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Business Writing Skills, Media Training, Presentation Skills Training (Not PowerPoint) Count On Quality Control
| Guest post by: Dave Griffiths |
Article Overview: • No matter how clever a writer you may be, failure to edit yourself carefully can harm your business communication and waste your improving writing skills. • The key to media training is building an effective communication bridge to the press. Accomplish that and you're on the way to marketing-oriented business communication that works. • Presentation skills training that succeeds stresses eye-to-eye effective communication and shuns PowerPoint.
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Free Download - Media Relations Training Should Focus On Knowing What Motivates Reporters By Dave Griffiths |
Business Writing Skills, Media Training, Presentation Skills Training (Not PowerPoint) Count On Quality Control
Editing as Quality Control (Or How to Avoid Looking Like an Idiot)
"Everyone needs an editor." ~ Ernest Hemingway
Papa Hemingway was honest enough to acknowledge that he wouldn't have emerged as one of the 20th century's most distinctive and popular prose stylists without help. He had Maxwell Perkins. You have colleagues and bosses and even subordinates who can help you exert quality control and sharpen your business writing skills.More importantly, you also have yourself.
Remember: Just because you've typed the last word doesn't mean you're finished. Assume you've misspelled at least several words. Assume you've dropped words as your fingers flew over the keyboard. Assume you've fallen into the "sentence fragment" and "comma splice" habits. DON'T assume that spell-check is enough.
Here are some fine examples from notes written to school by parents in Charleston, W.Va.:
"Please excuse Gloria from Jim today. She is administrating."
"My son is under a doctor's care and should not take P.E. today. Please execute him."
"Please excuse Jimmy for being. It was his father's fault."
"Sally won't be in school a week from Friday. We have to attend her funeral."
See how spell-check can let you down? Keep this in mind: That's YOU who signed the note or wrote the email or report. That's YOUR name on the poorly edited -- or unedited -- piece of writing. And that's a terrible impression of you and your business or agency or nonprofit.
Building a Bridge to the Press
If you've ever watched one of those Sunday morning shows where the late, lamented Tim Russert and his like question seasoned politicians and top Administration appointees and glib foreign leaders, you're familiar with the thrust and parry of the sparring. Having been a reporter in Washington (national security correspondent for Business Week magazine), I can tell you that the "non-answer answer" is about as frustrating as it gets -- particularly when we know that the public already finds the press obnoxious and pushy. But it's an occupational hazard and we have to live with it.
What those guests are doing is "bridging" from the import of the potentially embarrassing question to the "spin" that they want to leave in viewers' minds. Handled shrewdly, bridging often gets them through the half-hour untouched and perhaps even looking sharp and self-confident.
They come in with a message. If they don't like the questions, they can deploy such bridging phrases as:
--"What's important to remember, however..."
--"That's a good point, but I think you'd be interested in knowing..."
--"Let me put that in perspective."
--"What that means is..."
--"Yes, but that's not a fair comparison. We do things differently because..."
Put Power Point In Its Place
Two things happen during a Power Point show -- the lights go down and the speaker loses eye contact with the audience. Neither one helps you get your message across, particularly if you're constantly looking over your shoulder at the screen and referring your listeners to one dense slide (too many words in too small a space, or yet another boring chart) after another.
I recently spent three days running a writing skills seminar for seven Navy SEALs who, between overseas assignments, were doing staff work at the Naval Special Weapons Development Group in Virginia Beach, Va. To a man, they slammed Power Point for expecting too much of the audience. "You see a Power Point, and you're expected to be proficient," one SEAL said of the classroom training they often have to sit through. "But it's not enough."
So we worked on presentation training without Power Point. Each one practiced traditional communication skills, looking from listener to listener as the rest of us played the roles of the generals and admirals and ambassadors and foreign dignitaries who SEALs brief around the world. They went to the whiteboard to highlight key points with a magic marker, maintaining that vital audience contact throughout. They learned to be concise and leave enough room for the questions that anyone proficient inpresentation skills is sure to inspire. In other words, they communicated.
Writing Training, Business Communication Training, Presentation Skills Training And Instruction in Effective Communication
Convert Your PowerPoint to Podcast
Ways to Store and Share PowerPoint Training Files in Company
Fine Tuning Your Presentation Skills
Present the Butterflies in Formation
Referred by: http://www.thepincusgroup.com
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About the Author: Dave Griffiths RSS for Dave's articles - Visit Dave's website Click here to visit Dave's website   Business Writing Skills Can Bring Out The Thinker In Us and Presentation Skills Should Be Muted In Volume Effective Business Communication Counts On Lean Writing Skills Media Relations Training Should Focus On Knowing What Motivates Reporters Writing Skills Training And Media Training Clearly AIMed At Successful Business Communication Media Training MarektingOriented Business Communication Go Hand In Hand |
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