they exercise their voice, they were on the right path. They were in the right direction, and they were able to lead change. Kara. And I timed came to know each other as a result of an initiative that I took in 2008 and reaching out to an organization in Kenya.[00:03:54] Now, many of you may have heard this story. There was a woman in my class who said that her parents owned an orphanage. And I said, if you find any value, I'm happy to come to that orphanage. Now that was in 2008. I had the privilege and the honor of working with 60 young people. 60 young people in an orphanage.[00:04:15] Most of them with only one set of clothes, very few of them with any shoes. And they got one meal a day. But at the end of that experience, I saw lives transformed because they gained inner confidence. Not because of anything that I necessarily did, but because they began to believe in themselves. And some people reinforced that idea that they were worth something.[00:04:43] Kara. I am so excited to have you with us today to be a part of our guests and share your story. Welcome wall. [00:04:53] Cara: Thanks, Bart. I'm excited to be here and excited to be talking to you as always. It's always a pleasure. [00:04:59] Bart: Now I know you're known at work as the boss lady, but could you tell us a little bit about what your title is?[00:05:07] Outside of the boss lady, of course, [00:05:10] Cara: outside of the boss lady, that's at home and pers at personally and professionally, I should note, [00:05:19] Bart: we need to get your husband on here then. Cause we need to probably talk about that [00:05:24] Cara: conveniently. He is working on a sidewalk for his grandparents, but we'll say that's [00:05:30] Bart: my fault.[00:05:32] Cara: I'm an academic advisor at an institution, a higher education institution. So I do a lot of coaching and mentoring. That means that I. Usually, the bread and butter of what I do is plans of study. If you think about an academic advisor, the reality of what I do is really the coaching and mentoring and leading and guiding portion of my job.[00:05:57] So I fell into academic advising and a bit of an unconventional way. Originally I wanted to be a wedding planner. There's a. Long string of events between wedding planning and academic advising, but I have always had a passion for helping and mentoring, and guiding people. [00:06:16] Bart: Tell us just a little bit more about this path that you just shared.[00:06:21] What was the catalyst that made you say yes, I'm going to go take this job as an academic advisor.[00:06:31] Cara: It was just a common thread for me, and this is something I share with my students really often. There's going to be a common thread and the things you're attracted to the things you enjoy doing. And for me, that common thread that central pillar has always been people and helping people.[00:06:49] And what I found through the different organizations that I've worked for between event planning. Lodging hotels and. Property management and now, higher education is just a passion for helping people and mentoring, specifically people students in the high school and college-age range. I have been fortunate enough for that to be okay.[00:07:16] Something that's a part of my job, but not my central role in most of my positions. And I just have been so drawn to it. And, one day I just said, I think I ought to change my job. And so I did. I was really set on being an academic advisor with no experience whatsoever in doing it. And to give you the glory, it worked out. [00:07:37] Bart: though.[00:07:38] Tell me, how long have you been doing that now? [00:07:41] Cara: Since October of 2016, so 40 [00:07:43] Bart: years. Congratulations. Thank you. Sure. A little bit about when you first got started, what were the challenges that you faced, and then if you wouldn't mind share, of course, as a result of COVID in our pandemic situation, what are the challenges that you're now facing with the students?[00:08:06] Cara: So, at first, in my role, one of the most challenging parts was not understanding. Higher education as an organization. So if you've ever looked at a higher education website or worked in that industry, there's a lot of people with similar titles. I often tell my students you have to. There are many people with the title Dean, and it means something and higher education, but to students, it doesn't.[00:08:33] And so I was in this position where I'm trying to figure out who is the Dean of what and what that means. And. That's just a small example. But while they're also figuring it out. So I think that was one of the biggest challenges and transitioning from industry to higher education.[00:08:54] All of the other stuff was transferrable. If you're just the emotional intelligence, compassion, caring, concern for other people being able to say, I don't know, but I'll figure it out, or we'll figure it out together. That has been pretty much my motto or something that I think I say every day, but I don't know, but we'll figure it out.[00:09:17] Let's figure it out. And then in the days of COVID. The challenge is being physically distant from them. So we were really intended to create an office space. I have a wonderful team. That's just, they're wonderful to work with and have such great ideas, and they're welcoming. They make you feel at home.[00:09:37] And we wanted our students to feel at home in our office. So we had a coffee bar and—little snacks. We always made sure some things like gummies granola bars, because they often come to meetings for these really short time periods and haven't eaten, and they need that fuel to be successful in their classes and to get through even just a meeting with me, it helps.[00:10:00] So what ends up happening is they come by just to get coffee and snacks and say hi, which is totally fine with us. We love seeing them and love the love, the daily interruption. So while. COVID days feel a little bit more productive in terms of getting projects done. The students' distance and isolation make it really hard to connect with them and understand what their needs are.[00:10:26] Right now, we've been doing zoom, so we've been able to see them that way. Like most people, video conferencing in various formats, sometimes phone calls, but I think that's the most challenging. That's the most challenging part of COVID so far? [00:10:39]Bart: you said a keyword in there, and that was that idea of connecting with the students and being able to have a conversation with them.[00:10:46] So share with me just a little bit before us coming in and working with them on some of the communication skills, just from a communication perspective, you saw them, you were working with them, and you said here are some challenges we need to overcome. Can you maybe articulate the three or four things that you saw initially as issues or challenges or opportunities where they could get [00:11:07] Cara: better?[00:11:09] Absolutely. So I advise in the STEM field and so that, but my background is in business. And my experience at the same institution was very different from what I was seeing with our STEM students, and that was the focus of their education and curriculum. I had a lot of preparation for job interviews, career fairs.[00:11:37] The elevator pitches, selling yourself that, that was constant in all of my classes. And it was absent from my students' classes in STEM. So often, what I was saying was we would get to junior, senior year. And they weren't able to articulate what they wanted to do. They weren't able to have a conversation about how valuable they were to employers.[00:12:03] They have incredibly unique degrees that they couldn't get some, or it's the only place in the United States of America that you can get the degree that they're getting. And still, yet, they were struggling to have that promotional. This is why you need me—kind of conversation with an employer.[00:12:21] So we saw that and then a lack of confidence, some not necessarily extroverted versus introverted, but just really a lack of confidence in their ability. So they didn't feel like they had anything to bring to the table. I would hear, I'm not this. I know I'm not an engineer. I know I'm not a business student, and it would start from this point.[00:12:47] Taking a few steps back on. Here's what I don't bring to the table, instead of saying, here's what I do bring to the table. When I got to a point where I was, I helped to advise and lead a team of what we call ambassadors. So they do a lot of recruiting work for us, which meant a lot more one-on-one time outside of just planning their classes.[00:13:10] And the

In preparation for today's interview, Bart was digging into Gary Keller's book called "One Thing" which highlighted three things for Bart: Extraordinary results are directly determined by how narrow your focus is No one succeeds alone Mastery should be seen as a path and not a destination  Communication takes a lifetime to master. Thomas has seen his journey with mastering communication as an opportunity to focus on the path and not the destination. He is part of the theological program at the Shepherds Institute. He was involved in an organization called Send international and spent a year in Russia and we dive into his experience in this episode. They were teaching English in a summer camp format during their time in Russia. Thomas shares about what the three biggest challenges to overcome. 1. The cultural differences2. How to show people we love them without words, but through emotions and body language3. Working with the church about logistics without a shared language and vocabulary. We discuss overcoming the often negative stereotypes of Americans in Russia which Thomas described as an uphill battle. We discussed how in any communication there is a difference between perception and reality. That gap is called disparity. When addressing a group of people the perception of how you might perceive it is going as the communication may be different than the way the listeners are perceiving.  The goal of successful communication is learning to close that gap.  Thomas described hurdles he faced when trying to close that disparity gap during his time in Russia. Understanding what they needed and what they were looking for when they attended class versus what he thought they needed. This fits perfectly into an idea often discussed in classes by Bart which is being listener focused instead of teacher-focused.   Thomas also discussed how cultural differences communicated more than he intended. For example, when offered tea, he may have refused because he preferred water or not wanting people to go through the trouble of preparing tea, but in Russian culture sharing tea was a staple and often people would be offended by his refusal of tea.  Thomas also shared about his wife's experience as a woman in Russia, which is a largely patriarchal society. We discussed the power of a woman's voice in effective communication and transforming lives. When asked about what's next, Thomas shared some potential plans they have for their future.  We spent time talking about the cultural differences between churches in Russia to churches in America. For example, there is less influence of consumerism, mostly smaller, there are small changes in government restrictions.  

Nelson Mandella said, "Education is the most powerful weapon that you can use to change the world." Tina is a great example of the idea of taking education and using it as a weapon to produce change. Giving students the power to communicate helps them with college interviews, presentations, and sets a foundation for key relationships in their lives.  In 2008, Bart was able to travel to Kenya to work with juniors and seniors in an orphanage. It was during this trip that Bart felt called to give a million people their voice. It was during this time that Tina asked Bart to consider coming to her high school and working with her students. Tina is a dedicated teacher who goes above and beyond with her students. Bart has worked on and off with Tina and her students over a six-year period and they talk about the effects of investing in the communication skills of these young people. "It has been transformational both for the students and in my life to see these young people that have struggles beyond what we could imagine walking into your class and in three days walk out transformed." - Tina Tina shares examples of students who experienced transformation in their confidence to speak and engage with others and share their beliefs as they learn to live their purpose. Guadalupe was a young woman who took the class and went from a young lady with low self-esteem to the next year running for homecoming queen.  "I think that's what this class does better than anything, it empowers the student to be their best self." - Tina

Welcome to the remarkability Institute. This is Bart Queen, your host. Today. I am very excited about the program I've been doing around virtual communication. If you're joining us for the very first time today, what I've covered over the last podcasts, you're not going to want to miss. So make sure you go back. [00:01:24] the very first one, I gave a high-level overview of what a virtual meeting really needs to look like. That there were three major buckets to that. There's the pre virtual meeting. There's the actual virtual meeting. And then there's the post virtual meeting. And in my first podcast, I spent a fair amount of time on each one of those.[00:01:48] On the last podcast, I began to dive into the actual virtual meeting's actual content structure. Now guys, one of the things I shared was that most people think that 90% of the struggle is actually doing the meeting. It's actually now me interacting with the technology, and the student it's wrong.[00:02:10] It's really only 10%. 90% of the struggle is getting them to come to your meeting, getting them there, and then number two, driving them to action. Once it's done, it's not the actual meeting itself. It's getting them there, getting them to commit. And then how do I drive them? What's the action to take them forward.[00:02:34]The third piece that I shared was that idea around the actual content structure. And I shared several pins principles that are the foundation for us to build from today's podcast is actually getting into the content structure components, the actual components, as you began to craft content. So now, if you are at home, you're in your office, your listing, you have a place where you can have pen and paper.[00:03:05] I will definitely be able to take some notes, guys. I think you'll find some interesting things you can use immediately. And if you happen to be driving in your car, maybe, you can relisten to this again. You can turn your phone on record and listen from that perspective. That way you'll have some notes, guys.[00:03:23] All right. So the versed very first key component that we want to look at in content structure is what I call your three teas. Now, your three teas are your topic, your theme, and your title. When I'm coaching someone. And I ask them, do me a favor and write down your topic. Most people will give me a title.[00:03:49] Guys, what's the number one purpose of a title, whether you're writing or you're speaking,[00:03:54]most of you will say something to give the listener or the reader a sense of what you're talking about. Incorrect. The number one purpose of a title is to grab someone's attention period. I want you to start getting creative with your titles. Now with the title, you're allowed two subtitles, one subtitle, clarity to the topic.[00:04:21] the Second subtitle benefits the listener or the reader, depending on what you're trying to accomplish. I want you the next time. You're. Going to spend a Sunday at a Barnes and Noble or a bookstore. You're just going to hang out, drink coffee, look at magazines and look at a couple of books. Look at how that principle is lived out on almost every single book that you pick up.[00:04:44] What makes you pick up the book? It's either the title or the picture of the book. And then you look at the subtitles, which give you clarity into that title. A topic is the bull's eye center of what you're trying to talk about. So let's say the topic is just, it could be XYZ solution. It could be risk. It could be security.[00:05:10] It could be happiness. It could be humor. It could be anything, but you've pinpointed that topic down to something, boil that as simple as you can make it. Your theme is a common thread that you run through your content, a mountain climbing theme. A gardening thing, a physical fitness theme, any type of theme that you feel like you'd like to run through it.[00:05:38] Guys, this is a tremendous opportunity for you to share a little bit about yourself in building a common thread. One of my favorite examples of this is a book called beyond the summit. Tom Skinner is the author's freestyle mountain climber who climbed almost every single mountain in the world. He decided to write a book about what he's learned about mountain climbing and equated to business leadership, the book's topic, the business leadership theme in the book, mountain climbing title of the book beyond the summit.[00:06:21] A brilliant use. breaking out the three T's, the second major component. Anytime you're crafting a meeting and especially in the virtual world, it is your open and close. These are critical. That's a starting place in the ending place. Now, if you'll listen last week, you heard me talk about what's the purpose.[00:06:44] Is it education? Is it selling? Is it building awareness? What's the purpose. So once you've pinpointed the purpose, you have to have a starting place and an ending place. That's all an open-ended closed. Does it frames [00:06:59] the [00:07:00] Bart: body of what you want to share? It frames the body of what you want to share, the meat of what you want to share.[00:07:09] It gives your listener a natural starting place and putting this puzzle together and fitting the pieces together. And it gives you a listener, an exit point. The third major component then is the body. Excuse me, guys. It's the meat of what you want to share. And the last point, the last key component is what I call foundational information.[00:07:38] It's the logistics, it's housekeeping issues. It's credibility building both for yourself and for your business. If that's what you need to do, it's also the background. Now that background should have been from your discovery situation. Why you're there? What are you trying to solve? Remember, no pain, no value, no business.[00:08:04] So if you're not relating what you're bringing to the table to some type of an issue challenge or a pain you're hitting, you're just going to be missing the Mark guys.[00:08:14]Now, with those in mind, let me get into a little bit deeper detail around this idea of your body, the content, the main body of what you want to share. No more than four key points, anything more than four key points, guys. You're on that verge of how do I tell them more? Not how do I get them to remember more?[00:08:37] And with each within each one of those four key points or four main objectives or format ideas? No more than four sub-points within each one of them.[00:08:49]Three is ideal. Three major points and three subpoints are what you want to strive for. Now, if you want to go for three major points and four sub-points for each one, that's absolutely fine. Nothing wrong with that. If you're going to follow a body structure, that's more of a Ted type talk. It's one message backed up by three supporting points.[00:09:13] So study a good Ted Talk. They have one thing. That's the message they're trying to drive one single message, not three messages, one single the message. The greatest example that I enjoy on Ted talks like that is Simon Sinek. Start with why the one, especially that I enjoy is inspiring leaders. This is the one where he shows the golden circles.[00:09:38] If you, by chance, seen that or read one of his books. He's got one major point and three supporting points that back it up. If you go to the other side of a traditional keynote, remember a traditional keynote is really 60 minutes or 90 minutes on the longer side, where at Ted type talk is more of that 18 to 20 minute kind of a Mark a typical keynote.[00:10:05] You've got three major points that you're working with. Three major 0.3 major ideas that you're trying to drive. Whereas in the Ted type talk, it was one major idea backed up by three supporting points. [00:10:20] If [00:10:20] Bart: you're in the technical world, and you're doing some type of a demo of a solution, a product, a service, a piece of technology, I can't encourage you enough.[00:10:31] No more than five features. Five features that you want to share, that you're prepared to share based on the pain you're trying to solve, based on the pain you're trying to solve. You only want to map the features to the pain. Now, if you're actually doing a demo and someone asks you about, does it do this or do that?[00:10:52] Show them yes. Share it with them, but keep your demo on message. If somebody comes up to you and says, I want to see everything, you might as well walk away. Cause they're setting you up for failure.[00:11:08]You've got to keep your demo simple. No more than five features to walk in prepared to show based on the pain. No more than four key points. Go more than that too many. They can't remember it. I could ask you who are the three Stooges. Most people can tell me if I asked you what the seven dwarfs are, you're going to struggle a little bit.[00:11:29] If I said, can you name all the reindeer without singing the song? Most of us are going to struggle a little bit. Three is your ideal for your hitting max. Now, remember that your key points, whether they're. Four, there three there too. You're doing a Ted type talk. You're doing more of a keynote. Your key points must be three things.[00:11:52] I want you to remember this. Now your key points must be simple. They must be repeatable, and they must be memorable. If you follow this straightforward structure, you can speak for five minutes or speak for 15 minutes. Within that structure gives you the freedom to expand, and it gives you the freedom to contract.[00:12:19] And our typical three-day program, I share this a lot. It's called a framing concept. You frame your content at a hundred thousand feet at 50,000 feet. And at 25,000 feet. If you happen to have touched base with me on our teachable program, if you want to sign up for that, we've got the whole program online that you can do it at your pace.[00:12:41] I'm going to teach you the same idea, a hundred thousand feet, 50,025. That's the framing concept that you want to put your content into.[00:12:52]Now, when you break into that body, and you've got your three or four key points, pinpointed, remember no more than four supporting points to your key point and those supporting det

Welcome to the remarkability Institute. This is Bart Queen, your host. If you joined us last week, I began a series on virtual communication. And last week, I spent the majority of our time together giving you the structure of what the meeting needed to look like. I shared with you that there were three key pieces to do it, doing something virtually successfully.[00:01:29] Number one, there's the pre virtual meeting, getting all the logistics set up there is the actual meeting itself. Whether you're on Microsoft teams, you're on WebEx; you're on zoom, whatever kind of a platform you're using. And then there's the post virtual. Meeting critical to drive the listener forward the organization forward, get them to take the action steps that you so desire.[00:01:58] This is the second major piece of that, and this is around the actual virtual meeting. But within that virtual meeting, you must have some type of structure that you can work with then. And all the world travel that I've had an opportunity to do in my 30 years of working with this skillset and helping organizations.[00:02:26] One of the key things that I always enjoy is the architectural structures of things that I've had the privilege of seeing walking on the great wall of China, seeing. No true Dom seeing sacred heart, seeing things in the United States, seeing buildings and architecture all over the world. Now having spent most of my life in the Bay area as my home, that part of the world had two structures that I always admired.[00:03:01] One is the golden gate bridge and the other. It is the Hoover dam. Both of those structures to me are just mind-boggling about how they were built, how they've created, how they have been timely and timeless, and what they brought to you. And I not only visually, but to get from one side of the bay to the other and in the Hoover dam to produce electricity and just the visual sight of such a structure.[00:03:36] Most people. When we talk about structure, they want to fight me on this idea around content. They will say, Bart, that's not me. It constricts me. It makes me feel like it's too tight. I'm just one of those guys. That's gotta be pure freestyle. I love those people. Whether you want to be freestyle or you, want to work within a structure that you are authentic to who you are, but I want you to realize that in my example of.[00:04:05] The golden gate bridge and the Hoover dam that structure, the structure that they use gives the bridge and the dam strength. It allows it to be continuous. It allows it to be consistent. It allows it to be timely and timeless and what it brings to us. I want your content, whether you're talking personally or professionally.[00:04:31] To be timely and timeless with the people that you're sharing it with. One of the key things that will help you be successful in any communication situation is having a content structure that you work with them. Now today, guys are I dive into that second aspect around virtual communication.[00:04:57] What I want you to do is walk away with the elements of the content structure that you can use anywhere. Why it is so important in the virtual world is because the level of complexity, intensity, and confusion can skyrocket purely because of the mode that we're communicating in. When it's face to face, we can reduce some of those things.[00:05:22] But if we take these exponential factors that we have to deal with, we have to think of ways to make it seamless, effortless, make it so a listener can retain the information and, more importantly, in my mind so that they remember it. Remember, if you spend any time with me at all, you've heard me say, it's not about how do I tell them more. It's how do I get them to remember more?[00:05:47] That becomes so critical. I want to make sure that your content, whether it's five minutes, 50 minutes, or five hours, you're doing a whole day kind of an event that people walk out the door, absorbing what you said, structure. Is the beginning piece. It is the key critical factor that will set you out from everybody else.[00:06:13] Guys, if you will study a good keynote speech, if you will look at any successful book, if you will look at any successful movie, there is a structure that the directors, the writers, and the creators all build within. When I think about good movies. When I think about movies like Star Wars and avatar, though, some of those kinds of movies have followed a structure, and nine times out of 10, the structure that the directors followed was some form of the hero's journey.[00:06:53] You've heard me speak of this many times. So with that idea, let's dive into this idea of our virtual content structure for the actual meeting that you're doing.[00:07:06]Now, when I started this process with you, we talked about three major areas, the pre-meeting, the actual meeting, and the post-meeting; we're talking now about the structure within the actual meeting. This is where I'm going to focus on our time together. I want you to remember a simple principle that there are freedom and structure.[00:07:27] I also want you to remember. We never, we memorize what we put in it. We memorize the structure itself. If you memorize the structure, you can plug and play anything you want. You can move the pieces around if you want. But here's the hard thing. We have to do the hard work and keep it simple for our listeners, especially in the virtual world.[00:07:51] That is the principle. Number one, you have to be able to do the hard work. You gotta be able to keep it simple, do the hard work and keep it simple. I want you to remember that a confused mind will always say no. So if they're confused, they're not even going to absorb what you're talking about. So now that's principle number one, guys, let's take a look at principle.[00:08:16] Number two. It's what I call the 75% rule. Now, this rule has been saved many times. Let's say someone invites you to come in, and they're going to give you an hour to speak. You go back to your office, you go back to your acute cubicle, and you're starting to craft content. And most of you are probably crafting content in PowerPoint.[00:08:43] Now here's what I want you to remember about the 75% rule. It's 75% of the time you've been given is what you should try to fill. So if I've asked you to fill 60 minutes, And you apply the rule. That's 45 minutes. That's what everybody's going to think, but I want you to realize that is not correct.[00:09:09] There's one of the things that I want you to consider factoring in. I want you to back out what you and I would call your Q and time or your banter time or the time when you're just going to really have a conversation. Maybe that's all the way through. Maybe that's just at the end, depending on how you've laid out the communication situation you're in.[00:09:33] So if I've given you 60 minutes and you follow the 75% role, you're going to think, okay, I need to fill 45. Now, remember that's incorrect. So you take your 60 minutes back out what you want for banter Q and a. So let's make life easy and say that's 15 minutes. That leaves you 45 minutes. Now you want to take 75% of that to fill with your content.[00:10:03] Now, a lot of you are well, Bart, that doesn't seem like very much. That's because you have such a mindset of how do I tell them more? How do I tell them more? How do I tell them more? And my mindset to help you is how do you get them to remember more? I've what I'm telling you. If I invited you to a meeting at it ended five minutes early, would you be happy or sad?[00:10:26] That you'd be happy you go, Oh, great. I just got five minutes back, especially if they were thorough. It is better, far better to end on time and start on time than end late. Because what you're saying is you're not respectful of their time. Now, if you've engaged them if they felt wow, this is really awesome.[00:10:50] And they're saying, that's interesting. Tell me more. And you go over your timeframe. Then you are winning. But most of us want to try to cram 60 minutes of information into that 60-minute slot. And you leave yourself no leeway for conversation banter or even a question that takes you down a rabbit hole that you need to address.[00:11:13] And it may take a moment or two before you come back out and then you've really lost time. And if you have dictated everything you're doing by PowerPoint now, you're going okay, what do I have to do? Now I have to go through these sides really quickly. And guys, look what you've just done.[00:11:29] You've just compromised your information. You just said to this executive audience; this is of no value you've already lost. So let's say you walk in the door, and they gave you 60 minutes, and the executive says. I'm really sorry. We've had some time changes. You're down to 30 minutes. Okay. Now, if you said to them, all right, based on the 10 things I was going to share with you, and my time is roughly cut in half, which five would be the most important to you, and I'll cover those.[00:12:06] Now you need to think through that 75% rule based on that. But what you're saying in that first page says my information is a value and I'm not willing to compromise it. Don't compromise. Your information uses 75% role have the mindset that I'm trying to get you to remember more, not tell you more. You set a precedent.[00:12:29] It is your content. This is your valuable information. Don't sell it. Short principle. Number one. There is freedom and structure. Do the hard work. Keep it simple. The second principle, the 75% rule, that let's go for the third.[00:12:48]The third principle I want you to walk away with is the structure process. So if you have a pen and paper out and you're at home, you're listening to this. Or if you're driving, just keep listening. Then guys just keep listening and come back and make these notes. There are five steps in the process, and if you just follow these five steps every time you have to craft content, to work through the structure, you'll win every single time.[00:13:19] Number one, you have to set your goals. What is it you're trying to achieve? Are they more strategic goals? Are they more tactical goals? That drives ever

But remember, in the virtual world, everything is compounded. It's compounded more difficult and the challenges that you're facing. So how do I counterbalance and find all that? Now those are just some principles that are the foundation to you being successful virtually. Now let me mention some communications statistics, I think, are always important to keep in front of you.[00:01:24] Don't let go of these. In a face to face situation, you have 30 seconds to engage that audience. That's all you get is 30 seconds. Anything after that far more difficult in the virtual world. You have eight seconds, so if you have not said something in the first eight seconds in this virtual meeting that you're doing on your podcast, on your conference call, that engages the audience more difficult.[00:01:52] So you don't have the time to say, good afternoon, guys. Let's give everybody a chance to settle in. You've already lost because now I'm doing my email. I'm trying to catch up on what I need to get done.[00:02:02]The second statistic I want you to become aware of is what I call the four to six-minute kind of a rule. Every four to six minutes, you have got to change it up. Now in the face-to-face world, guys that could mean stand up, sit down. If you're doing something up on a big stage, move from the left to the right of the right to the left move forward or backward, depending on what you're trying to accomplish and our virtual world, it could mean stop and ask a question.[00:02:30] It could mean change slides. Anything that you can do now, this principle is based on a typical 30-minute American sitcom. If you study one of those guys, you'll see that every four to six minutes, you typically get an advertisement. The producers are brilliant at keeping you involved in that 30-minute story.[00:02:55] So I want you to have that same type of brilliance and say every 46 minutes, I change. I need to change it up. I'll get systems engineers who will come in and say to me, Bart; we are going to do a. Demo. It's a four-hour demo with a customer. My response is you're crazy. Who's going to be looking at a demo seated in front of a computer for four hours.[00:03:20] This is just not going to happen. It's hard to keep a focus for an hour 30 minutes. You're pushing it. So if that's the case, how do I create that kind of interaction and banter? Keep them focused and change it up every four to six minutes.[00:03:37] The other thing I want you to remember, and this goes across the board. I find this statistic fascinating. Our face to face communication really takes up. People will argue anywhere from 70 to about 95% of what you do on a day to day basis. A very small percentage is what you and I would call public speaking or presenting.[00:04:01] That's not the number I want you to remember. The number I want you to remember is that all of that 78 to 95%, 40 to 60% of what you communicate, gets forgotten. So let's just take a look at this podcast, guys. Now, this is roughly going to be 30 minutes. I'm going to have to face the fact that 50% of what I tell you will forget.[00:04:30] So the question for me is not, how do I slam dunk more information into this podcast for you? I could speak so fast that you could not keep up. That doesn't serve me. It doesn't serve you. So the question is, how do I communicate in this 30 minutes with you so that you walk out the door and share a principle or two with someone else?[00:04:55] If you're driving in your car on your way to work and you got to work and say, I just listened to a podcast from Bart, and he talked about this one principle. I think we should try to integrate that into what we're doing. Then we both win. That's what I want for you.[00:05:10]Now, I've laid out some challenges that we've got to overcome. And I laid out some statistics that give us a foundation to build from. So now, let's really take a look at the virtual meeting structure. Now, when I say that, most of you will think about the actual virtual meeting you're doing.[00:05:31] We're doing this on Tuesday from 12 to one. That's all you're thinking about, but if you're going to communicate virtually if you're going to communicate successfully. In that communication in that medium, that channel, you have to have three aspects to your overall meeting structure. There's the pre-meeting setup.[00:05:58] There's the actual meeting, and there's the post-meeting interaction. So if I'm doing a conference call, I would encourage you to have these three. If you're doing a webcast, Microsoft teams, a zoom type of a platform, you've got to have all three, the pre-meeting setup, the actual meeting, and the post-meeting interaction.[00:06:22] Now let me break each one of those apart. I think these are critical to your success. The pre virtual meeting is, in essence, what most people are; salespeople will call it your discovery call. It's getting on with the person who's inviting you in. It's getting with the person who's driving this idea that they want you to speak to their teams.[00:06:49] It understands their pain, their issues, and their concerns. Now, if you're not driving and just listening, you have a pen and paper. I want you to write this down. No pain, no value, no business, no pain, no value, no business. So during this discovery call, you've got to be able to bring forward, pull out, find out, discover what the three major issues, challenges, pains, concerns that you're trying to solve are.[00:07:19] You've got to be able to connect your virtual meeting to some type of an issue. Otherwise, why should people listen to you? I love the guy that says, I want you to come in, demo your product, your solution for us and show us everything. And I will tell that person that's a failure, just looking for a place to happen.[00:07:43] Cause they're not going to link it to anything, and you're not going to be successful. You've got to be able to link it to pain and issue a challenge or a problem. So that's the first piece. This pre virtual meeting is your discovery. The second is to confirm and layout what the meeting logistic ground rules are.[00:08:08] Now. Some of those are pretty simple. You can make them as complex or as simple as you like for me, I always start on time, and I will tell that person, Mr. Smith, when I come in next week, I will most importantly, I will start at noon, and I will end by one in the afternoon. If that's the time slot you've given me because most people are going, Oh, it'll take him 10 minutes to get started.[00:08:32] Nope. I start right on time. that's extremely important in this virtual world that you set that precedent that you become known for starting on time and ending on time. Now other ground rules could be at the bottom of the hour. I'm going to open it up for questions. I like to do that after 30 minutes.[00:08:52] That's just one way of changing it up if the group is small. If I have less than 15 people, that I've got a list of names who are on there, and I will ask very specific questions, and I will call them by name. Cause I'm trying to drive interaction, whatever ground rules you decide to set up whatever those are, to make your meeting work, hold to them.[00:09:19] There is. A tremendous book by Roger Schwartz called the skilled facilitator by Roger Schwartz. It's a pretty thick book. I think you may find value in that when he gets into some of the ideas around facilitating and organizing the structure of what your meeting looks like. It's a great reference.[00:09:43] I use it often. The other thing that you want to make clear in the pre virtual meeting is what is the purpose for us having this meeting, the actual meeting? What kind of awareness do I need to do? Is this a teaching meeting? Is this a selling meeting? What type of meeting is this? You want to pinpoint that.[00:10:07] If it's a teaching meeting, maybe I'm going to turn the camera off because I've got a fair amount of slides. I want to show if it's a conversation, maybe I want the camera on. If it's a selling type of a call, maybe I'm going to go camera on camera off, ask questions, keep my content down to a minimum, depending on what I'm trying to do.[00:10:32] Make sure you pinpoint your purpose. One of the bigger complaints that the executive gives about any type of meaning, the meeting lacked purpose; it lacked objectives. You want to make sure those are definitely on the front end. Then you've got all that information, guys. Now lay out the meeting agenda, but the meeting agenda, the actual agenda for the actual meeting, is based on what you did in the pre virtual meeting.[00:11:02] You've already got the person inviting you into sign off. Yes, this is what we want to be covered. Great. You're on solid ground. Now, does that mean when it gets out that somebody doesn't say, what about this, and what about that? No, of course, you may have to flex some that are part of the skill that you bring to the table, but you want to keep that as tight as possible.[00:11:29] And then I would ask what's their communication preference. Meaning as far as follow up additional conversation, is it, do you prefer email? Do you prefer text? Are you the type of person who wants to get on the phone? Find out what their communication preferences, when you do that, you're being listed focused, and you hold them more accountable.[00:11:54] Extremely important. If I said to a good friend of mine, Joe, now, as we communicate this, what's the best way for me to reach you. Email, voicemail, or texting? Joe says, Bart, from my perspective, texting always works the best for me. Okay, Joe, no problem. Now, when I text Joe, does he feel more accountable to want to respond or less?[00:12:20] No. I asked him, and he said text. He's gonna feel that he needs to respond to me because I took the time to ask.[00:12:27]this last point is a make or breakpoint in my mind, in the virtual world,[00:12:34]guys, in that, setting up the followup call. Most people will do a virtual meeting. They'll do a demo, they'll do something, and they'll think, you know what I'll call. I'll call them in a couple of days and see how they feel like it went. If they need additional information, you don't want to do that. You w

Welcome to the remarkability Institute. This is Bart Queen, your host. I am especially excited for the four-part series that I will run over the next couple of weeks on virtual communication  guys. I think we're in the absolute perfect storm. So let's take a look at what's happening right now.[00:01:27] Number one technology is constantly improving, and the competitive advantage is to have the right technology in the right situation. Number two, where we're working really hard, no matter what industry you're in, whether you're with a big company or an entrepreneur, to somehow have that cutting edge, that one thing that inches you above everybody else.[00:01:57] And then, of course, we are currently facing world challenges, both from a health perspective and from other political and business perspectives. When all of those come together in my mind, we're facing really the perfect storm. I believe that you and I have the ability to overcome that perfect storm.[00:02:22] And I believe one of the things that we can do to do that is to be able to master the way we communicate from a virtual perspective. Most of us, especially if you're in sales, especially if you do any type of customer-facing situation, face the importance of being face to face and having a conversation.[00:02:43] But if we look at the challenge that the world is throwing us right now, some of that opportunity is taken from us. So how do we find a place? How do we take what we've normally done face to face, where you feel comfortable, take all that strength. And now somehow put it in this virtual format into this black box into technology, into a computer screen and take your personality and make it come forward through that in this four-part series, I'm going to cover two major buckets bucket.[00:03:24] Number one, I'm going to spend a fair amount of time. On the actual overall look at what this virtual communication should be, meaning that I believe that there are three key pieces. There is pre your virtual meeting. There's the actual meeting, and there's a post virtual meeting. That's the first two segments.[00:03:46] So really looking at what your meeting should look like. And the second piece, two parts. Again, I'm going to break that up into the structure that I believe will help you communicate the most effectively. What I want you to do is not only become virtually literate. I want you to become virtually fluent in how you communicate with your -clients, with your customers, with the people you need to interface with.[00:04:20] What I want you to do today is began to learn at a higher level. Some of the aspects that you need to build awareness around and begin to incorporate them into the way you're communicating virtually. I want to make sure that in these next four sessions, you come across as confident you come across as conversational, no different than if you were having a coffee cup at Starbucks.[00:04:49] And I want to make sure that you have the ability to just connect with the people that you're communicating virtually. Yes. So let's really begin to dive into this, and what it looks like from my perspective, we've got some virtual challenges that we've gotta be able to take a look at and begin to figure out how we're going to handle.[00:05:14] Most people, if you look at the virtual world, are going to say that the biggest challenge is the actual meeting. The biggest challenge is right now; I'm using zoom. I'm using a webcast. I'm using Microsoft teams. I'm using some flop platform to communicate with my customer, my listeners right now; this moment is the biggest challenge.[00:05:39] I don't believe that's true. Correct. The biggest challenge you and I face is getting people to schedule commit to coming to your meeting to your virtual situation, to your virtual training class, to your virtual sales call. I think that's one of the bigger challenges. And the second one is then once you've got them to commit, [00:06:02] how [00:06:02] Bart: do you move them to action?[00:06:05] Really, the actual meeting is really 10%. That is 10% of your challenge, 90% getting them to commit and then getting them to move to action.[00:06:16]Now, once you've got them there, that third real big challenge is how do I create interaction? You and I have sat in enough webcasts in enough virtual meetings,  where you're just looking at a slide, and it is all one way coming at you. There's no interaction. So the challenge for you and I, how do we build interaction into what we're doing?[00:06:45] Okay, a bigger challenge, especially if you're more of a global company. If you're a global entrepreneur and reach all parts of the world, you've got cultural and language issues that offer a challenge. And then you add on top of that time zones, I was doing some virtual training for several of my clients, and one of my clients was in Singapore, and she said, Bart, this won't work for us.[00:07:11] And I said, what's the biggest challenge. He goes, it's the wrong time. Even though I've scheduled it for most of the East coast and most of Western Europe, what I failed in my thinking was to realize that the Asia pack part of the world has a 12-hour difference. So if I'm doing something at noon, it is midnight, their time.[00:07:31] That doesn't work. So how do I need to do to PA? Do I need to do two virtual meetings? One at 6:00 AM, which is 6:00 PM in Asia pack and parts of Asia pack, and then one at noon hitting more of the United States and Western Europe challenges. And then what platform am I going to use? What technology is best?[00:07:57] When I first started doing virtual meetings, I laid it all out, mostly through zoom. Then, one of my clients came to me and said that our department will not let us do zoom due to security issues. You're going to have to do Microsoft teams. So I'd take everything I learned in zoom. Learn Microsoft teams.[00:08:18] Now, both of them are fairly similar guys. I get that. But there are some nuances and things that just add a degree of difficulty that you have to think through. Those are some of the challenges that you and I are going to face. We've got to be able to overcome them. If we want to come across and connect with our customers, if we want to be able to have a conversation, and we want them to perceive me to be confident,[00:08:44]But now let's just look at it from a communication perspective. Those were more virtual challenges, but just purely communication. Number one, creating engagement. How many of you have been on some type of virtual meeting webcast? Whatever it may happen to be, let's say your executive team was running some type of kickoff, and you were at your home office.[00:09:09] You're in your cubicle, and you're paying attention.[00:09:11]Be honest with me now, what else are you doing? Yeah, if you raised your hand and said, Oh my gosh, I'm doing email. You'd be correct. You're doing something else because you're not engaged. So how do I create that engagement? And I've gotta be able to do that quickly. And then, how do I develop a connection?[00:09:34] Now, if you're face to face, you're looking people in the eye, there's a greater connection, but how do I connect through this screen? And especially if you've turned the camera off because you've got a large group of people. I know when I do some virtual communication from home guys because my internet is hot, not hardwired.[00:09:54] It comes in actually through my television. The system isn't that strong. So if I turn off my camera, I get less challenge in my internet. And then there's just as a technology work at times, making it difficult for us to communicate. So we've got a couple of things. We've got virtual challenges, and we've got communication challenges that you've got to be able to deal with.[00:10:25] So, with those challenges in mind, let me lay out some principles that I think are important to help us overcome those. Now, if you followed me in any of the podcasts, some of this may be a review for you and some of you, if you're just joining me, you may find this to be new information, but these are foundational pieces.[00:10:50] We've gotta be able to do the ordinary things extraordinarily well. And if we're not, we're missing out on some of these basic communication principles. So let's go with the first one. The first one is this idea. Okay. Here is my choice. Tell them more, or get them to remember more. Most of us are show up and throw up most of us when we do these types of things; you are going so fast through slides.[00:11:17] I would not call it a PowerPoint presentation. I'd call it a movie. Now you've spent hours and hours crafting those slides, but you barely give me time to absorb them, let alone have a conversation. So if there's one paradigm shift, I would want you to take both faces to face, and virtually it's to go from, tell me more.[00:11:39] This idea. Pardon me for telling them more about the idea of how do I get them to remember more? How do I get somebody to walk out of this podcast? And remember some of the principles that I've taught you or shared with you? That's my goal. My goal is not to overwhelm you with information in any podcast that I do.[00:12:00] I want you to walk out with principles that you can use, whether that's with your family, with a business situation, you're an entrepreneur, or you're adding the information and do a Ted type talk or a keynote type of speech. Now with this idea of building the conversation and building connection.[00:12:21] Everything that I teach and share is based on three major goals. How do I build trust? How do I build a relationship, and how do I build engagement from a hundred thousand foot level? Those three goals should drive everything you do from a communication perspective.[00:12:37]If I could write the script for you, mom, dads every morning when you wake up. When you put your legs over the edge of the bed, you're wiping up, sleep from your eye before you ever stand up before your feet ever hit the ground. Ask yourself one question. How do I deepen the trust between my spouse and me?[00:13:02] And how do I deepen the trust between my children and me? How do I deepen my trust between my

Jeff shares a heart-wrenching story about the kid's at his son's high school raising money for Josh, whose grandfather was hit and killed by a car while picking him up from the bus. He felt powerless and knew he needed to do something to help make it right. After meeting with a bunch of guys, they decided to build him a house from scratch.  Bart met him after hearing this story and brought a camera crew to help tell the story. This led to a lifetime friendship between the two. Later, Jeff introduced him to Yogi. Jeff felt called to serve at the AME church in Birmingham and believed Bart's communication courses could benefit some of the women at his church.  So Bart, already committed to the power of story, spent 3 days unpacking some powerful communication tools for Yogi and the women at the AME Church. Although she was currently a performer, she felt it would be important for her to attend. She has gone through many struggles in her life and went into it with the attitude of learning to tell her story with courage and heart. One of her key takeaways was thinking of the audience and what they take away or remember from your story. Yogi shared about the challenges she faced, how she overcame them, and the lessons that she can share with you that can apply to your life. Jeff shares his experience of being a white man in a predominantly black church and what he has learned from his experience. Jeff has learned the lesson of relevant vulnerability. Being able to share our weaknesses and what we have overcome is more impactful. Our words are containers that hold things. They either hold people up or tear them down.  Three keys that Yogi hit on: Know your audience The simplicity of the message is critical, not volume. Knowing what the result is Key takeaways that Jeff hit on: Be vulnerable Knowing the right time to share Bart shares his cancer experience and completely losing his voice and the resulting goals he added to his life.

Bart:   Welcome to the remarkability Institute. This is Bart Queen your host. Now, if you've been following me over the last couple of weeks, we've really been focusing in on some ideas around trust. In last week's episode, I gave you more of a high level overview of some trust concepts. I talked about the challenges that we face in building trust.[00:02:02] I gave you some ideas around the benefits, the things that will come to us as a result of working through our trust. And then I really looked at it  a deep dive in building trust from a visual perspective, as a communicator, from a verbal perspective, meaning more your content. And then from a vocal perspective, the idea on how you say things.[00:02:27] Today's episode is a followup to what I covered last week. Now I come back to this idea that if you Google the number one trusted person in America, you're going to find that the name Tom Hanks comes up. But if you Google, what's the number one authentic person in the world. You will get zero. If you, Google.[00:02:53] Who is the richest person in America. You'll find currently today, or when I Googled it, you'll get Jeff. So what I find interesting is that we can't pinpoint someone around authenticity, but we can pinpoint someone around trust. I come back to the idea that I shared with you last week. That's so very important in my mind that we need to look at trust as a critical factor that we focus in on.[00:03:22] It is not something that you should leave to what I call the whim that you don't really think about. And last week, I gave you a challenge that when you wake up in the morning, before your feet hit the floor that you ask yourself, what's a number, one thing I can do today to build trust lost with my spouse, my child, a family member, or one of my good friends.[00:03:46] And I had you keep it in the context of that close family idea before you start making an application to your customers or your clients, in this session. What I want you to do is begin to learn and understand some ideas around what I call credibility templates. And I want you to take those templates, build with them and begin to build your credibility in the market place differently.[00:04:16] I want you to get rid of what I call, show up and throw up about your credibility. How many times have you heard someone say this good afternoon? My name is Bart. I'm with XYZ company. Our company's been around for 35 years. We've got X number of employees. Our revenue is X. We're a global company, and we're a leader in this.[00:04:41] And you hear these long string of things, and you'll roll your eyes. If you're the customer, especially, and you say, who cares? I thought you came here to help me building your credibility by just giving a list of resume. It is probably not the most effective way to do it. I am saying I don't share that information.[00:05:05] What I am sharing I am saying is don't make that the first thing out of your mouth builds your credibility uniquely stand out so that they can remember you. So I come back to where I started. This is something that you should take a look at critically and not leave to a whim. And what I want you to do is understand these credibility templates and be able to apply them.[00:05:32] Now, here's what I know. You're going to find; you're going to build stronger relationships. You're going to create deeper connections, and you're going to be able to expand and make your ability to influence people far greater. One of my favorite quotes is from John Maxwell. That leadership is nothing more or nothing less than pure influence. Your ability to influence your friends, your family, and your clients is critical to your success.[00:06:02] So, let me come back and just review two pieces of foundational information I shared in the last episode that really the effectiveness of our communication relies more on the character of the message than the content of the message. But most of us feel like it's the content of the message. And I see this over and over again because you'll spend hours and hours on a PowerPoint slide, but you won't even take five minutes to think through in this situation, in this business meeting at this conference, in this keynote speech, how can I build my trust factor with my listeners?[00:06:44] The second thing I want you to remember around these foundational pieces is that credibility will continue to grow. Trust will continue to grow. The connection will continue to grow if credibility continues to go up, but as soon as that fails to go up, as soon as it is lessened, as soon as it is destroyed, the connection.[00:07:07] Becomes a disconnect. And if you don't have a connection with the people that you're communicating with, why to bother share information because you want to strengthen those connections, remember everything that I've shared with you is about building trust, build relationship engagement, and the, for a level two, that everything is about building connection, building a conversation and building your confidence.[00:07:33] And as we think about these ideas of trust, These are the things I want you to build in your confidence. I want you to have confidence in sharing who you are and what you're about, whether it's in a one-on-one, whether it's a small group around a boardroom table, whether it's in a training room of 25 to 50, or you're at a conference speaking in front of 250 people or 5,000 people, I want you to know how to build your credit bell credibility in a manner.[00:08:06] That people immediately begin to say, I'm like him. I trust him. This is good. And when our interaction time is shorter, you know, it's even more critical when that executive says, I've got five minutes, give you, give me what you got. The first thing that come through your mind, go, how do I build credibility or deeds?[00:08:27] The first thing that goes through your mind is, how do I sell this person? Where if you think about how do I build credibility and build a relationship, he or she will want you to come back, especially if you've engaged them about what you can bring to the table. But most of us don't think that way. I want you to start thinking that way.[00:08:49] I want you to take a paradigm shift and the way you build your credibility. I want you to think about it uniquely based on who you're speaking to. So think about the things you did when you met your spouse or your significant other; what did you do to create conversation and trust with them? You shared stories; you shared experiences, you shared where you've been, you share how you felt about things.[00:09:19] And if that connection started to build, if you felt like there was good communication, then the credibility begins to get stronger. So remember, within the first six months of any relationship, that communication trumps credibility, but after that six months, credibility trumps communication or overrides it; those are two amazing principals.[00:09:42] Think about those as you're building relationships with your customer. So now, let's really get into these ideas. In the last episode, I gave you an overview, but today I want to get very, very specific.[00:09:56]Remember that why trust is so important is because that we're capable. We're more capable of than what we think, and we're capable and building more, more reliability, we're capable and building more truth with the relationships that we have. W we're more capable of them believing in our ability of what we bring to the table, and in a business situation, someone having confidence in your ability is crucial to moving forward.[00:10:25] The higher the trust factor, the lower the fear factor of failure, the higher the trust factor, the lower the fear factor of failure. They've got to have confidence in your abilities and what you bring to the table. And how are they going to know what your abilities are if you've not shared the skills and the strengths of your company and the skills and the strengths that you personally bring to the table, remember people buy from people, and they buy from people that they like.[00:10:58] And as you share about yourself, Seamlessly sharing your strengths and abilities and examples and stories is a great way to build that without saying, hi, my name is Bart queen. This is where I went to school. This is what I bring to the table, and people roll their eyes at you. The other reason that trust is so important is that it creates that firm belief in your strength as a leader, as someone that can take them from point a to point B, that you can take them from uncertainty to certainty that you can take them from being unresolved to resolved that you can take them from.[00:11:41] No action to taking action from not being able to make a decision to be able to make a decision. I think one of the greatest benefits is when trust is in place, the decision-making process is much quicker, but if there is a lack of trust, it becomes very, very slow.[00:12:01]So let's look at this a little bit different perspective and guys.[00:12:05]There are three major areas, three major buckets, three major concepts. When you go to build your trust and credibility that I want you to think about the very first is your character. The second is your capabilities. And the third is your commitment. Now, let me get into really what I mean about that.[00:12:30] Let's look at the very first one, your character. What I mean by that is, do you walk the talk? Do you say, what do you do? What do you say you're going to do? Do you follow up? When you say you're going to follow up, do you send the information out? When you say you're going to send the information out, this is all part of your character.[00:12:52] And if you go back to the first foundational piece, I gave you that the effectiveness of our communication is based on the character of the messenger and not on the content. It makes a difference. Think about a young person coming out of school with no. Job experience when someone asks them, well, what's the number one thing you can bring to my company.[00:13:15] Most young people with no experience will say my sense of honesty, my sense of integrity, my sense of reliability. It's a

Welcome to the remarkability Institute. This is Bart Queen, your host. I'm incredibly excited today. As we dive into a different communication topic, I was having a conversation with a colleague earlier in the week. We ended up boiling down things into three major kinds of buckets. Again, number one.[00:01:59] Building the conversation, number two, building the connection, and then building your confidence. And as we got into a discussion on each one of those topics, I made the point that the number one thing that every one of us should do in building our confidence is to focus more on building our trust factor.[00:02:24] And when I, when he, when I said that to him, he said, what do you mean by this idea of a trust factor? I had shared with him earlier that we had three major goals of building trust, building relationships, and building engagement and building that trust factor is critical to our success—both personally and professionally.[00:02:45] I also mentioned to him that for most of us, Trust is something that we leave to a whim. It's not something that we strategically look at it and layout a game plan. Most of us don't get up every day and say, Hmm, how do I build trust with my wife or husband? How do I build deeper trust with my children?[00:03:11] I don't know how you'd build a deeper trust with my best buddy or friend. We don't even think about that with the customer. We know that with a customer, it's critical to build trust because they're not going to buy or deal with this or have a relationship with us if we don't come across as trustworthy.[00:03:29] But I come back to the idea. Most of us just look at it more from a whim than from looking at more at a strategic kind of. The focused thing that you're going to think about today. I want you to focus on that, the idea of how do you build your trust factor. And guys, as we discuss this, I would like you to put it in context, more of the people that are immediately around you, your spouse, your significant other, a child, a good friend, a family member.[00:04:06] Or a close client, but I want the circle to be pretty tight as we look at it. I'm asking you to do that because I want you to begin to think of immediate application on some of the ideas that I'm going to share with you now in our time together today, to me, which is a short 30 minutes for today, I want you to understand trust from a different perspective.[00:04:31] I want you to look at it differently, and I want you to begin to pick up tidbits' ideas on how you can build your trust factor and make it stronger. Now, if you'll do that for me in the next 30 minutes, here's what I think you're going to find. Number one, you can strengthen and deepen the relationships that you're in.[00:04:54] Number two, from a business perspective, you can build greater loyalty. So your customer only wants to do business with you. And more importantly, in my mind, in the first two, you get a connection, and you deepen that connection. Today, guys, I'm going to do more of a broad sweep on this idea of trust.[00:05:18] That way, I can just give you tidbits. If you care to go deeper, each one of these will allow you to do that. The first thing I want to look at is what I call trust, foundational concepts, three simple key ideas that I think layout a foundation for us to work with. I believe that the effectiveness of our communication, whether that's face to face, it's virtually it's over the phone, it's a large group or a small group, relies more on the character of the messenger of you and me, then the content of the message.[00:05:55] If you think about it, most of us put all our focus on the message. You'll spend hours and hours trying to craft the perfect PowerPoint slide and not even really think about what do I need to do? What do I need to say to create that trust factor? It's the exact opposite of what we think, where the real effectiveness of our communication lies in our character as the messenger.[00:06:20] So I want to remind you that people buy what they see before they buy what they hear. They're evaluating you. They're looking you up. They're looking you down and making an assessment already before you've opened your mouth, whether they're going to trust you or not. And then as you begin to share, they're going to be evaluating the things that you bring to the table.[00:06:43] And this is where your executive presence, your sense of authenticity, and your confidence need to come forward. Part of the character of the messenger is then developed through the stories you share through the examples that you give. So that first paradigm shift, I want you to think about and building your trust factor.[00:07:08] Is that we need to focus on the character of the messenger, you and I, more than we need to focus on the content. First the second thing I want you to realize is that credibility is a thing that makes the difference. And I found an interesting fact in my research, it said in the first six months of relationship communication, overrides credibility; so think about when you first met somebody that you dated, and maybe that person became your spouse in the first month as you went out, you had a good time.[00:07:46] You shared stories, you talked, you were building your credibility, but it was the connection you were creating through things that you shared experiences, that you had places that you went. But what I found interesting out of this study was the second six months' credibility overrides communication. So now, I want you to think about the communication you have with your spouse over a longer period.[00:08:19] Let's say you've been married ten years or longer in a relationship, ten years or longer. Hopefully, you both have a bank account of trust that you make deposits into, and you take money out of it, or you take trust out of it. There's an exchange back and forth. If you've built this account up strongly, there are moments when you have a bad day, and something doesn't happen.[00:08:46] You fail to call something that doesn't work out. And the credibility holds for you, even though the communication did not so if we think over the long haul in building a business if you think of a long haul in a relationship with one of your children in a relationship with your spouse, that credibility.[00:09:09] Becomes critical after six months over the communication that we have. It's that level of trust that we have. And the third thing I want you to realize from a foundational perspective is when credibility continues when it grows, and it strengthens that connection grows and strengthens, they learn to rely on you and depend on you, and they trust you.[00:09:38] But when credibility discontinues, the connection discontinues. So we can see this in marriages where someone broke. Their trust. We see that with politicians, where we had trust in someone, and something happened, they broke that trust. And then there becomes a disconnect you've had that happen with a friend where you had a falling out credibility fell apart.[00:10:06] There was a disconnect and maybe a long period that you didn't talk. Now, if that relationship begins to heal, You find that credibility bit builds again. You find that the connection builds again; these three basic foundational ideas are foundational to laying the trust factor and building it the way you see fit.[00:10:34] So now let's look at some of the challenges. Some of the things we have to overcome are the challenges with trust that become critical for you. And I.[00:10:44]One of the number one things that happen with a lack of trust in business, it stymies innovation, it stymies optimization, it stymies growth, and it stymies progress. It almost puts it to a halt and slows it down. Suppose the trust factor is not high enough. If the trust factor is also not high enough, it can create the perception.[00:11:10] Now, the perception of a hidden agenda. And if you're trying to sell me something and I feel like you have a hidden agenda, I'm going to put my hand out and give pushback. Cause I'm not trusting that. One of my favorite sayings is a confused mind will always say no. So if they feel like they're trying to pull something over on you, if you feel like there's a hidden agenda in there, you're going to push back because the trust levels are so low.[00:11:42] The other thing that happens in my mind is that the decision making process becomes very, very long, and drawn out—an example. I gave it a couple of weeks ago in class. I was sharing about a man that I met to talk about helping me with podcasts. We met this young man just at a coffee shop, and the idea was, find out what he does, how he could help us, and what it would look like.[00:12:10] If we decided to commit to doing podcasts, I brought my assistant along so we could just banter and talk. She was very much interested. We walked into the coffee shop within the first few minutes. I had already made the decision that I trusted this man. And we walked out the door after it was all said and done.[00:12:30] My assistant said he's a good guy. I trust him. And it was an automatic decision that we would do business with him because of the trust factor established so quickly. He was honest. He was upfront. He shared what worked and what didn't work. You got a very clear perspective. Now, the result of that higher trust was the decision-making process was fairly simple, but you know what it's like when you're don't trust the person; a lot of times, you won't do business with them, or you take your time before you make that decision.[00:13:05] The other thing that happens is productivity across the organization gets very slow. Because people don't trust the people around them, and they're in self-preservation and self-protection mode. You don't want that. You want productivity to go high. So if we're looking to look at these challenges and say, how do we speed up innovation?[00:13:27] How do we get rid of hidden agendas? How do we speed up the process of making a decision and increase productivity? You got to go to the other side; you've got to be able to build that trust factor. But we don't walk in the door thinking, how do I build that trust again

Bart Queen:  Welcome to the remarkability Institute podcast. This is Bart queen, your host. I'm really glad you're with us today. I recently had someone give me a call and ask me about the fear of public speaking and when I tried to address the issue with them. As I listened to him, he kept talking about all the things that he would naturally not do when he was standing in front of a group of people, and I laid out to him the idea that this is the issue that every single person faces when they think about public speaking.If I can really write the script, I take the word public speaking out of our vocabulary. I really truly believe it puts just fear and uncomfortableness in people's hearts. So the question becomes for all of us who do any type of communicating, whether it's a small group, one-on-one, a large group, 5,050 or 500, how do we come across more naturally?I think the best way to come across and their real natural sense is to take a mind shift from this idea of public speaking to just having a conversation. If you and I went to Starbucks and had a cup of coffee and we sat at one of those cushy kinds of chairs, and we're just going to chit chat and have coffee over something, we wouldn't even think twice about the way we're seated in a chair.We wouldn't think twice about what we do with our hands. We would gesture and just have a conversation. Most likely, we would look at each other as we shared whatever we were talking about. But as soon as you say to someone, Bart, can you get up in front of the group and share with them what your department, your division or company has been doing for the last six months? All of a sudden, people shift in their minds from having a conversation seated to standing to feel like their public speaking and presenting. I think this is the biggest challenge. Every single one of us faces, and to get past that, we've got to do a different mind shift. Here's the first mind shift.Last fall, I had an opportunity to spend six months in the Asia pack. One of the stops on my trip wasn't Singapore. Now, the package that the client put me up with was in a hotel called the Marina sands. I don't know if you've heard of this hotel. It's a beautiful hotel. It's almost a city within a city. It has absolutely everything, from shopping to casinos to a spa.At the very top of this hotel is a platform, and when you're on the ground, and you look up, it looks like Noah's Ark kind of landed up there. Now, this hotel is made up of three towers, and across the towers is this platform. There's a pool; there's a place you can eat. It's just beautiful. Now I'm an early riser, so I like to get up in the morning, go to the very top and enjoy some coffee.Now, as I'm enjoying my coffee, I'm reading USA today on the back page of the very first section, there was a small article about a black market organization, heisting men's kidneys. Now, according to the story, two men are out. They finished up work. They're going to go have a drink, glass of wine, a cup of coffee, whatever it may happen to be that's appropriate, and one says to the other, you know what?I think I need to go up and get some emails done before the end of the day. The other gentlemen say, "Oh, I'm just going to hang out for a little while." According to the article, a beautiful woman approaches him and says, can I buy you a drink? And this guy, being a gentleman, says, why, of course. And they start the conversation.Well, according to the story, the next thing that the man realizes is he wakes up in a bathtub full of ice with a small sign on the top that says, we've harvested one of your kidneys. You need to call nine one one immediately. Now. I had never heard this story before, and when I shared this story with folks, many people will go, well, Bart, I've heard that story before, Bart, I even saw a movie about this kind of an idea.Now, if I were in a classroom situation, I'd say, how many of you have heard this story before? And many of them would raise their hand, yes.I make the other point for those who raised their hand and said, no, they've never heard it. I tell them that most likely a break at lunch. When you go home tonight, you're going to say to a family member, a colleague. The story that I've just shared with you. Now, I don't know whether this story is true or not.That's not why I shared the story. Some people say that somebody put it out on the internet and it just went viral. Again, my point is not whether it's true or it's not true. My point is this. For those of you who had heard it before you went, I remember this, and for those of you who hadn't heard it, you'll most likely go tell the story.So here's the paradigm shift. I want every single one of us to take. As we think about talking to our customers, we talk to our clients as we're sharing information, as we're speaking in our teams, our units, or our divisions. The question in your mind should not be, how do I tell them more? I see this a lot from salespeople.It's this idea of showing up and throw up. How do I throw as much information at these people as I possibly can, guys? Just from my experience out of coaching folks out of the last 20 years, I don't think that's the right perspective. I think the question we should ask ourselves is, how do I get people to remember more.How do I get people to walk out of my meeting, out of my sales call, out of my talk, out of my presentation, out of my keynote speech, out of my podcast, whatever it may happen to be guys, and walk down the hall and see someone else and say, I was just in a short meeting with Bart, and these were the three things that he said.How do I get that kind of retention and memorability into my conversations? To my presentations to my webcasts, to my zoom sessions, to my one on one conversations. In my mind, it comes back to just something very, very simple we need to get away from, how do I tell them more to how do I get them to remember more.No. I think there are two ways that come to my mind right off the top of the bat that can help us do that. The first one is what I call a seven-factor phrase. Now, if you think about it, what is a seven-factor phrase? And most people will come back and say, Bart, that some type of a phrase that I have seven pieces to it.That's what I typically hear, but let me ask a different question. How many times does someone have to hear something before they remember it? Now, moms, dads, think about how many times you have to say to your children, pick up your clothes. Go, do your homework. Don't do that. Take out the trash. It's more than once.Most likely. I was always taught; it's three times you need to say something three times before it begins to stick in someone's mind. Guys, that's not correct. The actual number is seven. You have to say something seven times for it to begin to stick in someone's head. Now what I'm teaching with the MBA students at say, Duke University or NC state, their final for me is just a five-minute talk.As we walk them through the skillsets and through this information at the end of the semester, each one gives a five-minute talk, and I will tell them in that five-minute talk, you have to have a seven-factor phrase. You have to say something seven times. They'll come back to me and say, Bart, there's no way in five minutes.I can say one thing seven times, and I'll come back and say, if you don't say it seven times, you flunk. I put that much emphasis on it because I want them to grasp the power of what this does in the way that we communicate. It never fails. A student gets up, they do their five-minute presentation, and I can say to the whole class, what was Bill's seven-factor phrase?What was Mary seven seven-factor phrase? And the students will call it out every single time. Let me give you some examples of seven-factor phrases. Some of these you may recognize, some of them you may not, depending on where you're at in the world, what part of the region you're at or what part of the country you live in.How about this one? Can you hear me now? Now, most of you right now are probably thinking, okay, it's a telephone company, and you'd be correct. That's Verizon. So think about when Verizon first launched that. The gentlemen standing, standing up, and he says, can you hear me now? And he takes two steps. Can you hear me now?Two more steps. Can you hear me now? Two more steps. Can you hear me now? You remember that now if you remembered that phrase, I always get such a chuckle because I'll ask somebody in a class who's your carrier? And they'll go AT&T, and I will go, Verizon loves you. Verizon loves you because they own your brain.As soon as I said that, you went to Verizon. That's the power of a seven-factor phrase. How about a couple more plot, plot, fizz, fizz, Alka seltzer. Good to the last drop. Maxwell house. Don't leave home without it—American Express. My favorite growing up was this one. You'll probably recognize this one. Put a smile on everybody's face.Where's the beef? Wendy's. I can still picture that little old lady saying, where's the beef? Where's the beef? That's the power of a seven-factor phrase. That is one way, just one way to create the memorability and the retention that you're looking for. So in your next talk, in your next podcast, in your next meeting, in your next zoom session, in your next Ted type talk, what's the one thing.That you want to say seven times or more? That sticks in people's minds. No, guys, I'm not saying that you actually have to say it physically. Seven times. Say it four times; four times is better than one. Say it three times. Three times is better than one. The idea is to try to hit that seven Mark guys. That is just one way, one way to get people to remember more of what you said.Another way just to share with you is what I call the Scooby-doo factor. I heard someone share this principle with me once before, and it really, it really works. So think about Scooby doo when somebody would say something to Scooby-Doo, what was his response. He would typically go by row or a room.That's what you want people saying when you kick off a meeting talk or a presentation. You want people saying a "Ru?" tells me more cause you've only got

Bart queen here, and welcome to the remarkability Institute. Now, if you've been following me over the last couple of weeks or so, we've been focused on this idea of how do you physically come across or what I call your delivery mechanics.[00:01:42] Your delivery mechanics are just as important as your content, and many times folks will spend hours and hours and hours on crafting content. You've probably done that. Maybe you even spent all day on a Sunday. You didn't spend time with your family. You locked yourself in your home office, maybe even drove to the office, and said, I've got to get this presentation together.[00:02:05] And you go to the nth degree on what that PowerPoint slide is going to look like, and if you're crunched on time, like the majority of folks, you're doing that kind of twisting and tweaking right up to the very last minute. What just absolutely amazes me. Out of all the years that I've been coaching and helping people is this, they spend hours and hours on making a perfect PowerPoint slide, but they won't spend any time around what does this physical thing, you're you, yourself look like when you're sharing information.[00:02:46] Remember that I've shared with you many times that what you say and how you say it, guys, has to match. Those two things have to be the same, and when they're not the same, people don't buy into what you're saying. People buy what they see before they buy what they hear. It's got to be congruent. You've seen this many, many times.[00:03:07] We can see this from our politicians, our world leaders, many times, maybe a government office where they're sharing information, and you go, I just don't believe what they're telling me. Often, that's because what they say and how they say it just doesn't match. You've also heard me say that if I could give this to every 17 and 18 years old, that I would know guys.[00:03:31] Anytime I have an opportunity to travel internationally, I go overseas. I do my best to find a youth group or a nonprofit that I can give this information to. That's how important I feel like it is. Getting it out to our high school students, I think, is critical. I can sit next to somebody on an airplane, and they'll say, well, Bart, what do you do?[00:03:54] And I'll come back sometimes, and I'll say, I'm in the confidence business. And they'll say, well, what does that mean? And I'll share with them how this skillset, just this vehicle in helping our young people, gives them the confidence to stand up on their feet, articulate their message, what they're passionate about to get out there and make a difference in whatever they want to do in their world.[00:04:20] In my years of working with MBA students, one of the schools that I worked with came back, and they had done some type of a small survey, and they found that the students who went through this program went through this confidence-building program, learn to articulate themselves. If they practiced and showed those things during their internship, they received a 10 to 15% higher.[00:04:45] First-time pay offer than someone who was not giving you. Giving anyone the ability to articulate what they're passionate about, what's important to them to communicate their message is the key competitive advantage that you're looking for. It will set you apart from everybody else. You and I have both heard our ability to communicate verbally, and our ability to communicate from a written perspective are the two things that will set you apart above everybody else.[00:05:20] But it's the two things we spend the least amount of time with. So as we walked through our program today, guys, as we share our time, I want you to become aware of the number one skill. The number one skill that will separate you from everybody else. What I want you to do is not only learn about it, but I want you as soon as this podcast is over, begin to implement it with your family, with your friends, with your colleagues, with your presentations, with your demonstrations, with your WebExes, with whatever you're doing virtually.[00:05:55] Now, here's what I'm going to promise that you're going to find. Number one, you are going to be perceived as far more confident. Number two, you're going to find that you're far more articulate in your information because you're focused because of this one skillset. And number three, and in my mind, the most important, and you've heard me say it many times, that you can exponentially grow your ability to influence people.[00:06:22] Now, if you've been listening to some of my podcasts, I've given you an overview of your posture, the number one skill that communicates confidence before you open your mouth. I gave you some ideas and tips and tricks around movement. Now remember this, the number one reason you move is to raise that level of engagement.[00:06:40] The question that we're going to look at today is what drives movement, and that's that idea of your eye contact in my mind. In my mind, of all the delivery skills you're going to look at the delivery mechanics, your eye contact is the number one skill you should practice. Guys, forget about posture.[00:07:01] Forget about movement, forget about gestures. Forget about all those things. Focus just on this one. The simple idea of your eye contact. Now, here's, here's your rule of thumb. It's that simple. It's this easy if you want to come across as knowledgeable if you want to be perceived as a subject matter expert if you want to be able to drive people to take action, if you want to be influential in what you do if you want to connect with people, if any of those things mean anything to you, this one skillset.[00:07:40] Will be the foundation. It will be the cornerstone. It will be the catalyst that will create that for you. So here's your very simple rule of thumb. Do not speak, do not speak period, unless you're looking at a soft set of eyes. Do not speak unless you're looking at a set of eyes. This will change everything.[00:08:06] Little children do the best at this. Parents, I want you to think back when your children were, say two to about five or six. Yeah. How many times when you were at your laptop, or you're doing something, you're watching a game. One of your children came up to your side, grabbed your shirt, sleeve, your pant leg, and said, mommy, mommy, mommy, mommy, daddy, daddy, daddy, daddy.[00:08:31] I have a question for you as you think about that, as you remember that. When did they stop? They did not stop until you looked at them. Little children are brilliant cause dad, mom; if you're not looking at me, you're not listening. How many times when you were younger did a parent walk up to you and say, young man, young lady, you look at me, what I'm speaking to you.[00:09:01] They wanted that eye contact when you were a child, or maybe how many times have you said that to your child? Young man, young lady. You look at me when I'm talking to you now, in that situation, most likely you were kind of in trouble. So make an application of a teacher that you admired, whether that was high school or college.[00:09:24] Think about who did the majority of your teachers talk to. If I thought about that, most of my teachers talk to the chalkboard or the whiteboard as they taught, and I can tell you from my experience that's what I may be picked up my phone. I had a chit chat with a buddy. I looked at something important to me.[00:09:45] I thought about what I was going to do after I got out of class. It gave me an opportunity to check, just check out. But guys, if you'll think about the teacher that engaged you, that you loved learning from that you said to yourself right now, if I had an opportunity to take a class from him or her, I would, I'd put a $20 bill on the table and bet the fact was that they looked at you when they were speaking with you when they were teaching you, and you were engaged in this process.[00:10:20] The number one thing you want to do is only speak when you're looking at a set of eyes. So let's go to the other side of the coin. How many times have you been in a business situation or a business setting, and the person spent the whole time talking to their PowerPoint slide? We've all experienced that, and you're like, Ugh, this is just painful to experience.[00:10:42] You're looking at your watch going. Okay. How much longer, I have to get out of here cause there's no engagement to it. How many times, both for you guys and you ladies, has your spouse or significant other walked into the kitchen, the living room, wherever you happen to be. You're watching the game, you're on your laptop, you're doing email, you're cooking, whatever it may happen to be, and the spouse walks in, and you continue to do what you do, and you go, Hey, on, how was your day?[00:11:16] We've all done that, or how many times have you been doing something like that, and your child walked in maybe as a teenager and they're trying to have a conversation with you, and you're not even paying attention or vice versa. How many times have you walked into your children's room, and they're doing whatever they're doing, and you're trying to have a conversation, and they're not looking at you?[00:11:36] Gets to be pretty frustrating. Today with our technology, most of us have our head down, and our eyes are on our phone. I always get such a kick as they filmed somebody walking across some type of an open area and they're on their phone, they're not paying attention, and they trip and fall in a fountain, or they run into somebody else, or they run into a post.[00:11:57] We've all done that the next time. Gentlemen, here's a challenge just for us guys. The next time your spouse walks into the room that you're at and you're on your laptop, or you're watching the game, do me a big favor just as an experiment. Turn off the game, close the laptop, look up and say, Hey, how was your day?[00:12:20] And just pay attention to their expression. Watch what happens. I can promise you one of them will say, okay, what have you been up to? Where have you been? Or how much money have you spent? Gentlemen, you'll remember that when you first started falling in love, you were Google's eyes across the table

Hey there. Bart queen here. Welcome to the remarkability Institute today. Guys, I want to take a very strong look at one area around communication in that physical delivery on how you come across, whether you're doing something virtually or doing something face to face. In this particular area. If I could write the script, if I could have my way, if I wave my magic wand, I'd make sure every 17 and 18 years old got this kind of information.[00:02:14] Guys, I truly believe it would change how they do their college presentations, for lack of a better term. I truly believe it would change in that first job interview when someone says to them, why should I hire you over everybody else? And I, I believe it would begin to change how they're going to interact with their spouse or significant other whoever they're going to spend their lives with.[00:02:38] One of my famous sayings, or one of the one of the things I like to repeat, one of the things that are important to me is this very simple concept that people buy what they see before they buy, what they hear, that people buy what they see before they buy what they hear. Now, if we. Embrace that concept.[00:02:59] Then what we say and how we say it has to match. So for those of you who are parents out there, I want you to imagine that you're looking at one of your children, especially when they're younger, and you say, did you do that? And you can envision your son or your daughter putting their head down, kind of scuffing their feet and saying, no mom, no dad, I didn't do that.[00:03:24] And you can look right at them. I know you are guilty. I know you did it. That is a great example of what you say and how you say it has to match. Maybe you've had the experience where you've met someone, and you went up to shake their hand, and you reached out, and you said, very nice to meet you, and they looked at the floor and said, yes, nice to meet you as well.[00:03:52] That's another great example of what you say and how you say it has to match. The challenge here is when they don't match your credibility, and your trust factor goes down. The classic example I see, especially in the corporate world, if someone is in a small group meeting, they've done a presentation, they'll say, now are the, are there any questions?[00:04:19] And when they say, are there any questions? They, too, they take two steps back if you think about it; I'm sure you've seen that situation play over and over and over again. Or maybe by chance, the presentation is over. An executive in the room raises their hand and asks a question, and the person who is about to answer it steps back two or three steps.[00:04:43] I can promise you, even though they don't realize that they're stepping back, the visual that the audience sees says this is what it says to them. They're on the run. They don't believe what they've been telling us, and they're not confident in what they're telling us. This very simple concept of what you say and how you say it has to match is powerful.[00:05:08] People buy what they see before they buy what they hear. Guys, I know you've been in a situation where someone's stepped up front, and you went, Hmm, boy, something about him or her. I'm not trusting. I do not like it. I'm concerned about whether we want to believe that people judge a book by its cover or whether we want to accept that concept.[00:05:30] It's true. As soon as you and I walk into a room to do something, people will begin to look you up and look you down, and they get an assessment about you. They're already going to begin to say, wow, this looks like it's going to be good. I'm a little concerned. I trust them. No, I don't trust them.[00:05:51] They're going to make all those perceptions before you ever start. So if you happen to be at your desk, you happen to be at your house, you're seated. You got a pen and paper in front of you. I want you to write that simple concept down to people by what they see before buying what they hear. I want to be able to build on that idea.[00:06:14] Now, as we walked through this podcast today, guys, I'm going to be giving you a high-level overview of what I call the D delivery mechanics, the pieces that makeup everything that you need to think about when you're delivering a message. Now that's whether that's face to face or that's virtual. So realize if you're doing something virtually, they do not see some of these things, but these other mechanical pieces will come through in the way you carry yourself.[00:06:43] They're going to hear this through your voice. If you're face to face, I want you to embrace this idea. Every single thing counts, which you don't think counts, counts, which you may not have worried about, may count to one of your listeners. Now. I'm not asking you to change who you are. I'm not asking you to change your choice of clothes.[00:07:09] I am asking you to think through each one of those pieces and make sure that there isn't anything that you're doing that's a distraction. If there's something that's a distraction, I want you to think about getting rid of it. Just this week, I led a program around virtual communication, and one of the things that I highlighted in this virtual perspective is just for us guys, what is your shirt look like so I can incur and encourage you enough in those situations.[00:07:43] Get rid of stripes and get rid of plaids. When it comes across on the video, sometimes it can seem like those things are moving, and then it can be a distraction for you. For you ladies, many times, you may wear a lot of Jangles or bracelets on your arm, and every time you took your hand up or take your hand down, you'll get that jingling sound.[00:08:05] I'm not asking you guys again to change anything about what you do. [00:08:09] I'm [00:08:09] Bart Queen: asking, I'm asking you to build awareness around what may be a distraction. So let's take a couple of things in mind. Realize that people buy what they see before they buy what they hear. Big principle to think about. And number two, get rid of any of those distractions that may cause your listener, whether you're virtual or face to face, to not pay attention to what you're saying.[00:08:35] Now, as we get into the area of the make of the mechanics, there are a couple of things, or let me give you a list of those things that I want us to build awareness around. Number one is your posture, whether you're standing or you're seated. Number two is physical movement. Whether you're standing or seated, whether you're face to face or you're virtual, it matters.[00:09:00] I contact one of the probably the most important skill I want you to truly embrace and probably make a paradigm shift around from there, your physical gestures, what you're doing with your hands, your facial expressions, what you're doing with your face. You're smiling and realize that people can hear a smile on your face, which leads us to the last big component around your vocal variety.[00:09:28] Now, vocal variety has five core components to it. There's the rate you speak fast, low; there's volume, loud, soft, there are your God-given pitch and tone. Just how your voice sounds, there's influxion, which is up, down in your voice, or maybe some of you might call that modulation, and then the power of the pause.[00:09:56] This is your ability to give a sense of a sound bite. This is your ability to get rid of your ums and ahs. It may take us two different sessions to get through this, depending on how we break it apart. So if we only get through half of it, I want you to realize, look for that second podcast on your delivery mechanics and make sure you pick up the 72nd half.[00:10:22] So guys, let me get into that very first one around posture. Posture is the number one skill that communicates confidence before you open your mouth. It is the one thing where people will look you up and look you down and get a sense of how you come across. I want you to be perceived as confident before you ever open your mouth posture.[00:10:50] I would also believe it is one of your four power skills. This one scale will separate you from everybody else. Now, as I walk you through this, if we were doing a typical three-day program, or I was coaching you for a Ted talk or a keynote speech. I ask you to do this, you're going to go, Bart, this is uncomfortable, so I want to bring you back to a principle that I taught you in one of our other podcasts, and that was this idea of disparity.[00:11:22] I'm going to ask you to do things. You're going to go, Bart, that's way too uncomfortable. I don't like that. That makes me feel stiff. But here's the disparity piece. Your listeners get to go, wow. They look confident. They look open. So your rule of thumb is this, do not go with how it feels. Go with the impact it creates.[00:11:46] Guys, if you go with how it feels, you're never going to embrace these skillsets because they're uncomfortable. It's a skill set. So think about maybe learning a sport, and the coach was asking you to do it over and over again, and you went coach. That just doesn't feel right. And the coach eventually made you do it so many times that it started to feel natural.[00:12:10] For those of you who are musically inclined, maybe learning a musical instrument. You went through the same thing. I remember my freshman year in college, trying to learn how to play the guitar. I practiced and practiced until my fingers bled, and I finally said, I quit. I can't do this. I never pushed past that pain enough to embrace the idea of making it feel like it's more fluid.[00:12:36] Now for some of us, that curve as long, and for some of us, that curve is short. Every single one of these skillsets will be different for every single person. Now, if I had you in a three-day program, I would get you up on your feet. I'd put everybody in a big circle, and then I would get you to freeze, and we would start to look at some of these postures.[00:13:02] The first posture we're going to kind of take a look at is typically a man's posture. Now, guys, we tend to stand with our feet more shoulder with a military background sports background. The other structure or the other posture? IC, is that what I

This is Bart queen, and welcome to the remarkability Institute. Great to have you all back.  Now, if you've been following in the last series that I've been sharing, we've been focused on this idea of your delivery mechanics. And if you're just joining us, one of the things that I've spoken about many, many times is this idea that what you say and how you say it has to match.[00:02:05] It is the driving principle at looking at what a lot of people may call body language or what I call the delivery mechanics. How you physically come across. Now in our first couple of sessions, the very first one I, I covered this idea of your posture and your movement, bringing those two pieces together. I did one single, separated podcast guys just around eye contact and the power of what that can bring to the table.[00:02:37] Today, I want to focus on a couple more of those pieces. I want to be able to take a look at gestures. I want to be able to discuss facial expressions, what you're doing with your face, and then I want to get into this whole broader concept of vocal variety. So let me come back to this idea that people buy what they see before they buy what they hear, which has to be congruent.[00:03:02] So, as we go through this section today, I want you to realize that these mechanics are kind of the cherry on the top. They don't fall into the bucket of what I call your power skills. Your power skills are your posture. Your eye contact, the power of the pause, and a short to medium sentences. Those four things are the things that give you the greatest confidence and the greatest power when you're communicating the additional mechanics of your facial expressions, and your gestures, your vocal variety of some of the other pieces are cherry on the top.[00:03:42] They continue to enhance what you're doing. But if you said to me, Bart, where should I focus? I'd say focus on the power skills first. Now, I also taught you and shared with you that every single thing counts. So I am not diminishing these. These are important, but if you gave me an opportunity, if you said, Bart, give me a choice.[00:04:07] Go to your power skills first. Now as we walked through these this afternoon, this morning, wherever you happen to be listening, as you're driving to work, whatever you happen to be doing, I want you to take some notes on some of these ideas, whether their mental notes are notes you put on some paper because there are some pieces here that I want to make sure that you can remember.[00:04:32] If you can do that, you'll find that when you go to practice some of these ideas, you go to implement some of these ideas. You can come back to your note, and you can physically implement each of these pieces one by one. Let's dive in this afternoon in this idea of gestures, the number one purpose of a gesture, number one purpose.[00:04:58] Is to enhance your content. Now, when I'm talking about enhancing your content, I mean two things. The number one reason that most people gesture is an emphasis is what you see a lot of. The second reason you gesture is what I call visualization. If by chance, you've ever watched. Drew Carey show, whose line is it?[00:05:26] The next time you're channel surfing and you come across that show, do me a favor, hit the mute button on your TV. Just watch their gestures are so effective that you can tell what they're talking about without even hearing anything. The majority of those gestures are more for that idea of visualization.[00:05:48]Now, there's a couple of components within both of those you want to think about. If you think about this idea that people gesture to add emphasis, that brings us to a couple of dues and does not. I want you to consider you'll find a lot of people who will point. Now, if you're a parent with small children, you'll see them do this often where someone is pointing at you.[00:06:15] How does that get perceived. Most people would say, well, Bart, that gets perceived as condescending or scolding, a basic rule of thumb, never, ever point. I want you to break yourself of that habit. So if you can visualize what president Clinton, President Bush, and President Obama did when they pointed, they kind of.[00:06:44] Made a little fist, and with their thumb, they would emphasize something in my mind that is still pointing. What I would want you always to do is what I call an open Palm. So if you can do me a favor with your hand, make a finger point, like you're speaking to a child, you're pointing at them. Then do what the presidents did.[00:07:10] Make more of a fist with your thumb. And notice how that comes across. And then I want you to do what I call an open Palm. You're taking your Palm; it's open, you're directing it forward. Your fingers are not spread apart. Your fingers are together, your thumb is apart from your hand, and you make a gesture.[00:07:30] Now, as you look at that, ask yourself this question, which is more open and approachable, a finger point or more of an open Palm. I am mystified why our leaders, our executives, don't understand this: one simple comment, one simple concept on using your gestures. Again, we don't even know we're doing it.[00:07:59] We're not even thinking about it, but we're trying to emphasize a point, and you're pointing at people. That open Palm will create a whole big difference. Now, remember, it's about connecting and having a conversation. So if you're at Starbucks and you're sitting with your friend or a spouse or somebody you care about, a colleague, you're not going to point at them.[00:08:19] You're going to do more of an open type of a gesture, always an open Palm. Then that brings me to the second kind of guiding principle, never back of the hand. I'm not saying that your listeners can't see your back of the hand, but I see this a lot. I'll see someone standing in front of an audience, and they're going to show the number two, and they'll go, there are two things you should think about, and they'll do the back of a hand.[00:08:50] Now, in other parts of the world, this is extremely offensive. Most people will say, well, Bart's, that's doing the peace sign. No, the peace sign is more Palm forward. So the basic rule of thumb is if you've got notes in front of you, mental note guys, never back. Rule of thumb, Palm, always forward, Palm, always forward.[00:09:14] Now, with that, I want to add one more thing. The Palm always leads. Suppose I would share with you that we have increasing costs, and I was standing in front of a group of people. I would put my Palm up, and I would take my hand up. The Palm always leads. If you wanted to share something about decreased risk, take your hand up in the air, face the Palm down and say, this is decreasing risk.[00:09:44] Bring your Palm down. The Palm always leads. So number one, no finger point guys. Number two. No back, no. Back of hand. Number three, the Palm always leads. Now, a couple of more do not, and I have names for these so that it will help you remember how many times have you been standing or seated in an audience, and you've seen somebody do what I call spider pushups.[00:10:19] It's where they put their fingers touching each other. They're creating this, and they're bouncing their hand back and forth like this. This is what we call spider pushups. If someone is doing this, answer this question, where's the focus? Yes. You're probably focused on their hands. If you remember, the number one place you as a listener should be focused on is their face.[00:10:47] Everything you do with your gestures should emphasize a point, visualize the point, and then drive the listener back to your face. The way you do that is you make your gesture, and then you go back to your arms by your sides. If you listen to my podcasts on posture, I talked about that. Do whatever gesture you want.[00:11:10] Come back to your sides. Do whatever you want. Come back to your sides. Everything that you do drives that listener to your face—no more spider pushups. I do get a kick. I don't see this with many women, but I see this more with men of what I call the Napoleon. What arm is down to the side, what arm is kind of centered in their chest and all their gestures are right here.[00:11:35] Like Napoleon would be grabbing his shirt or put his hand in his shirt. I get a kick out of this for someone, and we'll go, alright, we need to go full circle, and they'll make a little circle and that, that arm, that hand will barely leave the center of their chest. This is what we call the Napoleon, that other arm that's not doing anything.[00:11:54] It just had a stroke. It's just hanging there as you want balance in your gestures. Now the challenge there can be that nine times out of 10, your dominant arm, my dominant arm is my right arm. I tend to do the majority of my gestures with my right arm. It takes a little practice and a little bit of focus to incorporate and bring that left arm in, or if you're lefthanded more of your right arm.[00:12:26] No finger point, no spider pushups, no Napoleon. The others do not is what I call Velcro elbows. The majority of the people that I coach and I train, the majority of folks are this idea of Velcro elbows. You have seen them, their elbows are kind of tight to their sides, and they're waving their arms back and forth, but they never let their side, their elbows leave their side.[00:12:53] They're very, very tight to the side. This makes you look like you're all tied up into notch, instead of feeling like you can put a little air underneath your armpits. Now your gestures need to be in two places you're in. Yet your gestures need to be chest level or what I call the Northern hemisphere around your face.[00:13:20] Many people will put their gestures, and when I call the Southern hemisphere, imagine someone standing in front of you, and their gestures are, or more down at their hip level. You don't want your gestures there. I'm not saying you can't put some gestures there or what I call the Southern hemisphere, but most of your gestures need to be chest level and around your face.[00:13:48] Why? Because it keeps the focus, keeps the listener's focus on your face. So as you began to practice the skill set, as you begi

Welcome to the remarkability Institute. This is Bart Queen, your host. Now, if you were following me last week, I covered an episode around visual AIDS. This is the second piece to last week's episode. So if you missed last week, guys, do me a favor. Go back and pay attention to last week's episode first, and then join me on this one.[00:02:05] We're covering today is the second major bucket on how you use your visuals. In last week's episode, I spent a fair amount of time talking about crafting your sides, not detailed things, but simple ideas that will keep you the center of attention. Everything that I talk about around communication boils up into three major buckets.[00:02:33] How do we build trust? How do we build engagement, and how do we build a relationship? And when it comes to this use of visual AIDS, building that trust and building relationship is critical to your success, whether using PowerPoint, a whiteboard, chalkboard, a flip chart, or you're showing some type of a prop, maybe a piece of equipment that you're showing them.[00:02:59] I want you to remember that you need to be the center of attention, not your visual, not the whiteboard or the chalkboard people buy from people. They buy from people that they like. They're going to buy you first and then get your slides. So everything that you do, you have to keep yourself the center of attention.[00:03:21] Now, on last week's episode, I asked you to take a paradigm shift around how you craft the slides and today's episode. I'm asking you to take a paradigm shift around the way you use your visuals, how you interact with a whiteboard or a chalkboard, how you interact with your PowerPoint, which is the visual itself on the screen, your laptop, that equipment, and your audience.[00:03:48] If you will take that paradigm shift for me if you'll take everything I'm sharing with you and make sure that you are the center of attention, here's what you're going to find. Number one, you're far more engaging. Number two, you're more connected to your audience. And number three, your ability to move the listener forward is exponentially much greater.[00:04:09] As you think about using your visuals, there are three major areas where you interact. If you're taking notes with me today, I want you to note these three major areas where you interact, number one, the way you interact with the audience. Number two is how you interact with the visual itself, what's up on the screen or the whiteboard, or the flip chart itself.[00:04:33] And then how you interact with equipment and a PowerPoint perspective. That's your laptop. Now, if you've been following me through the series of episodes, you have heard me discuss what we called your delivery skills, your eye, contact, your paws, your gestures, your facial expressions. Movement and your posture, when you think about those delivery skills, which three interact in the areas that I just mentioned to you of the audience, of the visual and of the equipment.[00:05:13] Take a moment and think through those just a little bit. If you came back and said, Bart, the number one skill I practice with the audience is eye contact. You are correct. And here's the paradigm shift you're going to take. When the average person presenter brings up a slide, as soon as the slide comes up, what do they do?[00:05:38] You're correct. They begin to talk right off the top of the bat. Now let me ask you this question. What is the listener? What is the audience doing? the audience is trying to consume your slot. Now, you and I are both intelligent. Your audience is intelligent, but guys, they can't read the slide and listen to you simultaneously, they can only do one thing at a time.[00:06:03] They're either reading or listening. They're either reading or listening. A great example of this. If you will think back to when you were in grammar school on the days when you were little, and you came in after recess at lunch, and the teacher read to you when the teacher read the book to you, and she or he wanted to show you a picture in the book, can you remember what happened?[00:06:29] Remember, the teacher would turn the book and slowly show it to the class. Now, let me ask you, did the teacher speak? Nope. The teacher was silent because they knew you were absorbing the picture and connecting it to what they just read. The majority of you will lock yourself in your home office on a Sunday and make sure your PowerPoint slides are perfect.[00:07:01] But when you bring it up, you don't give the listener an opportunity to absorb it. Why bother we do this because you have spent so much time around that side, it like the back of your hand, and when it comes up, you're immediately going to try to discuss it. But you have to give the list or an opportunity to absorb it.[00:07:20] This is the first paradigm shift you're going to take around this idea of using visuals. Now, the second skill set, when that visual comes up, is the power of the pause. You've got to pause and let them absorb it. Now, here's your kind of guiding principle around that. Guys. You do not have to wait for every single person.[00:07:45] To absorb the slide. Cause somebody's going to look at your side and they're going to go back down memory lane and think, wow, that's pretty cool. They're going to be thinking about their job. They're going to be thinking about whatever's up there. The majority of your audience, when they have consumed it, they will look at you now.[00:08:02] Here's where it connects to your eye contact. As soon as most people are looking at, you begin to speak again, the person who is so absorbed in the slide, as soon as they hear you speak. They will come right back into your content. But from an eye contact perspective, the slide comes up. Watch your audience; see what they're doing.[00:08:25] If they're reading your side, don't speak. Now I have to chuckle here because for some of you, the amount of information that you all put on a slide, I could take you all out to a three-course meal, come back. We could watch a movie, and somebody would still be reading your slides for the volume that people put on a slide.[00:08:45] Now, that's where I want you to reference back to last week's episode because I gave you some very strong guidelines to make readability high. So let me recap what I've shared with you. You bring up a slide; the slide comes up, your audience is reading it. You have to pause. Now, remember they're working, you get a chance to relax.[00:09:08] So if you'll think about it, this is an opportunity to look at your notes. If you need notes, this is an opportunity to take a sip of water. This is an opportunity to glance at your audience and see what they're doing, and then be able to reconnect with them. So here's the thought from an engagement perspective, when you transitioned from slide to slide, this is an opportunity to reengage your audience.[00:09:34] This is an opportunity to reengage your audience, but you have to give them a chance to absorb it. Now you can decide the percentage of 50%, 75, 85 90. You decide you have to be able to read the situation. But remember, give them time to read it. A good rule of thumb is you read it. And once you've read it, go again, nine times out of 10, they'll be with you.[00:10:01] So here are the first two skills—your eye contact. Wait for them to absorb it. Pause, don't say anything to the majority of your audiences with you. The third one is in this idea of, with your equipment. You have to be able to move. Now. Here's what I see—a lot. Someone is using PowerPoint. They are stuck on their laptop.[00:10:25] Guys. You have seen this. They're afraid to take two steps away from it. It's like somebody put a chain to their ankle and their computer and they can't step away from it. It looks like the laptop is in control of you. I want you to look like you're in control of the laptop. It makes a huge difference.[00:10:47] So here's what I want you to do. If you say doing a presentation in front of 30 people in a room and you bring up the slide, I want you to step away from your laptop and move to some other place in the room. Now here's, what's going to happen when you do that. When they finish reading the slide, they're going to look to you.[00:11:11] If you've stepped away from the slide or away from the screen, you can see heads turn, they're done. Suppose you're standing right next to the screen, where most people will continue to stand because they're going to stand up there and read the slide and point to it and touch it. You're not going to know when they're done.[00:11:31] You don't have to walk across the room. Take two steps, take three steps. Just reposition yourself. So when the audience finds you, and you've moved to a different place, let me ask this question. Does engagement go up, or does engagement go down? It goes up because they're saying, okay, Bart, why did you move over there?[00:11:52]I moved over there to reengage you, anytime you transition a side to another point of engagement, and now I have your full attention, cause you're not looking at the slide. If you're in a board room and seated at the table, I guess that you feel like you're going to send it the end of the table, closest to the slide.[00:12:14] I do want you to realize that is not the power position now, Mo somebody may say, I'm going to go to the other end of the table. That is not the power position. Either. The best place you can be is in the center of the table. So that they're going to look at the slide, then they have to come to you.[00:12:32] They're going to look at the slide, and then they have to come to you. Remember that you want to keep the audience with you, not at your slide, but because you took all this time to craft a slide, you got to give him a chance to absorb it. Otherwise, you don't, why bother even showing that slide? Your slide is to enhance your content.[00:12:54] It is not your message. You're the message. The visual is an enhancement of what you're talking about. It should reinforce what you're doing,[00:13:02]  so you've moved away, and now the audience is back to you. So the three skills I've shared with you so far is so when you bring it

We've been hitting a gamut of communication topics. Now, if you've been following me, there were three major buckets that we would spend time around. The first bucket was around this idea of delivery, physically, how you come across the second bucket was around crafting content, your message, your presentation, your keynote speech, and the third was around interaction.[00:02:05] Today. I want to take us deep into this idea of the way we use our visuals. I am not going to spend a lot of time giving you tips and tricks on how to create your PowerPoint slide. I'm going to give you a high-level overview of that, but where I want to spend the heart of my time with you is how we use our visuals.[00:02:27] Not how do we create our visuals? The University of Illinois did a study on the use of visual AIDS. Guys. They found that someone who uses visual AIDS is 85%. They are 85% more effective than someone who doesn't use their visual AIDS. So the question you and I have to ask ourselves is not whether I can use visuals for my presentation, my meeting, my talk, my virtual webcast, my zoom session.[00:02:58] That's not the question. The question becomes, how do I use them in such a manner that I stay the center of attention. Guys, just from my experience of helping folks for over the last 30 years, it is critical, no matter what communication channel that you're using, that you stay the center of attention.[00:03:20] I want you to remember that people buy you before they buy visual AIDS. I want you to remember that people buy from people that they like, and I want you to remember that people buy from people. They don't buy from companies. So when we slap up a bunch of slides, and you thought you have the ability to sell your company, your solution, tool, or product, you're missing the Mark.[00:03:45] They're going to buy you first. And then they're going to get your visuals. Now, those visuals could be PowerPoint, a whiteboard, a chalkboard, or a handout. It could be a prop, whatever you decide to bring to the table. As we walked through this brief session today, I'd like you to do two things for me.[00:04:03] I want you to take two paradigms shifts, a paradigm shift. Number one, I want you to think differently about how you craft a slide and paradigm shift. Number two, I want you to think differently about how you use the visual. Now, if you'll do those two things for me, here's what I think you're going to find.[00:04:24] Number one, you stay the center of attention. You stay at the focal point. Number two, you're going to find that engagement goes through the ceiling when you make these paradigm shifts. And most importantly, in my mind, you'll increase your ability to influence people. Now want you to remember something. John Maxwell said that leadership is nothing more, nothing less than pure influence, guys.[00:04:50] What we do when we use our visuals when communicating, we are influencing people. We are taking them from point a to point B. We're taking them from a place where they are uncertain to a place where they are searching. And I want you to remember primarily right to sound now for me, that the purpose of the visual aid is to enhance your content period, visual laser, not your notes, but that's how most people end up using their visuals.[00:05:22] Now, in our segment today, I'm going to break it into two major buckets. The first bucket I'm going to cover just some tips and tricks that may help you craft your slides. These are very simple ideas that will keep you the center of attention. Then I'm going to spend the majority of our time together, really talking about how to use those visual AIDS in such a manner that you stay the center of attention.[00:05:46] You keep your audience engaged, and you keep this idea that it's a conversation. Let's look at the first idea that I want to share with you around crafting your slides: idea number one, one idea per visual. So if I'm looking at your slide, if you're crafting a slide that should communicate one idea, you could have five bullet points on there.[00:06:12] Six bullet points, whatever you decide. You're going to have a cartoon. You can have a quote at the bottom, but as long as all those things on that one slide communicate one idea. Then your wedding. The second one, I call the golden rule. The title must convey the essence of the slide. I should be able to read the title of your slide guys and know exactly what you're talking about.[00:06:39] So many times, I see people bring up a slide and you read the title, and when you're trying to make a connection to what's in the body of the slide. And there's no connection. You should be able to look at the title of that slide and know exactly what I'm going to be talking about. Now, I want to make an application with that idea to a whiteboard.[00:06:59] How many times have you walked into a business meeting, maybe you walked in late, and there's a bunch of things on the whiteboard, and there is no title on that whiteboard, and you sit down, and you're trying to catch up, but you have no idea what that person's discussing. If you will put a title on your whiteboard and then put underneath it, whatever you want if you will put [00:07:20] a [00:07:20] Bart Queen: title on your flip chart, title on your chalkboard, I don't care what you're doing up there.[00:07:24] If you're handwriting, put a title and then put everything in it. The principle applies one idea per visual. So whatever you put up on that whiteboard, you've got a title, and then everything underneath it should be communicating around that single idea, goals, and rule number three, no more than seven words in a title.[00:07:47] Now I know as you're thinking, Bart, that's a lot of words in a title. Yes. I'm trying to think maximum here for you, especially for those folks of you who are in technology. When you need several words, now, seven in the title can include an, a, or XY. So you may need those kinds of simple words.[00:08:07] And that's why I'm allowing you to expand and did that total idea of seven words per title. So let's look at what I've given you. One idea for visual, the title. It must convey the essence of the slide and no more than seven words in a title. So let's look at the next golden rule. I want you to think about this.[00:08:31] One is critical, and this is where I get the biggest pushback. Pictures are better than text. Pictures are better than text, or you've heard the old saying that one. [00:08:42] picture [00:08:43] Bart Queen: is worth a thousand words. So I'm going to ask you a question. When you think of someone in the marketplace that you said, do a tremendous job with pictures in what I would call their presentations, who comes to mind.[00:09:01]the person that comes to my mind was Steven jobs. Think about when he launched a new Apple product; he was in his teens, black uniform, black t-shirt, black turtleneck, black jeans, black shoes up on stage, age, very conversational behind him, when he launched a product, typically a bunch of pictures.[00:09:23] Cause he knew that you would identify with the picture, glance to it, and stay focused on him. The other brilliant thing that he did was he would put music behind it. So you and I both know that when you see a picture, and you hear some type of music, you get an emotional connection. Steven's jobs were brilliant at the principal.[00:09:46] That people buy with emotion, and they verify with facts, and he drove that whenever he did his presentations. Now, for those of you in the technical world, you're thinking, okay, Bart, if I bring up a picture, I can talk about it. Still, if I'm going to leave something behind for my customer or my client, they're going to look at those pictures and not make any connection.[00:10:11] You're correct. And I'm with you a hundred percent, which leads us to the next golden rule. And that golden rule is what I call the double-deck idea. Guys, do me a favor, write that down the double-deck idea. So here's what I want you to do. I want you to create a deck that you put Warren peace on.[00:10:32] Make sure that there's no white space if that's what you feel like you need to do. Create the second deck that follows the golden rules that I'm sharing with you now; between the two decks, two things have to be the same. The titles have to be the same, and the slide number has to be the same. What changes?[00:10:55] It's what in the body of the slide. Now in your technical world, notice you get to give your client your technical person. You're Mr. R and D miss R and D. You get to give them the information they need, but when you're doing the talk, you're sharing information, you're keeping people engaged by seeing your picture.[00:11:19] I am not saying that every single slide has to be a picture. I am saying that a picture can speak a thousand words. Now I want to bring one more note in with this one. When you are watching someone share PowerPoint, and there's a bunch of text on the slide nine times out of 10, who is the communicator or the presenter in your words, who are they connected to?[00:11:47] Are they connected to the audience, or are they connected to the slide? Again guys, most of the time, if there are many words on the text, the presenter, the communicator, is connected to the slide because they're reading the slide. Whereas if you have a picture nine times out of 10, you've turned, and you're just talking about the picture to your audience now, which creates more impact, of course, you being connected to your audience, not reading your slides.[00:12:19] Guys, if you're listening to this podcast, if I find out just by chance, if somebody comes and tells me, wow, they were reading the slide, I'm going to find you. I'm going to hunt you down, and I'm going to hurt you because it is the number one complaint by executives—people who read the slide. Your slide is not your notes.[00:12:41] Your audience is perfectly capable of reading. You don't need to read it. Pictures are better than text. So now, with that thought in mind, let's just look at an example of what would be typical text possibly on a slide. So if we were looking at a slide on average, you're going t

Welcome to the remarkability Institute. This is Bart queen today. Our whole focus is around content. It is probably the number one question that executive salespeople, engineers, and technical folks ask me, how do I craft my content guys? Nine times out of 10, they come to me with a deck of slides and saying, here's what I've come up with.[00:02:05] And I have to tell them you're doing everything in the wrong order. The never one purpose of any type of visual, whether you're using a whiteboard, a chalkboard, or a flip chart, is to enhance your content. But most people, when they get directed to create some type of a message, go right to their laptop, and they start cranking out PowerPoint slides.[00:02:27] One of my favorite executives once said that if you use PowerPoint, you have no power, and you have no point. I don't have anything. The thing is PowerPoint. I think it's a tremendous tool, but where I have concerns is how we use PowerPoint. So w with that thought in mind, let me just back up a little and let's talk about structure.[00:02:53] On Sunday. I had an opportunity to relax for a little bit, and I caught a national geographic special in this special. They were talking about some of the greater things that have been built in America. The two things they highlighted was the golden gate bridge. And the Hoover dam and they were talking about the importance of the structure and how important that design was to make the bridge viable for a long time and the dam viable for a long time.[00:03:29] And as I was just relaxing and enjoying the special, the ideas of that structure came to my mind when it comes to our content. So let me use the golden gate bridge specifically as an example; that bridge from point a to point B is 1.7 miles. Now, this is a suspension bridge. But the beams that go across one on the left and one on the right that they built the rest of the structure upon is what carries the cars from point a to point B.[00:04:07] Now those beams are suspended. But what I want you to realize is because they had those two beams, one on the left and the one on the right that allowed them to do whatever they wanted to do. On the bridge to build the bridge. You and I, or on vacation or going to work or whatever it may happen to be, can go across it.[00:04:29] And then on top of it, they put the guide rails. There are sidewalks on either side, and then there are small fences to keep people from falling off those fences. And then sometimes they put in a guide rail in the middle. [00:04:45] But [00:04:46] Bart: here's what I want you to realize as it relates to the way you structure your content.[00:04:51] The two major beams that take you from point a to point B give you the most effective way to take your customer, your client, or your listener from where they're currently at or what sometimes I call their current state to point B or that vision state, where you're trying to take them. That adds it is an efficient manner for the listener to go through your content.[00:05:18] The guide rails, once they're put on track or top in my mind, are the things that keep you on track. I want you to realize that there are three things you have to control. Anytime you're sharing a message. Number one, you have to be able to control yourself. Number two, you have to be able to control your content or your conversation.[00:05:43] And number three, you've got to be able to control the situation you're in or the circumstance in which you're communicating. The guide rails allow you to take your listener from point a to point B. The safety rails allow you to stay on track. So here's the principle. I want you to Mark down. Here's a principle.[00:06:05] I don't want you ever to forget. There is freedom in structure. There is freedom in structure. There is freedom in structure. Now I never want you to memorize what you put in the structure. What I want you to memorize is the structure itself. As I walk you through this today, when you get done at the very end, I want you to have a structure you can speak through.[00:06:30] We've all been caught in a situation where someone says, you know, Bart,  I didn't plan. I didn't ask you to, but would you mind getting up and sharing about what your team's been doing? What's your division has been doing? And you look at that person and say, Oh, I'm not prepared to do that.[00:06:47] If you have a structure in your head, all you have to do is plug and play. You look like a rockstar. Not because you took a ton of time to plan, but because you had a structure to work through in my mind; structure in your content is one of the foundation cornerstones that allow you to be successful.[00:07:14] And out of our time today, I want you to walk away with some of the principles that will allow you to build that structure. Now, if you'll learn those principles, if you'll learn the structure, here's what I think you're going to have. You're going to have freedom in the way you craft your content in your word choice.[00:07:34] You're going to have freedom in the way you work the conversation. And you're going to have freedom in the circumstance that you're in to flex and adapt. And that's all you need to do is to have this conversation. So please remember it's a conversation. It's not a presentation. It's a conversation.[00:07:55] Whether you're giving a keynote speech, you're doing a Ted Talk, Guys it's a conversation, whether it's five minutes or 15 minutes, Giving you the confidence to speak no matter what the timeframe is, is what I'm committed to doing is to give you those principles. So let's take a look at one of the first principles I want to share with you.[00:08:17]It's what I call the 75% rule. If I asked you to come into my organization and speak for 60 minutes, nine times out of 10, you will work through enough content to fill that 60 minutes. I don't think that's the best approach. I want you to take an approach to what we call the 75% rule. So if I asked you to come in and speak for 60 minutes, if you apply the 75% rule, most of you are going to get, okay, Bart.[00:08:51] I'm going to craft content for 45 minutes, pretty obvious, but there's one slight change. I want you to make it. Out of that 60 minutes, before you apply the 75% rule, I want you to back out what you would probably call Q and a time I'm going to call it banter time, conversation time. Let's say, for example, that I decided to do a 15 minute kind of banter Q and time I'm going to take my 60 minutes.[00:09:25] I'm going to back out my 15 minutes. That leaves me with 45. Now, guys, I want you to take the 75% rule.[00:09:36]If you do that, you're resting it a little bit more than 30 minutes or so. That's the amount of time I want you to think about filling your audience will much prefer that you end early then go longer. They will appreciate you giving them time back. Now, remember one of the other podcasts I've shared with you that the driving force is getting them to say, tell me more, tell me more, tell me more.[00:10:06] So if you end five minutes early and they say, wow, Bart, this was great. Can you say a little bit longer? Can you answer some more questions? Feel free to stay. Cause now, guys, I'm guaranteeing you that they are engaged in your content, and you are winning. Now they want you to stay. You always want to finish up in respect a few minutes early.[00:10:29] Now, if you're doing a keynote type speech or a Ted type talk where you have to meet 18 minutes, and a Ted type talk on a typical keynote that 60 minutes I would get you to in 55 to 57 minutes every single time. The way that I would do that, I would get you to write it out—word for word. Now, in this example, this is the only time I'd ever get you to write it out.[00:10:52] Word for word, because I need to time the rate that you speak. When I understand the rate that you speak, whether that's very deliberate, more on the slower side or you're one of those enthusiastic speakers that speak on a faster rate, that is going to dictate to me the amount of content you can fit within that 55 to 57 minutes, this 75% rule.[00:11:17] Is one of the checkpoints that will keep you from "show up and throw up." This will keep you from fire, hosing someone. Your goal is not to tell them more. Your goal is to get them to remember more. And this is one of those checkpoints that will help you. This has saved me many, many times. And guys in those situations, when someone has said, I want you to tell them everything, I want you to tell them everything.[00:11:44] And I have given into that pressure every single time I've walked out, I've regretted it. Cause you get tied on time. He ended up talking fast at the end, and then all you do is compromise your content. I never want you to compromise yourself and I never want you to compromise what you bring to the table.[00:12:04] What you bring to the table is too valuable to compromise. It's also one of those things that happen when you walk in and the guy says, I know we gave you 45 minutes, but you're down to 20. And the average person ends up speaking fast. I don't want you to do that. So let's say you walked in with ten items to share with them.[00:12:26] And the man said you're half the time. Then I would say out of the ten things I would bring to the table, which five are the most important. Now, look at what you're saying about your content. You're saying my content is so valuable. I will not compromise it, which of the five are most important. Now, if you and I have done our job, right, they're going to say that was great.[00:12:49] We want the additional five. When can you come back notice again? When that happens, you're winning this 75% rule is a tremendous principle that you want to make sure you implement. Into your webcast to your virtual meetings, to your Ted type talks to your presentations or your sales call, the theme in all of this, around this content is this idea of doing the hard work.[00:13:16] Keep it simple, do the hard work, keep it simple. And to keep it simple, you have to do the hard work harder on our end, better on your listener's end. So let's go to that second principle.[00:13:30]When you think about the process of cr

Welcome to the remarkability Institute. This is Bart queen. If you've been following us over the last couple of podcasts, we've been focusing on this idea of around crafting content. Crafting content is probably one of the most difficult things to do well. If you don't do the hard work upfront and keep it simple, the complexity of your content for your listener for the receiver is even more difficult.[00:02:10] Statistically, we are told that we should be crafting our content at an eighth-grade level. Guys, there are some organizations that will tell you it should be fifth-grade level. I'm not talking about your vocabulary; your work with a Ph.D. group of folks use Ph.D. vocabulary. What I'm talking about is sentence structure.[00:02:34] I think the greatest example of this is you say today, those who remember when USA Today launched in the eighties. Everybody made fun of that paper. They said this newspaper would never be successful. They called it "McPaper" because it was written to simply, and they added color. But what I find fascinating is that the New York Times and the Wall Street Journal they followed suit.[00:03:06] They began to add color, and they made it simple to read, and for the listener to consume one of my favorite books, when I talk about content, is why business leaders speak like idiots.[00:03:20] The subtitle is a bullfighters guide, the whole focus. All of that book is creating content to the point that your listener can absorb it and walk away with it. Crafting your content and understanding the structure of your content is foundational to build the message that your listener can walk away with.[00:03:48] So, as we spend our time together today, I want you to walk away with the key components. The structure at a high level so that you can craft that content, fill in the buckets, and then whatever you want to do within them. You can now there are, in essence, three major buckets today that I want to make sure you build your awareness around.[00:04:18] Number one, bucket, number two, the body of what you're sharing, whether that's the body of a keynote speech, the body of a Ted type talk, the body of what you and I would call a presentation or a sales call. The other major bucket that you have to build into or think about is what I call foundational information.[00:04:47] This is foundational information or pieces like the logistics of the meeting. When you're going to take a break where the cocktail party is after the meeting's over those logistical pieces. The second part of that is your credibility, the credibility of your company, and the credibility of yourself. And the third bucket in that foundation is the background.[00:05:14] This is the information you should be pulling forward from a discovery or research piece that gives you the foundation to share your three key points, your four key points, or five key points, whatever you're going to do. Now, the first thing I want to address is what I call the three T's. So if you have a pen and paper, I want you to note these three T's are your topic, your theme.[00:05:44] And your title. Now, I want you to notice the order. I put them in topic, theme, and title. If I'm doing some type of a communication class, and I've got people beginning to work with content, I will ask them to put down their topic. 99% of people will put down the title. That's not what I want you to note first.[00:06:10] It's the last thing I want you to get you to do one purpose of a title. The number one purpose of a title is to grab your listeners' attention. Now, when you're crafting your titles, whether you're doing something more from a written perspective, say you're writing a white paper, writing a book, or you're doing it from what you're going to probably call it more of a presentation type situation.[00:06:37] You're allowed two subtitles. You can do two. You can do just one. One subtitle gives clarity to the topic. The second subtitle is a benefit to the listener. If you're speaking or a benefit to the reader, if you're writing number one purpose of a title, grab your attention, your two subtitles, then give a benefit and clarity to that theme.[00:07:05] So don't put—marketing optimization. Don't put financial optimization. That's boring. Come up with a title. How to go from zero to 60 in 12, the top three ways to succeed in your business. Those are the kinds of titles that grab someone's attention. And then you can do your subtitles. Here's what I want you to do the next time you go to your local bookstore, you go to Barnes and noble.[00:07:35] You go wherever you might look for a book on a Sunday afternoon when it's pouring rain and you going to want to drink a cup of coffee and relax, pick up any book, and you will see this principle lived out in some form or another. The very first thing I want you to note is the topic. So I want you to picture a bullseye, and that red bull's eye in the center of your target is your topic.[00:08:01] It's boiling it down to something simple. It is not a sentence. It could be your solution, tool, or product. It could be a pain you want to solve. It is very simple. Now, this is where most people get hung up because they're going to go. I don't want to say that. That's okay. I'm not asking you to say it.[00:08:23] I'm asking you to get a razor focus on what the content has, and then you can expand and talk from there. Your theme is where you want to build something into your meeting presentation or talk a mountain climbing theme, a gardening theme, and an athletic theme, a marathon theme. Now, what I want you to remember about this theme is this can give you an opportunity to express something about yourself.[00:08:57] I just had a friend who just bought a motorcycle, and he's all excited about it. It sounds like that's a passion for him so that he could build this idea of his love for motorcycles into what he wants to share and to his. So next podcast, he's going to make an analogy around that allows him to speak expressively.[00:09:21] His passion comes forward, and here's the interesting thing. Any one of his listeners that has a love for motorcycle is going to want it to jump onto that podcast because they have something in common with him. And here's that me too. Factor again. This is where you win the quicker. You get someone to say, me too.[00:09:41] Me too. You pull them into your content. Now, guys, this information I've just shared with you. It's just around your topic, your theme in a title. One of my favorite books on business leadership is called beyond the summit. Skinner is the author's last name, presale mountain climber, almost climbed every single mountain in the world.[00:10:05] He decided to write a book. Now he decided that this was what the topic would be business leadership, what he realized was all the principles he learned in climbing a mountain. He could apply to in business leadership, the title of the book, Beyond The Summit picture on the book.[00:10:28] I believe it's K2 topic in the book, business leadership. The theme in the book mountain climbing in my mind, a tremendous example of someone who leveraged what I call the three Ts. Now that second component, when you're crafting content and your structure are you're open and your close. These, in my mind are the most important.[00:10:54] So I want you to remember something don't muddle the beginning and don't muddle the end. If you want to muddle something, model the middle; you want an open that grabs them and pulls them in immediately. Guys, remember you have 30 seconds to engage an audience, 30 seconds. [00:11:13] Now, if you're doing something virtually, all you have is eight seconds to pull them in to craft some type of an open that is engaging and inspiring and brings people in critical to your content. Your close is just as important because the close is what happens at the end.[00:11:34] When you send them out the door of your meeting, you're talking to your presentation. And that's when I come back to the principle that I've shared with you, what do you want them to think? What do you want them to feel, and what do you want them to do at the end? That's all part of your clothes. The third key piece is the body of your content, the meat of what you want to share.[00:11:57] The last piece is then that foundation, your logistics, your credibility, your personal, your professional, and your background. So with that overview, let's break into these more specifically. When you think about the body of what you want to share, I want you to think this no more than four key points.[00:12:23] And no more than four supporting points. Each one of those key points, the principle of three by three, is your ideal. So if you think about it, the number three is almost in everything that we do. It's in our social security numbers; it's in our phone numbers. Now make a fun application. I'm going to give my age away here a little bit.[00:12:49] But if I said to you, can you name the three Stooges? One of you is going to say, Bart, there's four. And that would be correct. But if you're in my age group, you'd be able to name the three Stooges. Now, if I said to any of you, can you name the seven dwarfs? You're probably going to struggle a little bit.[00:13:09] If I said to you, can you name all the reindeer without singing the song? You might struggle a little bit. This principle of three in your communication is critical to your success.[00:13:25] All here, many salespeople drive one benefit, and I'll share and coach them that you need to have two more. That one benefit may not drive that listener. My favorite sport is water-skiing and if I said, guys, let's go water skiing because you're going to get some great exercise. Three-quarters of you go, "I'm out a Bart."[00:13:45] I don't want any exercise. But if I said, you're going to get some great exercise; we're going to have a chance to relax, lay in the sun. And I'm having a full barbecue catered from steak to all your favorite beverages and a buffet that you'll never stop. I'll get more of you motivated to come. That's based on that simple principle of three.[00:14:08] Now, let me make a differentiation here just briefly for you in a

Welcome to the remarkability Institute. This is Bart Queen, your host today. Now, if you've been following at all over the line, the last couple of sessions, I've been focused on this idea of content structure. And today, I want to take it one more level into actually what I'm going to call building the conversation.[00:01:59] Most people, when they start to dive into this, always, you use the term bar to have to go present, and I have to give a public speech. I have to public speak. I am not fond of either one of those words. If I could write the script, we would take the word presenting and public speaking out of the vocabulary.[00:02:21] I think all that does is put fear in people's hearts. If you look at it, the number one fear in America is public speaking. The fifth fear in America. Is death. Now, if you follow Seinfeld and remember one of his famous quotes, he said most people would prefer to be in the casket than giving the eulogy.[00:02:44] Why do we want to put fear in people's hearts? Because they feel like they have to stand in front of a group of people and share their message. I might toss to you whether you're standing or you are seated. It is a conversation. But here's how people's minds think. If I invited you to go to Starbucks and have a cup of coffee with me, we sat at a table, sat in a cushy chair, and we had a conversation, get to know each other.[00:03:12] We would not take one moment to think about how we're seated in that chair. We would just get comfortable. We would not take one moment to think about what you are doing with your hands? slightly, you got a cup of coffee or whatever you're drinking in one hand, and maybe you're gesturing for the other.[00:03:26] And you're not even going to think twice about it. And most likely, we would look at each other as we have this conversation. What I find interesting is as soon as I say, now, John, can you get up in front and share with us what your division is doing? All of a sudden, John goes from the seated position of having a conversation to a standing position of presenting.[00:03:51] I'm going to challenge you. There should be no difference when you're standing than when you're seated. You just happened to be standing. I don't care whether it's five people, 50 people, or 500 people when you're standing with a coworker after work in your car. And you're talking about the day and bantering about the weekend.[00:04:10] Do you feel like you're presenting when you're at home in the kitchen with your spouse or significant other, your family, whoever you spend time with, do you feel like you're presenting? No. Do you feel like you have your conversation? But because we get into this mindset of presenting in my mind, you let go of all the natural things that you do so nicely.[00:04:36] One of the most important things we can do when we communicate, whether you're standing or seated, is be conversational and be authentic, be who you are naturally. But here's what happens when you put yourself in presenting mode, you put yourself in performance mode, and when you put yourself in performance mode, you put yourself in perfection mode.[00:05:02] And when you put yourself in perfection mode, you feel like it has to be done a certain way, and then you fall apart. But when you just have a conversation, With whoever you're discussing something with, you don't think of any of those other things. You don't put yourself on a performance treadmill. If there's one thing I wish I could get all of us to do, if there were one place that I'd be committed to helping anyone with, it's getting off that performance treadmill and letting you share your heart.[00:05:34] I truly believe that you should let your life speak. And when you let your life speak, you're letting your words speak and your body language, speech in congruency. And when those two things happen, you get power. I remember reading a book called to let your life speak by Parker. And he said, when your true self and your true service come together, that's when you find your vocation.[00:06:03] That's when you find your groove, that's when you find your gift that you're going to share with the world, but you can't share your gift with the world, whether that's on a personal basis or professional basis if you're in prison station mode, you could only do that when you're in conversation mode. So I'm going to share some things with you today.[00:06:23] They will help you stay in this idea of having a conversation and not presenting. And this still is an all-around structure. It's still all around your ability to communicate whatever you want to communicate. I would believe that your structure is foundational to what you're going to communicate. It is a cornerstone.[00:06:44] You build everything from that structure, whether it's a complex structure or a simple structure. But there are some challenges with a structure that I constantly hear. Number one, if there is a lack of structure, people are verbose. They're all over the place. People will say I lost track. I went down a rabbit hole.[00:07:08] I didn't stay on track, and I didn't even get through my information. That's because they had no structure, no guidelines to work with. When you drive down the road, there's a line on one side of the line on the other that keeps your vehicle. This is where you're supposed to drive between now, as they're passing lanes, okay.[00:07:28] Here's a place where I can come out of the structure and come back into the structure. But if you don't have some type of structure, you can't do that. You're just all over the place. I think my greatest experience of that was the very first time I went to India. I remember when my driver picked me up at the airport and where we came out of the airport, and he's going down this major highway, and for four or five minutes, he was in what I perceive to be a lane.[00:07:58] And as we went down the road, all of a sudden he's out of the lane and all over the place. And I being a little more fearful, said, don't you want to stay in your lane? And I still remember him saying, here in India, we don't do that. And I was fascinated how they have a lack of traffic accidents, but they're all over the place in moving and jiving with each other in their vehicle, no structure in the way they drive, making it work, but no structure.[00:08:29] So the typical challenges of a lack of structure. You ramble, you're verbose. You lack clarity. And by no means, are you concise? I think the other factor that happens when you're not, you don't have a structure to work within; you do a data dump. This is where people show up and throw up. This is where you fire hose people with information.[00:08:51] This is where you're throwing anything you can to make it stick up on the wall, instead of having a focused message. And when you don't have structure, you can't stay on track. And when someone asks you a question, then it is not even relevant to what you're talking about. You get sidetracked, you lose control, and then you lost your moment to drive the listener forward.[00:09:16] Now, those are just some of the challenges that I typically see in helping people as they go to craft content. The other big challenge I get from content is a mindset by people. They will say, if you're going to make me worth it, work within a structure in narrows me, it limits my big beef. I get all the time.[00:09:38] The second thing they'll say is, that's just not who I am. I talk from the cuff, I just get up, and I am spontaneous, which is how I've always done it. Those are some of those mindset challenges. I hear them. I recognize them because the number one reason for those mindset ideas is they feel like the structure constricts them.[00:10:04] But what I want you to realize is within that structure, you have the freedom to do anything that you want to do. So I want you to think about when your children were small or if you have small children. Now you may say to a child, go to your room and play and do anything you want. Or you may say, go into the backyard and do anything you want.[00:10:29] You may say, go to the front yard, do anything you want, you may say, do anything you want, but do not leave our blocker our street. That's just giving them some structure. We'll work with him, artists all the time. Work with structure musicians, work with structure. Construction people work within a structure.[00:10:53] There are guidelines that we get these beautiful buildings, but they know how to play within their structure. The first thing you have to do is realize the principle of freedom and structure, freedom, and structure. And the second thing you have to realize, you have to do the hard work, which keeps it simple.[00:11:12] And for your message to be effective, you got to put it in a structure of some sort. And number two, you got to do the hard work and keep it simple.[00:11:25] Now, if you begin to work with this, you will find some conflict. The first conflict I get is structure versus freedom. If there's structure, there's no freedom. And I just shared with you that if you work with the right structure, you have the freedom to do anything that you want. The second conflict I get a lot of is skill versus style.[00:12:29] When I'm teaching the class and our traditional three-day program around delivery content and interaction. As I'm teaching some of the delivery mechanics around posture and eye contact and gestures, how you move in space, someone will say, Bart, that's a style I don't want. And I have to share it with them. I'm not teaching style.[00:12:53] I'm teaching you the skills that enhance your style. So think, for example, bill Clinton, I'm not talking politics here. Just think about his communication style. Most people would say he's laid back conversational, very comfortable. Now, if I gave you Colin Powell, most people would come back and say more deliberate, more authoritative in the way he comes across.[00:13:27] I would agree most likely from his military background. Those two men, their style is as different as the color of their skin. But if you study their skill sets, they're very similar. They twist and tweak the skills to make it work for

Welcome to the remarkability Institute podcast. This is Bart Queen , your host. I hope all of you are doing well today. [00:01:46] I typically get asked how do I go from feeling confident? To not feeling confident to feeling confident to not feeling confident. And a lot of times, people let their emotions drive them if there's anything that I've found out in my experience of helping and coaching folks. [00:02:07] Is that emotions have no intelligence when it comes to the skillset of communication. Now, as we spend our time together today. What I'd like you to do is open up your mind to the three goals and the five components that will help you become more effective or what I call a more strategic communicator. [00:02:29] I think if you have an open mind around those things, you'll gain some principles and ideas today in our short amount of time together. That you can immediately, make an application to implement into your life and see the effects. The outcomes and the results that happen from it. [00:02:47] I want you to go from this idea of how everything feels to a place where you're relying on the skillset to carry you through every single time. [00:02:59] Now, to lead you to those skill sets, I want to lay one more piece of the foundation that I think is important. And that's the three overall arching goals that each one of us should have in the way that we communicate. [00:03:12] Now, this applies to whether you're giving a keynote speech. You're doing a presentation. You're doing a one-on-one, you're doing a training class. You're having a conversation with your children. I have found that these three goals go all the way across the board. Goal number one is to build trust. This should be the most important thing that we do when we're communicating with our family, our friends, and our clients. [00:03:41][00:03:41] There's one important principle in this idea of building trust. Something I picked up out of a book called God is a sales person. Now it's not a religious book, but the author drives this point home. He said that people buy trust before they buy a solution tool or product. You also said that people buy trust before they buy the provider, meaning you or me.[00:04:06] The CEO of Pepsi once said that the new global currency, the new global currency, is not going to be money. It's going to be trusted. So the question that you have to face and the question that I have to face every single day is how do we build trust between yourself and the people that you're communicating with. [00:04:29] I think every day before we. Let our feet hit the floor with our families and with our children with our spouses. We should. I ask ourself as a simple question. What's the one thing I can do today to deepen the trust in my relationship with my spouse? I'm up. With my children. How can I deepen that trust between my company and my clients? [00:04:52] How can I deepen that trust between myself, my company, and the marketplace? [00:04:59] Now, I believe that there are four key pillars to building trust and how we communicate. Pillar number one. Is that our content must be clear. It must be clear. [00:05:13] It has to be easy to understand. So here's a principle I want you to make a note. If you happen to be listening or you've got a pen and paper in front of you. I want you to write this down. A confused mind will always say no. A confused mind will always say no. I got that principle out of a book called real leaders. Don't do PowerPoint. [00:05:35] Tremendous book. If you have not read it, I highly recommend you pick it up. But the author drives this idea home that as soon as someone says in their head, I don't get what you're telling me. They stop listening, and then we've lost all the way through. A confused mind will always say no. Pillar number one; your content has to be clear. [00:05:58] Pillar number two, your content has to be concise. [00:06:03] We know for a fact that most people are verbose. You've got somebody that you, you listen to, maybe a friend, and you find a look at them and say, what's the point. W, w. W. What are you trying to get to? What are you trying to tell me? Your information has to be concise. It's easy for all of us to be verbose much more difficult. [00:06:23] To be concise. I always remember something that Winston Churchill said. He said the shortest speeches are always the toughest because it requires an economy of words. So it's not the idea of how do I tell them more anymore. It's how do I get them to remember more; you remember that and one of the podcasts if you listened to in the past. [00:06:45] So the first two pillars or it has to be clear and it's got to be concise. The third pillar is critical as you and I communicate about our companies. It has to be consistent. [00:06:59] One of the companies that I've had a longterm relationship with when I was speaking with the. The CMIO. I said, what's the biggest challenge that you face in communicating with your company. And he said the biggest challenge I face is a clear, consistent message out in the marketplace. So he said, Bart, do me a favor. [00:07:18] Go out and talk to the employees. Ask five, six, seven, ten employees who we are and what we do and come back and share with me. What was the response that you got? I did just exactly what I wanted. He asked me to do. I came back, and I said, here's what I found. Every single employee gave me a different answer to the question. [00:07:38] On who they are and what they do. That lack of consistency. Creates confusion in the marketplace. Well, one sales person says the other sales person has to be able to say now that can vary just a little bit, but the essence of the message has to be the same. This is another place for that seven-factor phrase that I've mentioned in the past comes in. That gives you that kind of consistency in your message. [00:08:08] And the last pillar in developing this sense of trust. Is your competency your competency? Now what I mean by that are your stories, your examples, and your experiences. This allows you to bring your individual Allotey to the company message. This brings your uniqueness to the message. It allows you to tailor that message depending on who you're speaking to. [00:08:34] It allows you to personalize it. [00:08:38] That very first overarching goal is this idea that we have to build trust. And the four key pillars to building trust. It has to be clear. It has to be concise. It has to be consistent. And you bring in your competency, your uniqueness. Now, the second overall arching goal that we need to think about when we communicate is you have to be able to build a relationship. [00:09:03] There are two things here. I want you always to remember people buy from people. People don't buy from companies. They buy from people. And the second thing I want you to think about in that principle is that people buy from people that they like. That they like. So if we look at these first two goals, we have two factors that we have to build. Number one, we have to build a trust factor, and we have to be able to build that quickly.[00:09:30] So think about if you're giving a keynote speech, you want to build that trust factor almost immediately you want people in your audience saying, wow, I'm just like Bart. I'm just like a bill. I'm just like John. I'm just like Mary. You want that to happen quickly. That's building that trust factor. [00:09:47] The second thing you want to do is build that likability factor. [00:09:53] You've you all know someone, or you've met someone where you first meet them, and you go, wow. I don't think I want to build any type of relationship with them, and there are other people that you meet and you go, wow. I want to tell that person in my life story. A lot of times, that can be based on that trust and that likability factor. [00:10:11] Think about a time when you've gone to a social gathering, it looks across the room, and you saw someone, and they had a big smile on their face, and they were laughing, and you go, I'd like to get to know that person. And then there's someone sending on the other side of the room that maybe has a very stern look on your face and think, Whoa, wow. I probably don't. [00:10:27] They're not very approachable. That's that likability factor. [00:10:32] I think we see this evident in the example of people who Cut our hair both for men and women. I know for myself, I go to a very specific barbershop. There are four men in that barbershop. They're all great barbers. There are two. I prefer to cut my hair. And this barbershop, you don't make appointments. [00:10:55] You just walk in, and you have to wait, and sometimes I have to wait a long time to get to the barber of mind choice. [00:11:02] Now for those of you who make appointments, maybe you've walked into make your appointment, and the receptionist says, gee, I'm sorry that the person who cuts your hair, they just went home ill. They feel really bad, but they set it up for someone else to cut your hair. [00:11:17] Most of the time, people are going to say it's okay. I appreciate that, but let me reschedule. That's the idea of that trust and likability factor. I will ask a lot of women in my class. How long has that person been cutting your hair? And they'll say ten years, 15 years. And I'll give that example, and I say, what would you do? Would you reschedule, or would you let the person do it? [00:11:40] And nine times out of 10. They'll say I'll just reschedule. [00:11:46] Building those first two factors of building trust and relationships are critical and the way that we communicate. Now, the third overarching goal is this idea of engagement. Let me give you the definition of engagement. Engagement is the ability to. Get the listener to listen to respond, and interact. [00:12:12] Engagement is the ability to get the listener to listen, respond, and interact. Now, if you've paid attention to some of my other podcasts, I gave you some statistics, for example, in face to face. You've only got 30 seconds. I