Wishing you and your loved ones a wonderful holiday season.
Here’s to a terrific 2021.
Michael
P.S. Thank you for following my blog — and for sharing it with others. Helping people be better communicators and leaders is my passion, and my life’s work.
I’m excited to announce the launch of my podcast, Convey: Conversations on the Power of Good Communication.
On each episode, I’m going to talk to business leaders about how they use the power of good, clear, and ethical communication to influence, engage, and empower. Each guest brings their own unique perspective, experiences, and stories — and I hope you enjoy listening to these conversations as much as I enjoy having them with my guests.
I invited my colleague and friend Rod Hughes of Kimball Hughes Public Relations to help my kick things off with a conversation about communicating well during a crisis.
Listen to it here on my website, on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Anchor.fm or anywhere you subscribe to podcasts.
Check Out My New Podcast Read More »
When putting together my latest workshop, I had fun creating visual examples of the mistakes people make when they are on video. Here are the four top offenders I see quite often.
If we can see more ceiling than we do you, readjust! Make sure your face is in the top two-thirds of the screen.
Make sure the room is well lit to avoid grainy video, but don’t put bright light, such as a window, directly behind you. Light yourself from the front.
Virtual backgrounds seem like a fun idea until they become distracting. If you use a virtual background, get a green screen or design a background that works well when you test it. And remember, keep it professional when your credibility is on the line. This is called The Double Doozy because the background isn’t the only problem. The lighting on my face is too dark as well. Ugh.
This is a flattering one, right? No, it’s not. Put your laptop on a stack of books or get a stand.
Your video doesn’t have to be studio-quality, but with a little testing of viewing angles and lighting you can ensure you look your best on your next Zoom call.
For more tips, ask me about my new workshop on Remote Leadership Presence.
Remote meetings are here to stay. My new workshop, Remote Leadership Presence: Bringing Your Best When Leading & Meeting Virtually is designed to help professionals be more effective when participating in, or leading, a remote or virtual meeting.
You’ll learn:
Whether you are regularly conducing team meetings remotely or participating in online meetings or interviews, this workshop will give you tips you can use right away to improve your leadership presence.
Running Time: 60 or 90 minutes, depending on audience size.
Get in touch if you would like to discuss a one-on-one session or a workshop for your team.
New Workshop Available: Remote Leadership Presence Read More »
I recently bought an ebook from a well-known leadership expert. The same day I bought the book, I got 4 emails from him:
4 emails in one day? As a former brand communications and marketing agency leader, I knew what was going on here. The purchase of the book enrolled me in an automated workflow that looks like this:
I get it. Automation is a powerful tool when communicating with prospects or customers. Technology has made these highly personalized communications easier than ever. But the people who are setting up these automations are losing site of the human beings on the other end.
I wrote a post a while back about being inundated by emails on a daily basis from companies I like, but don’t want to hear from daily. They give me no choice to reduce the frequency of the communications, so they lose me as a subscriber. This is happening with advertising, too. This week I shopped online for a new pair of comfortable lounge pants and now I’m inundated with loungewear ads on virtually every screen I have in the house. Looks like I accepted a cookie somewhere along the line that allowed the site I was on to sell or share my data.
More personalized results on Google, in digital advertisements, and through email were once welcome. I found them helpful. But today, the automated “personalized” communications and ads that I receive aren’t feeling helpful anymore. I can almost see the robot behind them. The human element has all but disappeared.
My challenge to all of the marketers and professional communicators out there is to rethink your automations to consider the human beings on the other side of them. Highly personalized touchpoints that are too frequent, out-of-touch, or awkwardly invasive actually feel incredibly impersonal.
Personalized Communication Gone Astray Read More »
