THE VIRTUAL COMMUNICATOR: It’s Not as Easy as it Seems

Our “new normal” as virtual communicators has progressed in the last few months. As we’ve talked to clients, the first conversations were about how “easy it was” to make systems and processes work virtually. Corporate teams did a great job of setting up transitions and processes to move a workforce to a virtual setting. The first focus was the technology of communication…but it wasn’t as easy as it seemed.

Then, the conversation shifted to communicators and we were asked: “What should leaders be doing to create a virtual culture?” This was our article, “Leading through Video” that focused on how to stay visible with employees. Overnight, a leader’s toolkit expanded. Many had to adapt quickly to engage an invisible audience in virtual town halls and conferences…and it wasn’t as easy as it seemed.

And now, conversations are shifting from leaders to everybody else, and we’re hearing: “We need help with this. We don’t understand the ground rules of virtual communication. My team can’t run meetings, my team can’t lead customer conversations, my managers can’t influence their teams. We need help with platforms, we need help with focus, we need help with engagement.” None of it was  as easy as it seemed

How can that be?

Remote working and virtual working may not be synonymous. Remote working is a term we’ve used for a while to refer to someone who doesn’t come into the office. They may work remotely every day or just some days. It implies a different way of working and sometimes a different schedule. Remote workers set their own timeline, their own space and their own approach to their role. It works well for people who can work independent of almost everyone else.

When we made everyone virtual, we realized that every employee couldn’t work independent every day. We needed to communicate and interact with each other. And most people can feel work happening if they can “see” work. So overnight, virtual working required video. It’s a good way to get interaction and to talk to someone.

But it also required employees to sit at a computer and interact with a laptop screen for 8+ hours every day. It’s like playing a video game for hours on end. It wears you out. And it didn’t really follow the same practices of a remote worker who’s working, but within their guidelines and time frames. And very few were sitting for 8+ hours.

And now we’ve figured it out. It isn’t the same setting, and it isn’t as easy as it seems. In fact, it’s different from both perspectives.

For a listener, it’s more removed and more independent. You can get most of the experience through video, but it’s not always clear and focused. That’s because communicators are distracted by new steps and not always “ready” to manage a meeting. Listeners also have a harder time interacting with other listeners. It’s not like sitting in a room and observing others. Technology controls your view, and you get a snapshot of those talking a lot, not those who are quiet. And if a listener doesn’t like the pace or the interaction, they have the power and independence over video to turn off their camera, turn off their audio and just “leave” for a few moments.

That changes the power of the communicator. We’re not used to people connecting and disconnecting so easily. It makes things very disjointed. While the listener is a little more distant, the video makes the communicator more intimate. It’s a close-up shot of you. Yes, you can change that if you know how, but some communicators aren’t really sure where the camera is. So, the snapshot may have them looking down, looking left or all around, and it makes it harder to focus on them and harder to hear what they say. And many communicators say they’re managing too much in this new format, and it feels like a juggling exercise to run a virtual meeting.

It is different, and it’s a new set of skills. And it’s why in response to the questions and discussion mentioned above, we’ve pulled our best practices together to create “The  Virtual Communicator” program for leaders, sales teams, internal teams, project teams, and anyone who is trying to improve their impact in a virtual setting.

Our premise is that it takes three things: Preparation, Participation and Presence.

Here are a few highlights from the program.

 

PREPARATION

We’ve always said that a prepared communicator sends an agenda in advance, so participants know what you expect them to do in an upcoming conversation. It’s a best practice for all meetings, and it’s a necessity for the virtual communicator. It’s hard for the virtual communicator to generate participation in the moment. When listeners aren’t prepared to participate, the virtual meeting falls flat. This makes the communicator lose confidence, and the listener lose interest. And that’s when listeners disconnect.  They can turn on/off technology at will.

Sometimes, technology is the challenge for communicators and listeners. Platforms are being over-worked, and they aren’t running beautifully. But most of it is operator error. The leader is dropping calls, dropping people, talking without sound, talking with too much sound, etc. The first two minutes of any virtual meeting should be ground rules for technology and participation. No one is doing it, and everyone needs it.

PARTICIPATION

Once the ground rules are set, the communicator has to signal participation. We introduce techniques for getting involvement early and keeping it throughout a meeting.

It takes facilitation skills, and few communicators have had much experience with facilitation.

Technology works against you on this one. Technology pulls the talkers front and center. If you’re speaking, you show up more on the screen. The communicator needs to know who isn’t talking to make sure they have everyone engaged. And the quiet listeners are hard to “see.” We’ve developed a simple workaround that helps a communicator track a full group and still keep their focus on the conversation.

PRESENCE

Your presence is as important on video as it is in a conference room. In fact, it’s a more intimate snapshot. We don’t see the communicator from head to toe. We see a close-up shot from the shoulders up which makes connection and expression the most critical style component.

That’s a challenge because many communicators don’t seem to know where the camera is. In order to make a listener feel seen, you have to be talking directly to them. Communicators seems to be looking down and all around. In the close-up shot, the lack of connection is front and center.

You can adjust the listeners’ view…. you can improve it, but you have to think about it. Some teams are having a lot of fun with backdrops. They are fun, but distorting, for important meetings. It seems as if someone is behind a curtain pulling on your body parts. Ears get cut off, arms seem to be broken, etc. It will be a “to do” for marketing teams to improve the green screen backdrops. For now, find a real setting in your house that works for important meetings to avoid the distraction.

 

It’s a new medium, and it requires a new set of skills. They aren’t totally different, but they aren’t as easy as they may seem. If you’re beginning to focus on the skills of your communicators, we’d like to help your team manage and improve their virtual setting.

Learn more and sign up for The Virtual Communicator today.

We’re here when you need us.

Key Learnings from Virtual Meetings

It seemed like an easy concept. With the mounting concerns around COVID-19, the order to “work from home,” took hold without a lot of debate or exception. But I’m told by many clients that the shift to 100% virtual wasn’t easy. It was more a herculean task as companies moved everything from call centers to billing departments into a make-shift home office. It was a frenzied pace and transition, and then all of a sudden, we were home… working.

For some employees, it’s been easier than they thought. For others, it’s been harder than they expected. And for everyone, there have been surprises and key learnings.

First, the surprises. Whether you work virtually every day, occasionally or not at all, the experience hasn’t been quite what anyone expected. Prior to COVID-19, leaders often asked us for help in managing a virtual workforce. And our advice has always been: “Turn the video on. It’s a much better meeting if you have a visual connection with an employee or a team.”

I felt heard on that point after seeing the significant increase in Zoom, BlueJeans, and Teams Meeting invites on calendars. Everyone is on video meetings. And, they’re exhausted by it. How can that be?  Because the video adds a requirement that we misunderstood. Historically, “work from home” meant I can manage a personal schedule on top of a work one. And that interpretation means everything from not dressing up today, to making lunch over sales reviews, managing errands or home repairs, etc. Until now, virtual working has been a multi-tasking opportunity.

It doesn’t mean people weren’t paying attention on conference calls, but they were rarely in front of a computer screen. So, they weren’t participating in the same way that we’re asking employees to participate now. And that realization has also highlighted some challenges in managing a virtual meeting.

Here are some thoughts on improving the virtual video experience.

GROUND RULES:

The Zoom screen full of faces isn’t the same as the room full of bodies. If you didn’t realize it before, you now know how much we rely on body language to get a group’s attention or to speak up in meetings. It isn’t as easy in a virtual format. So, the meeting lead needs to set ground rules for how to participate. There are tools within most platforms to raise hands, wave and forward questions. But you have to know how to use them and establish that you are using them in order for them to be effective. There aren’t universal rules. So, set your own and call them out at the start of every meeting.

INTERRUPTIONS:

We’re also learning how to manage interruptions from dogs barking to kids who need something. The responsibility for managing this lies on the participant more than the meeting lead. Participants should be alert to sound quality, noises in a house, etc. We are overloading all internet systems, and most virtual meetings have at least one person with technical difficulty. Have a plan for managing this. Respond quickly to an interruption on your end. It’s OK to have interruptions right now; it’s not so good to ignore them or to be slow in response to them.

During this time, meeting leads need to be lenient. Be aware of who is more challenged working from home. Some people are balancing a lot more than others. Once we reset and define new boundaries, you can reset expectations. For now, try to help individuals manage interruptions so that everyone gets value out of a virtual meeting.

PARTICIPATION:

In a virtual setting, we often say someone needs to participate in order to listen well. As a meeting lead, you should encourage and manage participation differently. In our remote meetings workshop, we coach facilitation tools to help someone manage a virtual group of people. One simple tool is to draw a picture to replicate a meeting setting. Then add names of people so that you have a snapshot of who is in your meeting. Keep track of participation and discussion with a tally beside each name so that you can “see” involvement and call on people who haven’t had an opportunity to speak up.

BREAKS:

If you’re running long meetings or back to back meetings, remember the surprise that most people have about working virtually. People weren’t sitting in front of a screen for a virtual meeting, and now we’re asking them to do that. Virtual participants were taking breaks during those calls; we just didn’t realize it. So, make breaks a part of a video meeting. There should be breaks in meetings that run more than 1.5 hours. And if you acknowledge this in your ground rules, you’re less likely to see people leave the meeting or turn off their video.

SOCIAL TIME:

The “work from home” format also takes the social time out of the workday. Many companies are creating social time. Team leads are being encouraged to host “happy hours, game nights, workout challenges, etc.” Every culture is different, but it’s a nice way to help employees connect with each other without a tight agenda. Keep it light, keep it optional and see if your team values it.

 

No matter when we shift to a “new normal,” we’ve learned a bit about working virtually. And I stand by my advice on the video format. It’s the best way to work because it sets expectations very similar to being in an office. It isn’t a punitive step for a virtual employee; it’s just a better way to work as a team because it improves listening and increases participation.

I expect we will redefine virtual working and reset expectations. Today, working virtually has become the catch phrase for a day an employee needs to be somewhere else and hopes to multi-task between personal and work activities. That’s different than someone who is working in a different location. If virtual working stays front and center, I suspect we will define it more clearly.

In the meantime, it’s smart to sharpen your skills as a virtual communicator. And if your team would like help setting new ground rules and leveraging a different skill set, we can help you do so.

Stay healthy and call us when you need us.

From Conference Events to Virtual Conference Experiences

As companies begin to talk about returning to work, one big decision they’ll have to make is around their customer conference or their year-end events. Big events in second quarter were canceled or shifted to a virtual format. Third quarter events seem to be shifting to virtual, and most fourth quarter events are still on the fence. It’s a tough decision with valid points on either side of it. We’ve been a part of the transformation as many events shifted to a virtual format and just two months in, the shift has generated great discussion, key learnings and a new set of best practices.

Here are seven best practices that we’re using to help our clients reset the conference experience.

1. Shift your thinking from a virtual event to a virtual experience.

When your customers gather on-site for a conference event, you’ve created a total experience from the look and feel of the venue to the added elements of meals, activities and socializing that are woven throughout the event. When the conference goes virtual, you have to recreate the experience as something on a screen.  And you have to help viewers participate in order to keep them active in the event. The shift from attendees to viewers is the best way to rethink the conference experience. And in most cases, it’s best to start with a clean slate and create a different kind of experience.

2. Imagine the viewers setting during the experience.

The predictions are that most people will be back at work by third quarter. So, your viewers are likely to be back in an office setting. Consider whether you’re building an experience for an individual or a team. Can you create activities that teams will do together as a part of the virtual experience or are you focused only on an individual experience? It makes a difference in the viewership you may get with customers. Many companies are finding the virtual setting is a good format to double their attendance because it’s much easier for multiple viewers to attend. And, it may create some live feeds into your event from a customer’s setting.

3. Bring it to life for viewers in advance.

Just like you build hype for attendees, you’ll need to build hype for viewers. Shift your investment in swag from things given away at a conference to things that viewers will receive in advance. Send a box of things they’ll need during the experience. Break them up and send them one at a time to build suspense. Get every viewer intrigued and invested before the virtual experience begins. Consider partnering with a food vendor for coupons or delivery to add something to the setting in advance.

4. Build an experience to pull viewers through rather than disconnected content to push out.

Just as you imagine the big ballroom at the center of the on-site experience, you need to start with the screen and the online experience. Shift the investment in the grand scale of things to the activity and movement of things. Viewers won’t watch for hours, but they will participate for hours. Think of the difference in someone who watches a video versus someone who plays a video game.

Map the experience on a screen.  Think through the interactive components that will keep a viewer involved and interested in what’s ahead. You don’t have to gamify your event, but you will need an interactive role for viewers.

We’ve seen great ideas emerge around games, an animated MC, a chat room on the side, and virtual events that pop-up throughout the day.

5. Limit keynotes and expand the short segments.

The big ballroom presentations are the keystone of big conferences. Virtually, they aren’t as impactful. Simplify and limit the number of keynotes and streamline the messaging delivered in this format. The impact of keynotes comes through with the energy created in a large setting with a large audience. You can’t create that feeling virtually, so don’t try. Instead, focus more on short segments that can be repurposed and leveraged after the conference.

6. Lighten up the format, the content and the visuals.

PowerPoint doesn’t translate well on video. It’s a flat medium; video is not. Avoid the traditional role of presenters and lean into the dynamics of conversation. Video is a great medium for short, succinct and impactful messages. Consider powerful images and music to add energy in a different way.

Viewers prefer the talk show format. It takes energy to pull viewers in, and it helps for communicators to have a partner to help build this energy.

7. Add sizzle, surprise and reward.

You can keep viewers interested with a format that includes surprises and giveaways along the way. If you want viewers to participate throughout the day, incentivize them to do so. You’re competing with things that are happening all around them. You want to keep their focus on the screen or pull it back to the screen repeatedly.

One client knew the virtual format would require breaks. And, they were worried about getting viewers back after breaks. So, they made breaks longer and called them “walk abouts”. They kept talking, but they used light conversation to loosen up the format and keep content flowing. They never really disconnected with viewers, but it made it very easy for someone to leave a desk or chair and wander around for a period of time. These became some of the highest rated elements of their conference!

 

As we’ve worked on this new format, we’ve seen a lot of creativity and a lot of learning. And, I know we will see companies leverage the virtual channel very differently as we move ahead. We’ve also seen many challenges with this format. It isn’t an easy transition for a communicator, but it can be an impactful one when you learn the skills of structuring for a virtual viewer and connecting with an invisible audience. There’s no doubt, the time is right to add this skill to your toolkit.

Let us know if you need help with a virtual conference or a virtual meeting.

And as always, we’re here when you need us.

LEADING THROUGH VIDEO:An Essential Tool for Remote Working

Chances are you’ve been the “star” of a few corporate videos. It’s a good medium for communicators because it’s short and to the point. Video makes messaging easy to access and available 24/7.

When we became a virtual workforce overnight, many leaders were nudged toward it as the only communication channel. And if your instinct was to leverage it, it was a good instinct.  More than anything you can say to employees over a conference call or in an email, you can express it better if they can see your face. It’s not a time for wordsmithing as much as it is a time for sharing emotion. Employees need to see confidence, calmness and warmth.

So, if you’ve jumped fully into video, it’s the right channel. But it introduces some unique challenges for leaders who aren’t great at it and may now be producing videos without much support.

Here are our best practices to consider.

 

STAGING THE VIDEO:

Frame the Shot: Everyone says the shots should be informal, and leaders should let employees see them at home. My guidance is: yes and no. Yes, be honest and real about working from home. Try to match the culture of your company. But, be mindful that you are still leading, so seeing a bed in the background or chaos in a kitchen distracts from that impression. The shot can be as informal as you want it to be; just be sure it’s intentional.

You can also frame the shot around something personal that helps you build a story or share a little more of yourself. It’s been fun in the last few weeks helping leaders add a little energy to these videos. Some have picked songs that are reflective of their days; others have shared something happening in their households. Depending on the message of your video, a little humanity and little moments can keep someone connected to the team.

Pick the Setting: The best video shot is framed in a setting. It can be any setting, but it should be a setting. You can be framed by a bookcase behind you or a picture behind you. Think about putting yourself in a picture frame and take a few pictures so that you can test the setting before taping.

We’ve seen several videos taken outside as Spring settles in, and yards seem bright and colorful. If cheerful and uplifting is part of your message, the setting can help. Some messages aren’t as light today, and you should be sensitive to settings in your home or surroundings that express more about economic means than you may want to. A video is captured forever, and things you don’t notice because they are a part of your life are quickly noticed by others.

Leverage Equipment: Based on social distancing, many leaders are having to produce the videos themselves. You can do a few simple things to make a video a little more interesting. Great videos are shot with multiple cameras to allow for editing in different views. This keeps movement in a video which keeps the attention of the viewer. You can‘t bring in a camera crew today, but you can produce two different views if you have someone who can edit remotely. We’ve done this with two iPads focused on two different shots: close-up and further away. Keep in mind that all shots are best if aimed straight on shot with a slight down view on the communicator. Avoid a camera shot that is lower or looks up at a communicator.

 

TAPING THE VIDEO:

Plan the Content: Leaders always say they want to be conversational on videos. It’s the right idea, but it’s hard to execute on video. Unscripted tapings which were meant to be conversational usually sound like rambling. The informal approach to talking to a group in a live setting has to be more scripted via video. It seems counterintuitive, but it’s not.

As viewers, we expect videos to be short and to the point. You need a tight outline or a script to get to succinct thoughts that capture a viewer’s attention. Make it easy for viewers to stay with you for two to three minutes. The conversational approach actually comes through more in your tone and expression than your words. And that’s one of the hardest things to do over video.

Plan the Connection: The reason that tone and expression are hard via video is that there’s actually no one on the other side of the conversation. The communicator doesn’t have a listener, and that missing component has tough side effects for a communicator. When you aren’t talking to someone, bad habits creep in. Many communicators will stay in their head thinking about the talk track. The face becomes void of expression and the eyes seem harder as if someone is staring ahead versus talking with someone.

This is one of the hardest skills to develop. You can learn to simulate connection and bring expression into a video with a listener, but it takes work.  In these unprecedented times, the easier approach may be to put a listener on the other side of the camera. Kids can do this; spouses can do this. It helps immensely to have someone listening to you.

Talk to the Camera: The live listener will also help you with focus. When you tape a video, you need to keep your focus toward the camera. It seems counter intuitive because connection usually moves around a room to pull in different listeners. With video, there is only one listener represented by the camera. Your focus and engagement are all toward the camera so that viewers feel that you’re talking to them versus looking away from them.

Stand or Sit: When we produce videos, I prefer to have someone sit on a stool. We coach the concept of forward intent, and it’s harder via video than it is in person. The reason is that video is more two dimensional than three, so the concept of forwardness has to be more exaggerated on video. And it’s easiest to do on a high stool without a back. This prevents leaning back and allows someone to get their feet off the floor and onto the rungs of the stool. This way, you’ll sit back and lean forward.

Video is a different medium for leaders and a very effective way to connect with employees right now. If you’re producing videos, we can help. Call us for a virtual rehearsal, and we’ll help you put the steps above in place.  And if you aren’t producing videos but you’re leveraging video for team meetings and customer calls, we’ll soon be sharing our best practices for video meetings.

We’re here when you need us.

IT’S GETTING PERSONAL – Some Guidance for Managers

The last few weeks have been hard on everyone, and we’re still working through what a pandemic means for each of us and our families. Our thoughts and prayers go out to anyone who is dealing with COVID-19 in their homes and with their loved ones.

It has disrupted our work and our families, and we still don’t know what lies ahead. And neither do any of the managers trying to support and guide people through this uncertainty.

The role of the manager has lost its boundaries in the last few weeks.

Because once employees watch CNN, Fox News, local networks and all online news feeds for an update, they’re getting on calls with their managers and bringing their concerns and questions to those calls. Some concerns are about the work at hand, but most are about what’s ahead and how this will impact me.

It’s a role that a lot of managers just aren’t ready for. It’s ballooned beyond what I owe you today to what happens to me tomorrow. Emotions are on edge, protocols are forgotten, and managers are dealing with more neediness than they’ve seen before.

And, some managers are overwhelmed. This is so much more than managing work process and individual contributions.  It’s getting personal to people’s lives and what they’re dealing with in their virtual setting from simple things like home schooling and groceries to complex things like worrying about elderly parents and wondering how to keep your family and friends safe.  It’s humanity.  It’s up close and personal, and it’s overwhelming to someone who didn’t really sign up to take on counseling.

It’s a tough role; it’s a tough time. And as one colleague said, “This is when we’ll figure out who the strong people leaders really are.”

Whether you’re a young manager trying to navigate the blurred lines or an overwhelmed one looking for a few best practices, here are our thoughts on connection that could help out.

JUST LISTEN.

If you’re feeling overwhelmed by all the questions coming your way, don’t worry about providing  answers.  There aren’t concrete answers available right now.  Just listen. A starting point for anyone feeling overwhelmed or scared is to feel that someone is listening to those concerns.

Listen and acknowledge the worries.  Keep in mind that some employees live alone, and it won’t take many days of work from home to feel alone and lonely. Be a simple point of connection.  Listen and acknowledge the feelings that you hear.

REMEMBER ME.

Even though you’re juggling multiple things and jumping from call to call, your team doesn’t see it. They don’t have visibility to the line outside your office or your calendar invites which keep moving around.  They lose perspective on the tugs of your time, and you may lose a little perspective on their inputs as they ask for connection.

If you manage a large team, you may find it helpful to take notes and keep track of what I told you about my family or my roommates.  It will mean everything to me if you remember me when we talk again. And when people are under stress, they don’t remember as well as they normally do.

BE OPEN OR BE STILL.

You have a choice in what you share about your life and your family. In the last two weeks, some managers have felt invigorated to share their personal lives and home hurdles, and others feel like their entire team just moved into their living room.  Some managers are very open about their personal lives; others are more cautious.  And both reactions are OK.  You can define your boundaries and how front and center you want your whole life to be to others.

You owe employees a listening moment, not always your life story. You should always be present with your team, but it’s more about the team than the deep dive into you.

HEAR THE WEIGHT; DON’T WEAR IT.

You can’t solve this for everyone.  It’s going to be a long and hard process.  And you don’t have to.  You can hear me without taking on my challenges. Be very careful about that.  There is an art to learning how to help someone else feel better without making yourself feel worse. Focus on making someone feel heard, not solving their problem.  Notice we keep coming back to…. Just Listen.

KEEP WALKING.

I have four siblings and lots of nieces and nephews.  And when my father died, we had a house full of people working through the grief and the logistics. It was sad, it was close, and it was a little suffocating. And over the course of those days, we walked miles and miles…never all together and never fully alone.  We just seemed to pair up and take walks.  It was about getting space, breathing deeper, and resetting ourselves. It was the simple-ness of doing something. Take the space you need, especially when you’re in a newly defined workspace.  Take the time you need to breathe and clear your head.

YOU BEFORE ME.

It seems counterintuitive to tell a manager to put themselves first.  But the reality is no one is their best under pressure.  Nerves get frayed, and emotions run high.  You don’t want to be back on your heels, but the circumstances are not normal. Your team needs you to bring your best game.  Find a way to start each day with you.  Whatever it takes for you to focus your mind, open your heart and just take this one day at a time.

We’re here when you need us.

Don’t Blame PowerPoint!

Next to a laptop, PowerPoint (PPT) could be considered one of the top three tools used in business. More than 30 million presentations are built in the software every day tying up 15 million people hours at a cost of $252 million…..every single day! And yet, few of us are Masters of it. In fact, we have a love/hate relationship with the software which has led to the term, “death by PPT.”

AT SW&A, we hear a lot of the angst around preparing presentations blamed on the software.

From the listeners:

• “There were too many details and too much information.”
• “I got lost in the details and didn’t understand what the listener was asking me to do.”
• “It’s a horrible eye chart.”

From the communicators:

• “We go through more than 15 iterations of decks before we have a final presentation.”
• “I got so many edits to my slides that I’ve lost the point I was trying to make.”
• “I’m not artistic or creative; I hate building slides.”

And our response is always: Don’t blame PPT.

It’s the process…or lack of a process…that frustrates you. Not the software.

Here’s a little self-diagnosis.

Assume that you’re asked to deliver a presentation two weeks from today.  Whether you start planning it today or wait until next week to develop it, how many of you will start the process by opening up a PPT document on your laptop?

If this sounds like you, stay with me. Then, you begin outlining points by putting a text box on each slide or if you’ve covered the topic previously, you’ll open up another PPT and begin to migrate slides to your new deck. Either way, you’re building the foundation of your content, one slide at a time.

It’s a very linear approach to structure, and it’s the wrong approach.

Because now you have a collection of details instead of a storyline, and you will present the deck slide by slide versus concept linked to concept.

Is this your approach?  Most people say yes.

When PPT is used as the planning tool, it becomes cumbersome to work with and takes on a very different role. PPT’S role is to help you illustrate details or connect two points, not to thread all the points together.  That’s the role of an outline or storyline structure as we refer to it. The usage numbers above may explain this.  Because organizing content has become such a constant in our day, we may be telling ourselves that we can skip a step and organize our thoughts at the same time as we illustrate them. And, that’s a misuse of PPT.

The storyline structure is the first step, always. Whether you use our model or you have your own tool, as the communicator, you should always start with an end to end view of what you’re asking the listener to do. It’s rarely the details that fail in presentations; it’s always the connection between them.

A storyline view helps a communicator understand the bigger ideas and repeatable points that will lead the listener to an outcome or takeaway.  This changes how you build out a PPT.

When PPT becomes the second step, it works beautifully for the communicator and the listener. A broader storyline helps the listener see beyond what you’re illustrating and understand why you’re illustrating it. The communicator’s focus gets simpler and key concepts get repeated as the communicator focuses on pulling ideas forward rather than making every point.

PPT is also a horrible communicator and a really good illustrator.

Let’s diagnose that one.

Assume that the presentation you’re building is for another leader to deliver or it has such high visibility that several people want to give input before you deliver it. So, you work on the PPT for a few days and then you forward it for feedback.

Does this sound like you?  Then, what you may not realize is that even though you shared it for feedback, you were pretty locked into those slides. And your editors now begin to interpret what the slides mean.  They can see the illustration; they just don’t know the storyline. So, they create their own mental storyline to support your details. Then, they edit to their own thinking.

This leads to adding content on your slides, reordering your slides and even adding new slides to support their thinking. You get the edits back and don’t feel grateful for the input.  You’re frustrated. Because they’ve changed the meaning of your slides and thrown off the flow of your storyline. At least the storyline you have in your head.  Because it was never shared as a structure for the conversation.

Have you had this experience? Most people say yes.

 

The storyline drives communication; PPT creates illustration. If an editor can read a storyline to see the end to end plan for communication, they are much less likely to edit slides.  Instead, they’ll identify areas of the storyline that aren’t easy to understand or where they want you to add detail.

In fact, when a team is involved in preparing a presentation, we urge communicators to get buy-in to the storyline first before PPT is even introduced. This helps a group align to the full direction of communication and the big ideas before the supporting PPT takes shape. And it keeps a team moving through the organization process together. Then when you move to PPT, the second step, the feedback is limited to the look and feel of illustrations.

As a communicator, you want listeners spending less time on how to follow your thoughts and more time on understanding how the big ideas connect and lead to outcomes.

And if we’re pleased with the transformation we see when individuals add our first step  into content planning, we’re ecstatic when we see teams adopt it. Because if an individual can improve a single meeting, the full team can change their influence in an organization.

We know because we’ve made it happen.

We’ve taken many teams beyond the storyline structure to a team template that gives the communicators a template to follow and the listeners a consistent expectation. So, listeners spend less time trying to follow the structure and more time hearing the ideas.

When teams adopt a standard structure, it quickly takes hold in an organization. They become known for their ability to deliver clear ideas and recommendations which often raises their visibility in a company.

If you’re getting bogged down in details and edits, don’t blame PPT. Put the first step back into your process. And if you’d like some help learning to do that, join us for an upcoming storylines workshop. Even better, bring your team together and strengthen the group’s impact across your organization.

Call us when you need us.

With SW&A, Your Troubles Will be Out of Sight

You’re ready for some Christmas cheer
And the magical sound of eight tiny reindeer;
But before you can get to calm and bright
You have one last presentation to wrap tonight.

Those chestnuts are roasting, but you feel the fire
As your boss’s voice echoes like the Tabernacle choir;
You waited too late to do this and can only blame yourself
Your resources are now helpless – like that elf on a shelf.

It doesn’t have to be this way
Dashing through slides the night before
If you’ll only remember that a storyline
Takes a message, a framework and little more.

So while you feel like crying this time
There’s no need to pout and I’m telling you why
SW&A can help solve this
With a twitch of a nose and the blink of an eye.

And while we don’t climb down any chimneys
We’ll work our magic even when you’re awake;
Because while presentations can be bad or good
Make yours great… for goodness sake!

So, add us to your development plan
And check that list twice
Because when SW&A guides your content
Your troubles will be out of sight!

Happy Holidays from the SW&A Team! 

Retirements, Weddings and Funerals

Whether you’re a frequent communicator or an occasional one, chances are you’ve had the experience and pressure of speaking at some of life’s most important moments. Whether it’s a colleague’s retirement, a friend’s wedding or a loved one’s funeral, these important life moments raise the bar on wanting to get the message right and covering all the highlights.

I’ve helped with these moments hundreds of times by writing a toast, editing a eulogy, or bringing humor to a retirement speech. And in each instance, the communicator shares the concern and pressure of getting it right and saying it all. They feel responsible for communicating the importance of the individual as well as their relationship with them.

It’s a classic example of the difference between a communicator who is worried about everything they need to say and loses focus on what a group of listeners really want to hear. I had to follow my own advice a week ago when my son got married, and it brought the “rules of engagement” for these short speeches top of mind. 

Like any speech, success is defined by what listeners want to hear.

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The “rules of engagement” are:

Make a Point.

While most speakers feel the pressure to give a summary of events or cover a timeline, it’s better to make a single point than talk through a laundry list of points. Listeners want to hear one or two points about an individual, not every point. In fact, the most important goal is to connect the audience or group to the individual being honored, and it works much better to focus on a few ideas and bring them to life with stories.  

Stories set time, place and situation. So even listeners who weren’t a part of the story can connect to the situation and relate to the individual because of it.

Use Humor. 

All life moments include emotion. Whether it’s grief or joy, speakers often get overwhelmed by emotion during their remarks. It’s fine to share emotion and acknowledge it as part of your remarks. But in most of these situations, the listeners really want to be entertained. They want to laugh and connect to the humanity of the individual. Sharing sentiment is good; but a speech based entirely on emotion rarely works because it leaves the listeners focused on the communicator rather than the honoree.

Avoid Inuendoes.

While there may be a few stories or events that are unique to you and the honoree, if you aren’t comfortable being clear about the event, don’t talk about it. There’s nothing worse than a speech that has vague references or hints about something that a group doesn’t understand. If you have a story that’s inappropriate for the group but important to you, talk about the topic rather than the event and focus on how the honoree handled it or what you learned about them as a result of going through it. 

End with Impact.

Endings are as important as openings in these speeches. Work to connect how the speech begins with how it ends. Listeners like to hear the connection between how you started and how you ended. It adds impact, surprise and validates that you led them to a point.

Prepare & Practice.

Finding time to prepare remarks for an unexpected life moment or a long-planned one is difficult. This is where the pressure is real because listeners expect thoughts to be planned in a way that helps them celebrate an event, mourn a loss or bring closure to a career. 

And when a communicator rambles through thoughts, it frustrates listeners and they seem to miss the point of why they are together. In time-pressed situations, give yourself permission to tell one story and practice delivering it well. It’s less about making profound remarks and all about connecting the listeners to the honoree.

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“So, how well did the communication coach follow her own rules?“

And since I confessed that the “rules of engagement” were real for me a week ago, you may be  wondering:  So, how well did the communication coach follow her own rules? Pretty well, but it wasn’t easy.

Like most communicators, I had a lifeline to cover and wanted to be sure that I expressed my love and pride in my son a hundred times over. I felt the pressure to say it all as no one, but his Mother, could. Well actually, I guess his Father could cover the same lifeline, so we decided to deliver our toast together. That complicated things!

His father was happy for me to write it, but he wanted editing rights. Fair compromise. As we worked on our point, several stories and experiences hit the edit floor. And, I made us stay true to a point. We focused on two attributes of his personality that everyone in the room had experienced, and we built most of his friends into the examples we gave so that the listeners felt a part of our story.

We added humor in our delivery with back and forth banter and a story that illustrated our two different perspectives as parents. We connected the opening to the close and wrapped up with a final message to his bride.

Did it work? I think so. A lot of laughter, a few tears and a special hug were our proof points. But mostly for me, a good reminder that these short speeches are less about saying the right thing and all about connecting people to each other to celebrate important life moments.

And whether your speech is a life moment, a career moment or just a routine one, it’s our goal to help you connect with listeners. 

Call us when you need us!

Creating High-Performing Teams

As leaders step into new roles and realign strategies, they almost always adjust their teams. It makes sense. Leaders need people that they can trust, and they want people that they have experience with. In short order, they bring trusted colleagues into their group. It gives them peace of mind and an established working pattern, but it doesn’t immediately yield a high-performing team.

In fact, it can create competing priorities on a leadership team. As strategies get realigned, it shifts focus, responsibility and some initiatives. And unintentionally, peers can get on opposite sides of an issue from one another. The real risk of conflict is competition among the leaders’ employees who can feel as if they’re working on opposing teams. This creates friction within a culture and angst among employees. In order for employees to align behind strategies, the leadership team has to appear to be aligned with each other. And that doesn’t happen without effort.

To drive fast results, leaders create great 1:1 relationships with members of their team but they don’t always take the time or have the time to help the new colleagues build relationships with each other. In fact, the 1:1 approach can eliminate any need for peers to collaborate with each other.  When this happens, leaders have strong relationships but lack the bench strength that they’d like to have, the team trust that they need to have or the support system that the team needs.

Over time, it may sort itself out among the peers or by the leader.  But time is the one thing that organizations don’t seem to have these days. And, that’s why we’re often asked to help a leader accelerate the process.

Essentially, you’re trying to establish openness and candid feedback in order to work toward trust.

A high-performing team has three core qualities.

• They value diverse thinking.

  They’ve learned to see their peers beyond functional responsibility.  Instead, they value the way peers think and they learn to seek out the added perspective in their own decision making.

• They share ownership.

  A true team mentality comes from working together and solving together. They understand that they will have to compromise or improvise on most initiatives. They respect that multiple perspectives are usually better than a single one. And once their voice is heard, they align to the decision of the team.  

• They trust each other.

  Trust is an earned relationship and a goal the team reaches over time. By accelerating openness of thought and feedback, trust becomes a more intentional goal rather than evolving over time with trials and missteps along the way.

So how do you get a peer group there quickly? By focusing on the first two qualities in a way that lays the foundation for trust to develop. 

We follow a three-step process with teams to improve how they interact with each other and to strengthen their impact across a company.

First, we get to openness by putting each leader’s brand and peer impressions on the table for discussion. With our help, each individual understands how they’re perceived within a group today and what the group expects from them. We help each individual understand their strengths/challenges, and the areas where they will need to improve to win trust with their peers. We talk through the aspiration of a high-performing team and what each member needs to feel a part of it. This work is done without the leader and begins the process of empowering a team.

Second, we work to help each individual introduce new skills into the team. This may take shape in a workshop or across projects with a partner.  To value diverse thinking, the group has to begin to experience it. The openness of feedback and willingness to grow together sets the right environment for peers to speak up and get outside of their function area more often.

And finally, the leader has to adjust to a team mentality versus the 1:1 relationship that they may have started. While 1:1 expedites activity and gives the leader quick insights, it can also blindside buy-in across a group.  Leaders need help learning to defer decisions to group settings and shut down some of the side conversations that lead to misalignment. When a team senses that a leader has trust in them, they begin to respect the perspectives and ideas of one another. This drives more honesty in the room and ultimately works toward building trust for decision making within the team.

A high-performing team leads to a high-performing organization.

But with today’s pace of change across leaders and teams, most groups need a little help. If you’re leading a new team, a great starting point is peer feedback and honest impressions. And if the timing is right, we’d be happy to talk through how we might develop a plan for your team.

Call us when you need us!

CHANGE: An Advantage or Disruption to Early Career Employees?

We’ve all heard the catch phrases:  “Change is the New Normal” or “The Only Thing Constant Is Change.” And, certainly in the workplace, they’ve proven to be true.  But we hear much less about the impact of that change on employees. Especially those who are newer to the workforce and trying to establish a foundation for a career path.

Companies are focused on the mid-tier group, the new leaders. The pace of change is creating more opportunity than it ever has for those who are close to leadership. Opportunities are coming faster, the landscape is bigger and it’s why leadership development teams have focused on this group. And we’ve partnered with companies to expand the skills of these new leaders.

But most recently, we’ve paid attention to the impact of change on a different group….the early career employees.

The first decade of a career builds the foundational skills that define a career path. Leaders who started careers 20+ years ago didn’t navigate their careers at the same pace. They had more time, more direction and more support.  Now that they’ve become the group competing for the opportunities, they have less time and less focus to mentor the newest generation in the workforce.

But the bigger challenge is that the model for establishing a career foundation has changed significantly. Most early career employees don’t have the right guidelines. This employee group is trying to navigate a path that hasn’t been traveled by anyone else. 

So, we’ve taken an interest in helping early career employees navigate their career. And we’ve focused on our three “V’s” that best support career advancement in today’s shifting environments:  Visibility, Value and Velocity.

VISIBILITY

The number of managers most employees have in the first decade of their career has continued to climb. On average, most have had seven different managers at the end of ten years, which means having a new boss every 18 months.

Some of that change is their own doing by moving to different companies, but the pattern of a single manager promoting you within a company and creating the next opportunity for you is no longer the model.  Very early on, employees need to learn how to build relationships and create visibility for themselves.  To gain visibility, you have to build your unique network within a company early so that your success is lined up to multiple people and not a single (often revolving) track.

VALUE 

Access to leaders is easier today than ever before. Leaders want to hear all ideas, but you have to know how to position ideas with them. You need to know how to add value to the conversation.  For years, we’ve helped seasoned managers get a seat at the table by building conversations with measurable outcomes. And today, we’re helping a younger employee understand the leader’s perspective.

VELOCITY

There are confusing messages about how to work in corporate America. To attract employees, employers have offered many incentives:  unlimited vacation, flexible schedules and every sort of amenity from onsite childcare to ping-pong.  But for a generation that hasn’t fully developed a work ethic, it can be a little misleading.  It could suggest “do things when you want” and “get things to me when you can.” 

That’s incongruent with the pace of work. The typical front-line job requires upwards of 50 hours a week and can reach much longer during heavy “sprint” periods.  And with an early career employee expected to work nine to ten hours a day amongst unlimited choices, a few poor choices are likely to be made.

Gaining visibility and adding value to a conversation only matters if you’re willing to work hard to deliver on a result.  You have to put in the hours to achieve the results. That part of the career journey hasn’t changed.  

An early career employee always asks:  How long does it take to add value?  And the answer is much longer than they think.

This is the generation that is more prepared and capable than other generations have been. But they are restless.  They are constantly thinking about the next step and they are easily distracted by moving their skills to a different place that offers a different perk, a unique project or a better culture setting.  That impatience can lead to careers that move more sideways than forward. 

Velocity is a balance of speed and direction. And moving just to move doesn’t fit the formula. Moves should advance a career. Many early career employees get frustrated and move because they’re bored or restless, and in the end, that impatience and quick change ultimately leads them to continued frustration.

We’re working on a simple formula to help an early employee understand when their skills are considered advanceable and when their experience shows enough repetition that someone would put them in a bigger role or expanded responsibility. We hope it instills a little patience and a reason to stay in a role a little longer.  

Change doesn’t have to be disruptive.  And, in fact, with a little coaching it can be an asset.

Companies know they’re either headed toward change, they’re in the middle of change or they’re coming out of change, and someone who has been through it has great value to them. The key is to build a career story that reflects that experience rather than one that shows a limited skill set.

We’re excited by this new dimension to our conversations in companies and we are digging deeper for insights and experiences that can teach others how to navigate change. If change has disrupted your career path, we’d like to capture your insights.  If you’d like to share your story, please take a few minutes and complete our survey.

And if you see the challenges of change in your employee group, we’d love to host a program for you. We’ve rolled out the concepts above in short seminars and custom workshops. And, we expect that could be a sign of a more general program in the year ahead.

Call us when you need us.